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Arun Karthik hits a winning, breezy century

Sports Reporter

Karnataka overhauled Goa’s big total
Hyderabad posted a win over Andhra

— Photo: K. Pichumani

IN FULL FLOW: Arun Karthik revelled in Tamil Nadu’s win on Wednesday.

Chennai: Tamil Nadu began its defence of the Subbiah Pillai Trophy with an eight-wicket win over Kerala here on Wednesday, earning a bonus point for the brevity of its chase.

The host bowled Kerala out for 189 and reached its target in just 36 overs, thanks to a breezy unbeaten hundred from K.B. Arun Karthik.

Following skipper Dinesh Karthik’s decision to field, opening bowlers L. Balaji and C. Ganapathy settled quickly, with the CPT-IP wicket affording them significant bounce.

Ganapathy strikes

Ganapathy struck in the eighth over, with Kerala’s total reading 24. Arun Poulose edged a slash to Abhinav Mukund, who reacted quickly at slip to cup the still-rising ball.

Abhishek Hegde and Robert Fernandez added 26 before the former became Ganapathy’s second victim. The opener flung his bat at a wide one with feet unmoved, only managing a faint nick to the keeper.

Hegde’s 29 was one of three unconverted starts for Kerala, with Fernandez making 38 and skipper Raiphi Vincent Gomez 29. All were out to soft dismissals, Fernandez pulling an innocuous Abhinav Mukund leg break straight to deep midwicket and Gomez scooping Balaji to short third man.

Such dismissals remained the norm — most of the Kerala batsmen brought about their own downfall, attempting non-percentage shots to escape Tamil Nadu’s professionally-executed strangulation.

Crucially, Kerala delayed the batting powerplay till the end of the 45th over, by which time it was seven down. Ganapathy finished with three wickets, while seamer Yo Mahesh and off spinner R. Ashwin bagged two each.

Big partnership

Left only 189 to defend, Kerala’s bowlers made little impact upon Arun Karthik and Abhinav Mukund, who put on 139 for the second wicket. Sreesanth ran in hard and provided the only period of drama in the match, a riveting early tussle with Abhinav.

Sreesanth, revelling in the carry, bounced Abhinav frequently, hurtling one past the left-handed opener’s nose. Abhinav saw out the spell assuredly, and carried on to post an unfussy, almost invisible 53 (79b, 5x4).

At the other end, Arun Karthik was irrepressible. Balanced beautifully whichever way his feet went, he found the boundary whenever he pleased.

In all, he hit ten fours and four sixes in his 98-ball knock, and saved his most venomous strokes for left arm spinner P. Prashanth, in whose first over he struck a six and two fours. All three strokes were variants of the pull, the second, which pierced mid-wicket and long-on, analogous to a tennis player’s top-spin forehand.

The scores:

Kerala 189 in 49.2 overs lost to Tamil Nadu 192 for two in 36 overs (Abhinav Mukund 53, K.B. Arun Karthik 106 not out). Tamil Nadu 5 points, Kerala -1.

Andhra 201 for eight in 50 overs (D. Shiva Kumar 67 not out) lost to Hyderabad 203 for eight in 48.4 overs (Ravi Teja 67, Anirudh Singh 58). Hyderabad 4, Andhra 0.

Goa 286 for nine in 50 overs (S. Sriram 63, Ajay Ratra 45, Saurabh Bandekar 60, K.P. Appanna five for 56) lost to Karnataka 289 for five in 39.2 overs (Robin Uthappa 51, Ganesh Satish 100, Manish Pandey 95). Karnataka 5, Goa -1 .

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