The opener fell just four short of what would have the first-ever century in T20 Mumbai history.
ttmum
A magnificent batting effort from Parag Khanapurkar followed by a brilliant performance from his team’s spin department helped SoBo SuperSonics beat ARCS Andheri by 48 runs at the Wankhede Stadium on Tuesday.
Having been put into bat, the SuperSonics were off to a flyer as Hersh Tank tonked 15 in just the second over of the match but was dismissed in the third thanks to some outstanding work in the field by Gaurav Jathar whose throw caught the opener short of his crease.
A couple of overs later, SuperSonics captain Jay Bista perished as well after edging a bodyline delivery straight into the keeper’s hand with the scoreboard reading 33-2 for two after five overs. In came Parag Khanapurkar and rebuilt the inning with Mansingh Nigade, as the two forged a 30-run partnership in the next five overs to negate the effect of the two early blows.
Having gotten their eye in, both batsmen upped the ante and smashed 19 off the 11th over, which included a six and two boundaries, and continued to grow from strength-to-strength in their brilliant partnership. While Nigade played the anchor’s role, Khanapurkar continued to hammer the bowling attacking, smashing a couple of sixes and a four in the 15th and 16th over to not only complete his 50 but also their century stand.
Over the next two overs, Khanapurkar added 21 more to his and the team’s total but on the penultimate delivery of the 18th over, Nigade was run out ending their 118-run stand. Veteran all-rounder Rohan Raje smashed 18 off six before departing in the final over and a couple of deliveries, Khanapurkar’s magnificent knock also ended with him just four short of what would have been a well-deserved century.
However, his outstanding knock helped the team finish with a massive total of 188/5.
In reply, the ARCS Andheri openers gave their team a perfect start, scoring 30 off the first three overs, but three tidy overs from the SuperSonics spinners pegged the run rate back to over nine an over. The pressure that the spinners created earned the team a reward, as Shashank Attarde got rid of Suffiyan Shaikh with the scoreboard reading 53/1 at the end of seven overs.
The spinners continued their exceptional work and allowed just 25 runs over the next five overs, raising the required rate to 10 runs per over. The scoreboard pressure finally got to Kevin Almeida who shimmied down the wicket to get a move on but was beaten by the sharp turn on the delivery giving the keeper an easy stumping opportunity.
Pankaj Jaiswal upped the ante in the 14th over and seemed to have gotten his team back into the contest, but his inning didn’t last much longer as he perished in the very next over after a quickfire 25 off 13 deliveries. The next two overs saw the ARCS Andheri lose two more wickets and score just eight, as they kept running out of balls and batsmen to help them chase down the total.
Stunning catches from substitute fielder Vaibhav Mali and Dhrumil Matkar summed up the night for the ARCS Andheri as they came out second best in this contest by a margin of 48 runs.
Score kya hai?
SoBo Supersonics 188 for 5(Parag Khanapurkar 96, Mansingh Nigade 33, Vineet Sinha 1-27) beat
ARCS Andheri (Sufiyan Shaikh 30, Akhil Herwadkar 26, Rohan Raje 2-8) by 48 runs.
