Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy | Mumbai wins fourth in a row

Beats Pondicherry by 27 runs after a brief scare from Dogra

The fall of Pondicherry’s Paras Dogra in the 14th over allowed Mumbai to force its fourth win in as many games in a Group D league match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy Twenty20 tournament at the Wankhede Stadium here on Tuesday.

Mumbai’s remaining league matches are against Bengal, Meghalaya and Assam and, barring a major hiccup, the side should advance to the super league-knockout stage to be played in Surat from November 21.

Mumbai made significant changes in the team sheet for its fourth match, bringing in Shreyas Iyer, Shivam Dube and Shardul Thakur for Sarfaraz Khan, Sujith Nayak and Dhawal Kulkarni. The completion of the Twenty20 series against Bangladesh had facilitated their return to the domestic tournament, and they made small contributions to their side.

Champion knock

But it was skipper Suryakumar Yadav who once again played a champion knock for his team to set a stiff target of 172 for Pondicherry. After the fall of Jay Bista and Aditya Tare soon after the six over power play, Suryakumar forged a 49-run third-wicket stand with Shreyas, and 55 for the fourth wicket with Siddhesh Lad.

Suryakumar (57, 37b, 6×4, 3×6) was hit on the midriff twice by seamers, but kept a calm mind and showed terrific skill to accelerate the run rate before falling to Sagar Trivedi in the 20th over.

Trivedi struck three times in the last over, taking the wickets of Suryakumar, Lad and Dubey, to finish his fine effort at four for 29.

Good start

Pondicherry began well with K.B. Arun Karthik in good nick and after his departure, Dogra threatened with some big shots.

But after pummelling three fours and as many sixes — during a third-wicket stand of 51 with Subramanian Anand — the former Himachal Pradesh batsman holed out an easy catch to Shardul.

Dogra’s dismissal enlivened the Mumbai bowling to take charge of the match and win by 27 runs.

In the first match played at the same venue, Meghalaya scored an upset win against Assam, with Punit Bisht scoring a weighty 42.

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