the goan I network
PANAJI
Middle-order batsman Pavan Deshpande’s 63-runs blitzkrieg and leggie Shreyas Gopal’s 3/14 enabled Karnataka to a fine 35-run win over Goa in a concluding Group A Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 fixture at the ACA Academy ground, Vizianagaram on Sunday.
Put into bat, a star-studded Karnataka posted a competitive 172/9, largely due to a late surge wherein 66 runs came from their final six overs. Pavan Deshpande cracked 63 from merely 32 deliveries aided by a boundary and five maximums. In the Goa attack, 21-year-old right-arm medium-fast bowler, Heramb Parab impressed with 5/24 from his four over quota.
Chasing a challenging target, Goa began sedately with the restored opening pair of Aditya Kaushik and Rajshekar Harikant putting on 29 runs until the latter fell for nine. Walking to bat as a pinch-hitter for the second time in the campaign, Malliksab Sirur set the stage alight with a quick-fire 27 (13b, 4x4, 1x6).
His departure midway through the eighth over at the team score of 66 was not before getting his side back in the contest. But the tide was soon to change dramatically with leg-break bowler, Praveen Dubey effecting a double breakthrough with the removal of Snehal Kauthankar and Amit Verma for nought respectively.
Reduced to 74/4 in the ninth over, it required Aditya Kaushik in company of new man, Suyash Prabhudessai to rebuild the innings. The Kaushik-Prabhudessai pair did a fairly good recovery job in raising 48 runs for the fifth wicket and give their team a fighting chance of a remarkable turnaround. But with a well-set Prabhudessai falling at the end of the 16th over for 28 (26b, 2x4,1x6) and also a looking good Kaushik departing two balls later on an individual score of 48 (43b, 2x4, 1x6), hopes for an upset was all but doused. The incoming batsmen came and went in a hurry with Goa bowled out inside their 20 overs. Leggie Shreyas Gopal was the pick of the Karnataka bowlers with 3/14.
Goa bow out after suffering four straight losses and ending Group A sixth from seven teams, only above a
winless Bihar.
