Ranji Trophy: Manish Pandey, Karun Nair take Karnataka to semi-finals
Former captain R Vinay Kumar, who hit a crucial 83 at number nine in the first innings, was adjudged the Man-of-the-match.
FollowBengaluru: Half centuries from captain Manish Pandey and Karun Nair helped Karnataka ace a tricky 184-run chase against Team Rajasthan and book a spot in the Ranji Trophy semi-finals.
On Friday, at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Pandey (87 not out) and Nair (61 not out) added a match-winning unbeaten partnership of 129 runs for the fifth wicket.
Thanks to the duo's excellent batting efforts, Karnataka won by six wickets, reaching 185/4 in 47.5 overs.
Former captain R Vinay Kumar, who hit a crucial 83 at number nine in the first innings, was adjudged the Man-of-the-match.
Resuming at their overnight score of 45/3, Karnataka lost nightwatchman Ronit More (8) soon and the hosts were reduced to 56/4. But that was the only success for Rajasthan on the fourth day of the five-day contest.
This brought skipper Pandey to the crease and he was aggressive right from the start. He hit 14 fours and two sixes in his 75-ball knock.
The right-hander was recently dropped from the Indian ODI squad and took charge of the state team. And he led from the front in this knockout encounter. Pandey was dropped on 38 by Deepak Chahar off his cousin Rahul Chahar's bowling.
Nair, at the other end, ensured that he was the perfect ally to his skipper. He faced 129 balls and scored six boundaries.
Now, Karnataka await the winner of Uttar Pradesh-Saurashtra quarter-final to know their opponents for the last-four contest, which will be played from January 24.
Brief Scores
Team Rajasthan 224 (Rajesh Bishnoi Sr 79, Manipal Lomror 50, K Gowtham 3/54, Abhimanyu Mithun 3/48, R Vinay Kumar 2/29, Shreyas Gopal 2/41) and 222 (Robin Bist 44, Lomror 42, Gowtham 4/54, Gopal 3/52) lost to Karnataka 263 (Vinay Kumar 83, KV Siddharth 52, Rahul Chahar 5/93) and 185/4 in 47.3 overs (Manish Pandey 87 not out, Karun Nair 61 not out, Aniket Choudhary 2/32)
