da bwin： The prospect of an interesting finish diminished as the West ZoneCooch Behar Trophy match involving Maharashtra and Gujarat at theNehru Stadium in Pune fizzled out into a draw on the third and finalday on Saturday
Natarajan Sriram05-Nov-2000The prospect of an interesting finish diminished as the West ZoneCooch Behar Trophy match involving Maharashtra and Gujarat at theNehru Stadium in Pune fizzled out into a draw on the third and finalday on Saturday.Needing 109 for a win with only 11 overs left in the day, Maharashtramade a disastrous start when they lost opener AY Shaik off the veryfirst ball. Then Awate (20) and AP Thakur (19) took the score on to38, when Awate was bowled by SK Trivedi. Nine runs later Trivedi hadAS Bhosale (4) in much the similar manner. Then disaster struckMaharashtra as two batsmen ran themselves out before stumps were drawnwith the hosts (67 for 6) heaving a sigh of relief.Earlier, on the opening day, Gujarat opted to bat and were reduced to178 thanks to useful knocks from PA Patil (34), BD Thaker (30), RRPatel (28) and SB Patel (23). Adhav (4 for 29) was the most successfulbowler for Maharashtra. In reply, Maharashtra took a 104 run leadthanks to a 102 run eighth wicket stand between YV Takawala (53) andKR Adhav (50 not out).Gujarat, in their second innings scored 212 runs aided by a fine 78 bywicketkeeper PA Patil. Patil was involved in a 64 run third wicketstand with SB Patil (35). Then RR Patil (33) joined PA Patil andforged a 50 run seventh wicket partnership which helped the visitorsin the end to set a victory target of 109 runs.