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Agarkar bowls Mumbai into the last four

G. Viswanath

Agarkar returned five for 78 in 18 overs
Zaheer Khan will play the semifinal against Saurashtra

Ahmedabad: For the first time this season, the ball appeared a hostile object coming from the arm of Ajit Agarkar.

Taking almost three months to recover from a hernia-related ailment, Mumbai’s frontline seamer for many years chose to sit out of three super league matches, handing over the seam attack duty to young Dhawal Kulkarni.

Even on the first day of the Ranji Trophy quarterfinal against Himachal Pradesh, he appeared rusty and searching for ideas. But on Sunday evening and on Monday morning he looked the part.

Impressive

Agarkar’s five for 78 in eighteen overs was impressive and notable for the manner in which he approached the task in hand; he was quick and sent down yorker-length deliveries at will, intimidating short balls at times and also managed to swing. A snorter of a delivery saw the exit of Paras Dogra, who was 10 runs short of a century.

Thanks to Agarkar’s splendid effort, Mumbai marched towards victory against an opponent that managed to avoid an innings defeat at the Sardar Patel Stadium, Motera.

Mumbai’s sixth win in eight matches, that came less than half an hour before lunch, portrayed the strength of its bowling combination.

Rohit Sharma’s acrobatic effort at cover saw the first dismissal of the fourth day’s play, a sixth victim in Sarandeep Singh. In the same over Agarkar also won an appeal for leg-before from umpire Shavir Tarapore against Vishal Bhatia.

In spite of some early setbacks, Himachal Pradesh made 87 runs in 76 balls thanks to the employment of the long handle by Ashok Thakur and Vikramjeet Singh Malik.

Potent bowling side

In achieving six outright wins and two draws, the Mumbai bowlers in Agarkar, Kulkarni, Usman Malvi, Murtaza Hussain, Rajesh Verma, Rahil Shaikh, Ramesh Powar, Sairaj Bahutule and Kshemal Waingankar captured 124 wickets; Ankit Chavan, Amol Muzumdar and Rohit had five wickets.

India pace spearhead left-arm seamer Zaheer Khan will bolster the attack for the semifinal against Saurashtra to be played at Chennai from January 4, 2009.

The scores:

Himachal Pradesh — 1st innings: 250.

Mumbai — 1st innings: 495.

Himachal Pradesh — 2nd innings: B. Thakkar c Samant b Agarkar 4, Sangram lbw b Agarkar 58, V. Indulkar c Jaffer b Powar 24, M. Sharma c (sub) I. Abdulla b Nayar 8, P. Dogra c Samant b Agarkar 90, A. Mannu c Powar b Bahutule 6, Sarandeep c Sharma b Agarkar 18, V. Bhatia lbw b Agarkar 0, A. Thakur (run out) 17 , V. Malik c & b Powar 26, J. Mehta (not out) 14, Extras (lb-6, nb-16) 22; Total (in 68.4 overs): 287.

Fall of wickets: 1-4, 2-61, 3-82, 4-151, 5-187, 6-219, 7-219, 8-224, 9-265.

Mumbai bowling: Agarkar 18-4-78-5, Kulkarni 19-3-90-0, Nayar 9-0-21-1, Shaikh 5-0-18-0, Powar 10.4-0-42-2, Bahutule 7-0-32-1.

Mumbai — 2nd innings: V. Samant (not out) 24, A. Rahane lbw b Thakkar 17, A. Nayar (not out) 2; Total (for one wkt. in 13.4 overs): 43.

Fall of wicket: 1-26.

Himachal Pradesh bowling: Dogra 4-0-11-0, Sangram 4-0-10-0, Thakkar 3.4-0-18-1, Mannu 2-0-4-0.

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