Medium-pacer Rohan shines with 5-40 as Maratha Royals beat Eagle Thane Strikers by eight wickets to storm into T20 Mumbai League final at Wankhede
Maratha Royals’s Rohan Raje bowls vs Thane Strikers in the T20 Mumbai League semi-final yesterday. Pic/Atul Kamble
In a league that’s meant to spot talent for the future, two seasoned campaigners in their 30s dictated terms on Tuesday to shine in their team’s semi-final victory.
League’s first fifer
After 38-year-old medium-pacer Rohan Raje picked up the first five-wicket haul of this edition (5-40), 33-year-old captain Siddhesh Lad scored a responsible half-century (74 not out) to guide Mumbai South Central Maratha Royals (MSCMR) into the T20 Mumbai League final.
In the first semi-final at the Wankhede, MSCMR made a successful chase of a paltry target of 132 set by Eagle Thane Strikers (ETS) to win by eight wickets with 13 deliveries to spare. In the second semi-final at the same venue, SoBo Mumbai Falcons beat Bandra Blasters by five wickets.
Lad led by example on a tricky pitch that assisted spinners. The right-handed experienced Ranji Trophy batsman scored his third fifty of the season with a calm head and largely played along the ground, picking the gaps. His second-wicket partnership of 48 with Chinmay Sutar set the momentum for Royals’s win.
After captain Atharva Ankolekar chose to bat in bright sunshine, surprising as the pitch was turning and on the slower side, his openers did not thrive. Both Anish Chaudhary and Varun Lavande fell to soft dismissals, playing straight into the hands of mid-wicket and cover fielders, respectively, in each of Raje’s first and second overs.
No steady partnership
From 28-2 in the fourth over, the Strikers needed a steady partnership from the third wicket pair of Ajit Yadav and Sairaj Patil. But the introduction of spin in the sixth over through left-armer Aditya Dhumal saw the left-handed Yadav clean bowled. Dhumal did not only stop the flow of runs, conceding just one run in his first two overs that included a wicket-maiden, but also snared his second wicket, inviting left-handed Shashikant Kadam to loft one to Maxwell Swaminathan at mid-wicket. Dhumal, 30, took 2-12 in his four overs.
Runs dry up
A fifth-wicket partnership of 43 between the two most expensive players at the auction, Patil (R15 lakh) and Ankolekar (R16.25 lakh) ended with Raje’s return to the attack in the 17th over. With runs difficult to come by and Patil looking like the only one seeking boundaries, he despatched Raje for a six over long-on, but in the same over, was caught at long-off for 41.
Ankolekar had no option but to go for big hits, which he did off two successive deliveries in Raje’s final over, but the bowler removed Vinay Kunwar and Shashank Attarde to catches in the outfield.
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