Veteran Inter District T-20 Cricket Lakhimpur derails Northeast Frontier Railway
Our Sports Reporter
GUWAHATI: Continuing their all-round show Lakhimpur completely outplayed hot favourite Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) by 45 runs and stormed into the semifinals of the 11th Veteran Inter-District T-20 Cricket Tournament 2019, which is organised in memory of Madhurjya Prasad Baruah and Badan Saikia at Mangaldai College playground today.
The highlights of the rain-hit match were the power hits of the Upper Assam side and then their fiery bowling. After elected to bat first in the 12-over affair, Lakhimpur lost openers Jugananda Saikia (4) and Rantu Pachani (12) quickly, but middle order showed some powerful hits. Gautam Saikia played a quick fire innings of 27 runs in 9 balls with 2 fours and 3 sixes. Rituraj Barpatra Gohain struck 20 in 12 balls with 3 sixes. They managed 105 runs in allotted overs losing 7 wickets. Mrigen Talukdar and Parag Das claimed two wickets each.
The beginning of NFR innings was shocking as they lost their star batsmen Parag Das (0), RB Indrajeet (0) and Deep Bora (0) in first five balls. Then former Ranji stars Zakaria Zaffri (11) and Bachan Singh (0) went back when the score was 19 in the 6th over. Finally they were restricted at 50 in 12 overs losing 9 wicket. Skipper Nitya Chetia, who took three wickets in first over of the innings, was adjudged as the Man of the Match. Rituraj grabbed 3 wickets for 9 runs in 3 overs while Manuj Saikia took two.
Lakhimpur will play against the winner of Group D in the first semifinal on Monday.
Brief Score: Lakhimpur-105/7 in 12 overs (Gautam Saikia 27, Rituraj Barpatra Gohain 20, Mrigen Talukdar 2/20, Parag Das 2/27) beat NFR 50/9 in 12 overs (Rajesh Rao 13no, Rituraj Barpatra Gohain 3/9, Nitya Chetia 3/13, Manuj Saikia 2/6).
Jorhat thrashed Dhubri by 10 wickets in a group D match. Dhubri was restricted at 86 first, and then Jorhat reached the target without losing wicket. Anupam Gogoi hit 69 off 35 balls with 4 sixes. Surya Kanta Gogoi of Jorhat took 4 wickets for 13.
On the other hand, Tinsukia beat Nalbari by 9 wickets while Guwahati thrashed Advocate XI by 7 wickets. Guwahati reached the semifinals as the winner of Group B.
Also read: Local Sports
