Vijay Hazare Trophy: Pant Fails To Fire As Delhi Suffer Big Defeat At Hands of Odisha

Alur: India keeper Rishabh Pant's indifferent form coupled with Delhi's leading batters failing to fire saw their unbeaten run being interrupted by Odisha, who carved out a huge 79-run victory in a fourth-round Group D match of the Vijay Hazare Trophy here on Wednesday. With the national selectors set to announce the squad for the five-match ODI series against New Zealand in first week of January, it was the charismatic India keeper-batter and Delhi skipper Pant, who was the focus of attention.

But the feisty cricketer could score only 24 as the much-vaunted Delhi batting imploded, managing just 193 in 43.3 overs in the chase of an immensely gettable 272/8 scored by Odisha after being sent in to bat first.

Delhi's innings have largely been built around one solid batting performance so far this season. But the absence of one on Wednesday cost them not just the match but also their top position on the points table, which could come back to haunt them as the tournament progresses.

Odisha went top of the table with 12 points and a healthy net run rate (NRR), while Delhi, despite being on the same number of points, slipped to fourth, with even Railways and Haryana getting ahead of them on better NRR.

It was also the first time so far this season that Delhi could not cross 200, something which looked so easy when Virat Kohli slammed a century against Andhra in the opener, and opener Priyansh Arya scored a fine 78 in the previous game against Saurashtra.

Pant, following scores of 5, 70, 22 could only manage 24 off 28 balls before he was dismissed by pacer Debabrata Pradhan (3/28), who along with young right-arm pacer Sambit Baral (3/34), hastened Delhi's collapse.

Odisha's competitive total was built around veteran skipper Biplab Samantray, who scored a 74-ball-72 after they lost three wickets before their scored crossed the 100 mark.

Odisha's lower rung made small but useful contributions to frustrate the Delhi bowling attack, led by India players Navdeep Saini and Nitish Rana, though off-spinner Hrithik Shokeen returned excellent figures of 4/27 in his 10 overs.

Delhi's batters were off to an awful start losing openers Priyansh Arya and Sarthak Ranjan on single-dight scores to be two down for just six runs on the board. Pant's dismissal saw Delhi teetering at 50/3 in only the 11th over, which quickly became 55/5.

A recovery from this stage was next to impossible but due credit to Harsh Tyagi (43) and Hrithik Shokeen (32) for delaying the inevitable with some gritty batting.

Meanwhile, Saurashtra defeated Andhra by 74 runs with right-arm pacer Ankur Panwar taking a five-for and dismissing the rivals for 180 in the chase of 255.

Odisha 272 for 8 in 50 overs (Biplab Samantray 72; Hrithik Shokeen 4/27, Prince Yadav 2/57) beat Delhi 193 in 42.3 overs (Harsh Tyagi 43; Rajesh Mohanty 2/42, Debabrata Pradhan 3/28, Sambit Baral 3/34) by 79 runs.

Saurashtra 254 for 7 in 50 overs (Harvik Desai 61, Chirag Jani 69, Ruchit Ahir 76; Satyanarayana Raju 3/45, Kalidindi Raju 2/64) beat Andhra 180 in 47.2 overs (Ankur Panwar 5/27) by 74 runs.

Gujarat 283 all out in 47.4 overs (Jaymeet Patel 75; Zubair Ali 2/38, Karn Sharma 2/38, Raj Choudhary 3/57) lost to Railways 287 for 6 in 48 overs (Chintan Gaja 2/35) by 4 wickets.

Services 271 for 8 in 50 overs (Irfan Ali 103 not out, Nakul Sharma 72; Anshul Kamboj 443) lost to Haryana 275 for 3 in 43.1 overs (Ankit Kumar 144 not out, Himanshu Rana 64; Nitin Yadav 2/35).