Goa U-25 team has reached the quarterfinals of the Men's U-25 State A Trophy after defeating Tamil Nadu by 9 Runs (VJD Method) on Friday, December 3.
Goa will face Punjab in the quarterfinals on 5 December. The Tamil Nadu team won the toss and asked the Goan team to bat first at the Alur Cricket Stadium III in Bengaluru.
Amidst overcast conditions, the Goa batters had a challenging start. Opener Aditya Suryawanshi was dismissed after scoring 15 in the third over. The batting struggles continued as Tamil Nadu dismissed the in-form duo of Kashyap Bakl and Manthan Khutkar in the next six overs.
Languishing at 38 for 3, Captain Suyash Prabhudessai and Tunish Sawkar steadied the Goan innings as they stitched up a 65-run partnership. In the 27th over, S Ganesh caught Prabhudessai for 36 off Ajith Ram S' bowling. Tunish continued batting as he held Goan innings with wickets falling on the other end. Sawkar finally ended the innings with a massive score of 86, which included five fours and four sixes. Mohit Redkar scored a quickfire 28 in 15 balls to push Goa's score to 207.
In the second innings, Tamil Nadu got off to a great start. Their opening pair scored 42 in five overs as Mohit Redkar dismissed Tushar Raheja for six. Opener S Arvind was in a great rhythm as he scored 46 in 35 balls with 11 fours. But Redkar struck again as he dismissed Arvind four short of his half-century. Tamil Nadu Captain S Lokeshwar and number three batter Nidhish Rajagopal steadied the innings and put up a 36-run partnership to take the score over a hundred.
Goa then retaliated as Nihal S got S Lokeshwar out for 12, which was immediately followed by Nidhish Rajagopal's run out. The Goan bowlers continued taking wickets as they broke the lower middle-order as Tamil Nadu was trailing at 113 - 6. U Mukilesh was only the batter surviving in the middle as rain halted play in the 30th over.
As the downpour intensified, the umpires called off the game as Goa won by nine runs and qualified for the quarterfinals via the VJD method.
