Left-arm spinner Mehdi Hasan claimed his maiden five-wicket haul in List A cricket as Hyderabad delivered Uttar Pradesh a nine-wicket rollicking at the Air Force Complex in New Delhi on Friday.
Hasan dismissed two key top-order batsmen – opener Upendra Yadav and No. 3 Abhishek Goswami – and sparked a lower-order collapse that saw five wickets fall for 13 runs. Through enterprising run-making from openers Tanmay Agarwal (62*, 101b,4X4, 1X6) and Akshath Reddy (64, 89b, 6X4,1X6), Hyderabad strolled to its target in the 36th over to collect its second win of the competition.
UP’s batting faltered right from the outset. Shivam Chaudhary departed for a duck in the second over of the contest, falling leg-before-wicket to seamer C. V. Milind. It turned out to be one of the three dismissals effected by seamers in the entire day; spinners claimed the rest on a wicket that suited them.
Run-making was slow and wickets fell consistently when the spinners took over. Mehdi profited from an accurate “wicket-to-wicket” line and a full length; Abhishek failed to put bat to ball when attempting to play a stroke off the front foot and was stumped, and Upendra hesitated in his drive to provide a catch back to the bowler.
Captain Suresh Raina attempted a revival with a smart, well-paced knock. Initially vigilant, he let loose once part-time spinners B. Sandeep and K. Rohit Rayudu were in operation. Raina and Rinku featured in a 59-run partnership for the sixth wicket, before both batsmen got out against the run of play. After playing an audacious reverse-sweep to Mehdi, Rinku was trapped lbw by the bowler. Soon after, Raina carelessly sliced seamer Mohammed Siraj to the deep cover fielder.
Sensing an opportunity, Mehdi ran through the tail. It was his reward for reading the pitch accurately. “I knew if the ball was bowled quick through the air, and full, batsmen would find it difficult to play it. The wicket was slow, and I focussed on bowling a wicket-to-wicket line,” Mehdi said after the victory.
“It is one of the better performances of my career. I took some wickets in the last few matches, but I thought to myself, ‘I have to get a five-for to contribute to a win.’ I felt confident,” he added.
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The rest felt like formality as Tanmay and Akshath settled in quickly on the wicket. There were drives, flicks and slog sweeps as the duo scored 10 boundaries together. Needing seven runs to win, however, Akshath fell, stumped off off-spinner Shiva Singh.
Dour defence and plays and misses marked much of the rest of the contest as Hyderabad made things hard for itslelf, but the win arrived nonetheless, in a fittingly disdainful manner – a nonchalant sweep for four by Tanmay. It was a dominant performance.
The other contest at the Air Force Complex, in contrast, turned out to be a humdinger. Odisha fell one run short of matching Madhya Pradesh’s total of 277. Abhishek Raut’s unbeaten half-century (55, 53b, 3X4, 2X6) had kept the chasing team in the hunt. There were significant contributions from opener Anurag Sarangi (78, 97b, 6X4, 2X6) and Biplab Samantaray (53, 72b, 3X4, 1X6), too.
Yash Dubey (75, 77b, 6X4, 2X6), Anshul Tripathi (52, 52b, 6X4) and left-arm spinner Rameez Khan (4 for 49) were the chief architects of the win for MP.
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