Ahmedabad: Mahipal Lomror’s 78 off 37 balls helped Rajasthan beat Bihar by 16 runs in the quarter-finals of the Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 Trophy at the Motera Stadium on Wednesday. Lomror’s innings helped Rajasthan score 164/5 and Bihar were restricted to 148/4.
Rajasthan now face Tamil Nadu in the first semi-final on January 29 while Punjab take on Baroda in the second semi-final on the same day. Ahmedabad will be the venue for both matches as well as the final which is scheduled for January 31.
Mangal Mahrour led the Bihar chase with an unbeaten 68 off 58 balls while Ravi Bishnoi, Chandrapal Singh and Aniket Choudhary all chipped in with a wicket each for Rajasthan.
Bihar, the only Plate team to qualify for the knockout stage of the tournament, were behind the required run rate for much of their chase. Rajasthan kept them in check in the last four overs of the chase, thus leaving them needing a whopping 27 runs from the final over. Vikash Yadav’s six off the second last ball helped Bihar take 10 runs from the over.
Brief scores: Rajasthan 164/5 in 20 overs (Mahipal Lomror 78 not out, Bharat Sharma 38; Suraj Kashyap 2/28) beat Bihar 148/4 in 20 overs (Mangal Mahrour 68 not out, Vikash Yadav 27 not out; Chandrapal Singh 1/21)
IANS
