Prolific Mayank Agarwal helps Karnataka lift Vijay Hazare Trophy

Photo: BCCI website

New Delhi: Riding on Mayank Agarwal's 90, Karnataka won the Vijay Hazare Trophy defeating Saurashtra by 41 runs in the final at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground here on Tuesday.

Agarwal, who scored a staggering 723 runs in the tournament, helped Karnataka score 253. They then restricted Saurashtra to 212 all out to win the premier 50-over domestic tournament for the third time. 

Saurashtra skipper Cheteshwar Pujara scored 94 but it was in vain.

Karnataka celebrate their third #VijayHazare Trophy win after beating Saurashtra in the 2017-18 #Final @paytm pic.twitter.com/8wwdOJAbJC — BCCI Domestic (@BCCIdomestic) February 27, 2018

Agarwal's prolific run in the Vijay Hazare Trophy read 109, 84, 28, 102, 89, 140, 81 and 90.

He also became the first batsman to score 2000 runs in a domestic season. His total tally in the season stood at 2141 runs, which included 1160 runs in the Ranji Trophy, 723 in Vijay Hazare Trophy and 258 in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (T20s). 

Following the win, Karnataka pacer Sreenath Arvind also announced his retirement from first-class and list A cricket.

Chasing, 254, Saurashtra failed to get the start they wanted and started losing wickets at quick intervals. Apart from Pujara, no other batsmen stepped up to the occasion and gifted away their wickets. 

Prasidh Krishna and Krishnappa Gowtham took three wickets each for Karnataka.

Put into bat, Karnataka started off on a bad note, losing Karun Nair (0) and Lokesh Rahul (0) in first three overs in the innings. 

With the scoreboard reading 5/2, Ravikumar Samarth (48) came in the middle and played handsomely. The duo forged 136-run partnership to stabilise the innings. 

But just when things seemed good in the middle, Agarwal was dismissed in the 25th over by Dharmendrasinh Jadeja. In his 79 ball innings, Agarwal played slammed 11 fours and three sixes.

Soon, Samarth was also sent packing by Prerak Mankad in the next over to make it 147/4. 

Unperturbed by the fall of wickets, in-coming batsmen Pavan Deshpande (49) played a crucial knock in the middle overs. Apart from him, other batsmen Stuart Binny (5), Shreyas Gopal (31), Krishnappa Gowtham (9) could not add much to the score. 

For Saurashtra, Kamlesh Makvana chipped in with four wickets while Prerak Mankad took two wickets.

Brief Scores: Karnataka 253 all out (Mayank Agarwal 90, Pavan Deshpande 49; Kamlesh Makvana 4/32) beat Saurashtra 212 all out (Cheteshwar Pujara 94; Krishnappa Gowtham 3/27).

(With inputs from IANS)