Tamil Nadu have been off-color all tournament but today they showed a glimpse of what they can do when they play to their potential! Tripura unfortunately was on the receiving end on this occasion! The SMAT will continue in all its pomp in two days' time! Tripura will take on Uttarakhand next, and Tamil Nadu are drawn against Jharkhand!
On this note, I, Manan Mehta would like to take your leave on behalf of my co-commentator Saptak Sanyal and our scorer/analyst Manish Bishnoi!
Player of the match: Sai Kishore
7:56 PM IST and Local Time : Tamil Nadu have won the game against Tripura by a massive margin of 61 runs. This victory is a massive boost to their NRR but with the previous three losses they are not in a good position in this year's Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. Tripura won the toss and sent Tamil Nadu to bat first. Tamil Nadu got into the dire straits early in the game as they lost four wickets inside the powerplay. They were 27/4 after the first 6 overs losing big wickets like Tushar Raheja, Amith Sathvik and B Sai Sudharsan. But Sai Kishore and Narayan Jagadeesan had other ideas. They went off to a sedate start and then went off to a flier. Jagadeesan got to his fifty and then eventually ended his innings on 83. He hit 6 fours and 4 sixes in his 49-ball stay at the crease. Sai Kishore was sent ahead of big hitters like Sonu Yadav and Rajkumar but he proved his mettle too. His unbeaten innings of 87 runs from 39 balls was essential for Tamil Nadu to put 204 runs on the board losing 5 wickets. He hit 8 huge maximums on his way. For Tripura, Saurabh Singh took 2 wickets for 24 runs. Indrajit Debnath and Manisankar Murasingh took a wicket each. Coming to chase the steep target of 205 runs, Tripura got into a precarious condition as they lost four wickets inside the first four overs. Hanuma Vihari, Sridam Paul, Sentu Sarkar and Samrat Sutradhar got out for cheap scores. But Vijay Shankar and Swapnil Singh then decided to put up a resistance. They added some runs on the board but in a very sedate fashion.
They batted for 46 balls together to put up just 60 runs on the board before Swapnil got out scoring 23 from 21 balls. Vijay Shankar and Manisankar Murasingh then had the onus to continue the innings. Shankar got out for 39 off 34 hitting 3 fours and a maximum and that outplayed Tripura from the game. Manisankar Murasingh played a fine cameo of 33 runs off 23 balls but Natarajan removed him. Eventually Tripura got bundled out for just 143. For Tamil Nadu, T Natarajan and Ramsingh Sonu Yadav took a couple of wickets each. Manimaran Siddharth and Gurjapneet Singh chipped in with a wicket each.
W WICKETTT!!! Done and dusted then!!! Short ball at the stumps, Debnath steps out and looks to pull it hard over midwicket, gets a thick top edge. The mid on fielder ran back a decent distance. Sathvik the fielder underneath it and took a safe catch! Tamil Nadu win by 61 runs!
18.4 G Singh to Debnath
0 Round the wicket, length ball on the stumps, Debnath looks to pull it hard but gets an inside edge on to the pads!