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Board's President bags Wills Trophy

The Board's President XI, led by former skipper Mohammed Azharuddin, lifted the Wills Trophy defeating a depleted Karnataka side by 97 runs at the Indira Priyadarshini Stadium, Vishakapatnam.

Azhar, looking to find favour with the national selectors, flopped, going out on a duck in the first over of the day.

Dodda Ganesh started the proceedings, having S S Das caught behind by Shiriguppi. Three balls later, he had Azharuddin edging one to skipper Sujith Somsunder in the slips. The decision was a little dicey since Somsunder appeared to have caught the ball off the bounce. But at zero for two wickets, the Board's President seemed headed for a low total.

And when Mansoor Ali Khan, bowling from the other end snapped up southpaw Sriram in the sixth, the Board's President was reeling at 20 for 3.

Thereafter, opener Jyoti Yadav and Nilesh Modi added 97 runs for the fourth wicket off 23.5 overs. Jyoti Yadav finally holed out to off-spinner Yalvigi when his score was 56. Yadav had faced 82 deliveries and hit six to the fence.

Sanjay Bangar and Nilesh Modi had 27-run partnership for the fifth wicket before David Johnson had Modi, at 51, caught by Ganesh. Sanjay Bangar took over from there on and, in a breezy sixth-wicket partnership with Ashish Kapoor, plundered 41 runs off 5.5 overs.

Ashish Kapoor and keeper Dahiya fell thereafter, leaving the score at 186 for 7 with eight overs remaining in the innings.

Karnataka seemed to be clawing its way back into the match when Bangar and J Gokulakrishnan got together and added 63 runs off 6.3 overs for the eighth wicket.

Bangar continued his good form with his unbeaten 73 off 59 balls with five fours and a six.

Karnataka needed a quickfire start to make a match of it. Openers Arun Kumar (26) and Mithun Beerala (21) did just that, putting up 48 runs off 12.2 overs.

Kumaran then breached Beerala's defences and Murali Kartik bowled Arun Kumar soon after. Kartik then had Tilak Naidu caught behind for one, leaving Karnataka in a bad position at 53 for three.

Skipper Sujith Somasundar (39) and Somasekhar Shiraguppi (22) revived Karnataka's hopes with a fourth-wicket partnership of 39 runs off 11 overs. But, thereafter, the wickets kept falling at regular intervals and Karnataka slowly but surely lost their grip of the game.

Karnataka lost their last six wickets for just 24 runs off five overs. They were all out for 165 in 40.4 overs.

Murali Kartik was the pick of the bowlers, with figures of four wickets for 19 runs off 8.4 overs.

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