East Zone cricket team vs South Zone cricket team match scorecard: Vaibhav Sooryavanshi continued his rich form in the Duleep Trophy final as the 15-year-old clobbered India pacer Mohammed Siraj with utter disdain at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai on the opening day on Sunday.
Coming on the back of a 92 and 40 in the semifinal, Sooryavanshi gave East Zone a flying start after opting to bat first against South Zone.
The southpaw took his time in the middle initially before opening his arms for his first boundary in the third over off Siraj. It didn’t much time for Sooryavanshi before he launched an attack on the Hyderabad pacer in the seventh over of the East Zone innings on a good batting track.
With Siraj pitching the delivery on the fourth stump on the off-side, Sooryavanshi, with a huge back lift, just opened the face of the bat and angled it through point for the ball to race away to the boundary. The next delivery was a treat to the eyes for everyone.
As Tilak Varma spread the outfield, Siraj pitched the delivery on the up hoping to induce an edge off Sooryavanshi. But the teenage prodigy had other plans as the left-hander took the aerial route and swung his bat through the line to clear the ropes at long-off.
Sooryavanshi finished the over with a similar lofted shot, but it reached the boundary one bounce into the fence. However, the teenager failed to convert on the start, falling just one hit short of what could have been his second half-century in the tournament.
Vaibhav Sooryavanshi misses half-century
Trying to take Chama Milind on the bounce, the ball hits the the splice and flew over mid-wicket only to be caught by substitute fielder Tanay Thyagarajan. During his time in the middle, Sooryavanshi played 37 balls for his knock of 44, studded with five fours and one six. He forged a 100-run opening wicket stand with Abhimanyu Easwaran in 14.4 overs.
Earlier, East Zone won the toss and opted to bat first against South Zone. Notably, Mohammed Siraj and Devdutt Padikkal, who played in the Test series against Sri Lanka, are featuring for South Zone. While East Zone captain Ishan Kishan went with an unchanged XI, South Zone made four.
Along with Siraj and Padikkal, pacers Tripurana Vijay and CV Milind came into the side. Padikkal’s inclusion would certainly strengthen South Zone’s batting, after the Karnataka batter’s red-hot form in Sri Lanka. The left-hander scored three consecutive hundreds, including one in the warm-up fixture. Padikkal’s scores read 142 not out, 167 and 117.
East Zone vs South Zone playing XIs
East Zone: Abhimanyu Easwaran, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Kumar Kushagra, Sudip Kumar Gharami, Shikhar Mohan, Ishan Kishan(w/c), Md Kounain Quraishi, Anukul Roy, Mohammed Shami, Abhijit K Sarkar, Mukesh Kumar
South Zone: Ricky Bhui, Narayan Jagadeesan(w), Devdutt Padikkal, Shaik Rasheed, Tilak Varma(c), Smaran Ravichandran, Shreyas Gopal, Tripurana Vijay, Mohammed Siraj, Chama V Milind, MD Nidheesh.