Tamil Nadu pull off dramatic victory

Tamil Nadu pulled off a dramatic 12-run victory over Delhi to clinch a semifinal berth in the Vijay Merchant (under-16) Trophy cricket tournament at Thiruvananthapuram on Friday.

The odds were in favour of Delhi when play resumed on the third and final day. Chasing 168 for victory, Delhi were 67 without loss at stumps on Thursday. And things continued to go Delhi's way initially. Openers G Malhotra (37) and skipper R Jaswal (34) went on to put on 91 runs in 35.5 overs before the latter was out. In the following over and without any addition to the score, Malhotra was dismissed. Sushil Kumar (5) fell at 98 and A Trehan (0) was out at 101.

K Bhardwaj and Deepak Sharma however took the score to 129 and Delhi needed only 39 runs for victory with six wickets intact. However at this stage Deepak Sharma (6) was out. A Budania now joined Bhardwaj and they took the score to 143 when Bhardwaj was run out for 24. S Khullar and Budania now came together and the 150 was raised. At 151 for six, Delhi were just 17 runs away from victory.

Now came the dramatic denouement. First Khullar was caught by skipper Aditya Srikkanth off Malick for 2. Off the last ball of the same over, at the same score, Malick had Abhishek Sharma caught by Vijayasarathy for a duck. Off the fifth ball of the following over, without any addition to the score, Rudania gave Vasudevadoss a return catch. And finally in his next over, after four runs had been added, Vasudevasdoss had last man Aggarwal caught by Karthik for two and Delhi were all out for 155. K Lal remained not out on one and Tamil Nadu had ended surprise victors. The bowling honours were shared by Vasudevadoss who took two for 30 and Malik who bowled 27 overs to capture four wickets for 33.