Giants leave minnows broken hearted

hyderabad: star-studded mrf taught a young and inexperienced karnataka side a lesson by register a 78-run victory in their last group a league encounter of the moin-ud-dowla gold cup at the ecil ground, here on monday. it virtually turned out into a knock-out blow as karnataka, who had an all-win record till monday, looked a certainty in the quarter-final line-up. but the defeat sent them into oblivion. mrf, sical and karnataka finished with six points each but the first two made the grade by virtue of better net run rates. coming back to the game, mrf won the toss and elected to bat.but things did not turn out well for the team as they lost openers aashish kapoor (6) and vikram rathour (9) with just 20 on the board in the seventh over itself. india discard and southpaw hrishikesh kanitkar and rajat bhatia (11) put on 40 for the third wicket before bhatia fell. this brought another southpaw and india discard hemang badani to the crease. but badani (2), who did not have a good tour of sri lanka, belied all hopes, lasting only seven balls. he hit off-spinner dharmichand straight to shyam ponappa at long off for a regulation catch. kanitkar (42; 63b, 5x4, 1x6), who looked set for a big innings,chanced his arm once too often to perish, caught at long on by affan sherief off dharmichand. mrf were 100 for five with 26 overs gone. tanveer jabbar (30;61b, 3x4) and captain s sriram added 38 runs for the sixth wicket. jabbar went the way the previous two had gone, lofting the ball from spinner shyam ponappa to s shinde. mrf looked in dire straits at 168 for eight in the 39th over. but mediumpacer t kumaran got together with his skipper and bailed the side out with a 54-run partnership for the ninth wicket. kumaran's 36 came off just 31 balls with three fours. sriram was unlucky to miss out on a well-deserved half-century, falling for 47 — run out off the penultimate ball of the innings. chasing 229 for victory, karnataka never looked like posing any threat as they kept losing wickets at regular intervals. opener shyam ponappa topscored with a patient 32 (63b, 5x4). and towards the end, dh sunil kumar used the long handle to good affect speeding to an unbeaten 26 off 20 balls with five fours. the last wicket pair — sunil and dharmichand — added 37 runs. but the efforts were like drops in the ocean and karnataka finished at 150 in 39.2 overs. in the quarter-finals to be played on wednesday, sical will meet new zealand 'a' at the lal bahadur stadium, while all india associate banks will cross swords with mrf at the aoc ground. brief scores ecil ground: mrf 228 (hrishikesh kanitkar 42, tanveer jabbar 30, s sriram 47, t kumaran 36; dh sunil kumar 2/47, anand katti 3/34, dharmichand 2/35) bt karnataka 150 (shyam ponappa 32, dh sunil kumar 26; mr srinivas 2/19, s mahesh 2/18, aashish kapoor 3/27, hemang badani 2/23). rrc ground: district xi 144 (rohit sabharwal 71; musavir khote 2/28, khaja obaidullah 2/14, sanjay satpathy 3/40, yere goud 2/20) lost to indian railways 147/3 (sudhir wankhede 41, amit pagnis 37, santosh sahu 25 n.o.; munawar hussain 2/33). gymkhana ground: cab 165 (safi ahmed 40; satish 3/34, ram kumar 3/20, s raja 3/46) lost to chemplast 166/5 (y gnaneshwara rao 39, ajay kuduva 41 n.o., j harish 30 n.o.).