Continuing their dominance, North Zone decimated North East Zone by 511 runs to storm into the semifinals of the Duleep Trophy 2023, here on Saturday.
North Zone will now face Mayank Agarwal led South Zone in the semi-finals from July 5 at the same venue.
Chasing a mammoth 666 to win, North East started the day on 58 for 3 and suffered a middle-order collapse to get bowled out for 154 in their second innings. Off-spinner Pulkit Narang (4-43) was the star performer with the ball for North Zone in their second innings as he finished the game with seven wickets and 46 runs.
Apart from the Narang, it was also a memorable game for other young North Zone players, such as Nishant Sindhu, who had hit 150 before picking up two wickets on Saturday, and Harshit Rana, who scored an unbeaten 122 and also took two wickets in the match.
On the other hand, the only bright spot for North East in their second innings was the 57-run fourth-wicket partnership between Palzor Tamang and Nilesh Lamichaney. Sindhu broke the stand with Lamichaney's wicket, which began North East's slide and eventually the run chase turned out to be a big task for them.
Brief scores: North Zone 540 for 8 dec (Sindhu 150, Shorey 135, Rana 122*, Singha 2-74) and 259 for 6 dec (Ankit 70, Prabhsimran 59, Jotin 2-44) beat North East Zone 134 (Lamichaney 44, Kaul 3-16, Narang 3-27) and 154 (Tamang 40, Narang 4-43, Sindhu 2-25) by 511 runs.
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