Vidarbha 460 (Taide 109, Rathod 93, Nair 90, Kaverappa 4-99) and 196 (Shorey 57, Kaverappa 6-61) beat Karnataka 286 (Jose 82, Samarth 59, Thakur 3-48, Sarwate 3-50) and 243 (Agarwal 70, Sarwate 4-78) by 127 runs
Vidarbha progressed to the Ranji Trophy semi-final with a resounding 127-run win over Karnataka in Nagpur, where they will meet Madhya Pradesh.
Victory was achieved courtesy an outstanding spell of left-arm spin bowling early on the final day by Aditya Sarwate. The two-time Ranji winner picked up the key wickets of Mayank Agarwal and Manish Pandey early to hasten Karnataka’s meltdown. He ended with figures of 4 for 78 to take his match haul to seven wickets.
Karnataka began the day with dreams of a heist. At 103 for 1, they needed a further 268 runs. There was hope because Agarwal had battled superbly late on the fourth day during his 101-run opening stand with R Samarth, but he fell for 70, tamely chipping one to mid-on after being deceived in flight.
Nikin Jose, who top…
