The one-day cricket series for the 20th Vijay Hazare Cup started yesterday in 7 cities including Mumbai, Guwahati, Thiruvananthapuram and Jaipur. The 38 participating teams are divided into 6 divisions and compete in the league. At the end of the league round, the top 5 teams in the Elite A, B, C, D, and E divisions advance directly to the quarterfinals.
The top teams in the Blade Division meet the top 2 teams in the Elite Division in the pre-quarterfinals. The 3 winning teams will advance to the quarterfinals.
The five-time champions of the Elite ‘B’ division of the tournament faced defending champions Mumbai in their opening league match. Mumbai won the toss and elected to field
Batting first, Tamil Nadu scored 290 for 8 in 50 overs. Top scorers were Shah Rukh (66 off 35 balls, 6 fours, 5 sixes), Baba Indrajith (45), Washington Sunder (34) and Dinesh Karthik (32). Dhawal Kulkarni took 3 wickets for Mumbai.
Following this, Mumbai were bowled out for 236 in 46.4 overs. Thus the Tamil Nadu team won by 54 runs. Captain Shams Mulani top-scored with 75 runs. Washington Sunder, Siddharth Thala took 3 wickets each and Sai Kishore took 2 wickets for Tamil Nadu.
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