East Zone make sure of Hazare Trophy

East Zone beat West Zone by six wickets in the Vijay Hazare Trophy (under-16) tournament at the SJ Public School, Jaipur on Thursday. This was East zone's third consecutive victory and they thus made sure of the title with a match in hand.

Chasing a score of 199 for victory, East Zone romped home in 38 overs. M Vardhan (93 runs of 111 balls with 10 fours and 2 sixes) and P Kumar (23 runs of 18 balls) gave a steady start putting on 34 runs for the first wicket. Vardhan and PJ Das (51 runs of 62 balls with 4 fours and a 6) then added 94 runs for the third wicket to make East Zone's victory certain.

Earlier, West Zone scored 198 runs for nine wickets in 50 overs chiefly due to the efforts of SP Bagul (40 runs of 81 balls) and P Jadeja (52 runs of 59 balls). They shared a fourth wicket stand of 87 runs in 21.1 overs. But in the end overs, West lost their way when three quick wickets fell in the form of P Jadeja, NR Rathod and HD Rawle to the bowling of Gaurav Sharma (3 for 33).