The Rajasthan cricket team slumped to a disappointing defeat to Maharashtra in its first match of the Vijay Hazare Trophy 2024 at the Sharad Pawar Cricket Academy BKC grounds in Mumbai on Saturday.
Kartik Sharma’s fighting 123 off 90 balls helped Rajasthan recover from an early collapse before staggering to a total of 215 in 40.1 overs. Maharashtra managed to chase the target down despite Aniket Choudhary’s four-fer.
Rajasthan are in Group B of the Vijay Hazare Trophy, the premier domestic 50-over tournament in India. Maharashtra, Services, Railways, Himachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Meghalaya and Sikkim are the other seven teams in Group B.
Each team will play once against all other teams in the same group in a single round-robin format during the league phase. The top-ranked teams from each of the five groups along with the best second-placed team will directly qualify for the quarter-finals.
The other four second-placed teams meet in the preliminary quarter-finals with the winners filling the last two spots in the quarters.
Asked to bat first after Maharashtra cricket team captain Ruturaj Gaikwad won the toss, Rajasthan found themselves looking down the barrel.
Rajneesh Gurbani, who was the pick of the Maharashtra bowlers in the match with figures of 4/35, did the early damage, dismissing Rajasthan openers Zubair Ali and Sumit Godara before accounting for the Manav Suthar.
Skipper Mahipal Lomror’s run out paired with Deepak Hooda’s departure for just 12 had Rajasthan reeling at 71/5 around the 15-over mark.
Just as it seemed that Rajasthan would struggle to go past 150 in the match, Kartik Sharma stepped in and played a brilliant kn ock of 123 off just 90 balls, garnished with seven boundaries and 11 maximums.
However, as Kartik Sharma mounted his onslaught at one end, Rajasthan kept losing wickets from the other end. It wasn’t long before Sharma ran out of partners and he himself was the last wicket to fall as the Rajasthan innings folded for 215 in 40.1 overs.
Sharma was Gurbani’s fourth wicket in the match.
Maharashtra’s chase got off to a shaky start as Aniket Choudhary dismissed Ruturaj Gaikwad early and Lormor had OM Bhosale run out in the sixth over.
However, a 70-run stand between Siddhesh Veer (43) and Ankit Bawne steadied the Maharashtra innings.
Choudhary managed to break the partnership by dismissing Veer in the 17th over and then sent back both Rahul Tripathi and Azim Kazi for ducks within a span of three balls in the 19th to keep Rajasthan hoping.
Bawne, though, kept at it and paired up with Nikhil Naik (46 off 56) to put together another productive partnership for his team.
Suthar managed to send Naik and Satyajeet Bachhav back to the pavilion to hand Rajasthan a last straw to grasp at but Player of the Match Bawne (74* off 95) remained composed to take his team over the finish line in the 43rd over.
Choudhary bowled out his 10 overs in the match for 4/49. Suthar took two wickets for 34 in seven overs.
Rajasthan will play Andhra Pradesh in their next Vijay Hazare Trophy 2024 Group B match on Monday.
Rajasthan vs Maharashtra, Vijay Hazare Trophy 2024, brief scores: RAJ 215/10 in 40.1 overs (Kartik Sharma 123, Rajneesh Gurbani 4/35) lost to MAHA 217/7 in 42.3 overs (Ankit Bawne 74*, Aniket Choudhary 4/49) by three wickets.
