Vijay Hazare Trophy reached its finals where Karnataka and Saurashtra clashed to claim the winner’s trophy at the historic Feroz Shah Kotla ground in New Delhi.

Saurashtra captain Cheteshwar Pujara won the toss and chose to field first. Karnataka suffered huge blows first up as they lost KL Rahul and Karun Nair for ducks. But then in form batsman, Mayank Agarwal stepped up to the plate and scored a brilliant 90 in just 79 balls with 11 fours and 3 sixes. He got support from R Samarth who made 48 and Pavan Deshpande, who made 49.

Shreyas Gopal hit 31 runs, in the end, to take Karnataka to 253 in 45.5 overs. Kamlesh Makwana was the pick of Saurashtra bowlers with figures of 4/34.

Saurashtra had a modest target of 254 to chase down, but for some reason, the Saurashtra batsmen took undue pressure on themselves. Avi Barot hit 30 runs in 43 balls. But the biggest drawback in their chase was Cheteshwar Pujara and Ravindra Jadeja’s turtle-paced batting.

Cheteshwar Pujara was run out for 94 in 127 balls with 10 fours and 1 six, while Jadeja hit 15 in 38 balls. The rising run rate proved to be the undoing of the Saurashtra batting, as wickets fell in a heap, trying to go for runs. Chirag Jani hit 22 in 25 balls, while Makwana (20*) too hit some lusty blows down the order in trying to win the match for his team.

But the asking rate proved to be too much for Saurashtra batting. K Gowtham picked 3/27 in his 10 overs and M Prasidh picked 3 wickets as well to end the match for Karnataka.

BRIEF SCORES:
KAR 253 (M AGARWAL 90, P DESHPANDE 49; K MAKWANA 4/34) defeated SAU 212 (C PUJARA 94; M PRASIDH 3/37) by 41 runs

KARNATAKA WON THE 2018 VIJAY HAZARE TROPHY