All the three teams Tamil Nadu, Hyderabad and Karnataka fully utilisedthe advantage of playing on home turf to score convincing wins overKerala, Goa and Andhra respectively in the recent round of matches inthe Under-16 South Zone league Vijay

Natarajan Sriram16-Dec-2000All the three teams Tamil Nadu, Hyderabad and Karnataka fully utilisedthe advantage of playing on home turf to score convincing wins overKerala, Goa and Andhra respectively in the recent round of matches inthe Under-16 South Zone league Vijay Merchant Trophy tournament.A tally of nine wickets in the match by Rajesh helped Tamil Nadu teamscored an innings and 11 run win over Kerala at the MA Chidambaramstadium in Chennai on Saturday. Having won the toss on the openingday, Kerala opted to bat and were shot out for a paltry 78. Rajeshripped through the visitors’ line up ending with figures of 7 for 17while the other three wickets were shared by Varun, Raina and SatishKumar.In response, Tamil Nadu took a massive 202 run lead thanks to 160 runfourth wicket stand between KDK Kartik (99) and M Muthupandey (79).Tamil Nadu skipper Vasudeva Das declared the innings at 280 for 7.Kartik who missed a well deserved century by a run, was at the creasefor 213 minutes and faced 192 balls while finding the boundaries oneight occasions.Kerala’s batting woes continued in their second innings and were shotout for 191. Only four batsmen JS Kurien (26), skipper NJ John (59),PR Prem (50) and P Prasanth (18) reached the double figures. Thewickets were shared allround with Vasudeva Das (3 for 53) and Varun (3for 11) being the pick.In the second match of the tournament at the MJWSC Ground inBangalore, Karnataka had to sweat a bit even as they scored an inningsand 2 run win over Andhra on Saturday. Opting to bat, Andhra werebundled out for just 164 runs by Chetan Williams (6 for 30) andChauhan (4 for 64).In reply, Karnataka declared their first innings at 370 for 9, a leadof 206 runs. The Karnataka batsmen were in good form with opener PTTrishul (70), MK Manjunath (76) and GVK Agarwal (78) making the bulkof the scoring. Andhra in their second innings fell short by two runsto make the home side bat again, scoring 204 runs. Chauhan andWilliams were among the wickets again taking three apiece. Moinuddinalso ended taking three wickets.The last match of the present round of South Zone matches sawHyderabad defeat Goa by ten wickets at the Nuclear Fuel Complex Groundin Hyderabad. Having to score just 69 for a win on the final day,Hyderabad openers SP Peter (42) and Mohd Imran (30) accomplished thetask off 15.4 overs.Earlier on the opening day, Opting to bat the hosts, Hyderabad,amassed 355 on the board. PS Niranjan (75) was the top scorer whileGoa’s SS Shetty (5 for 119) and SB Yadav (3 for 122) shared thebowling honours. In reply the Goan batting failed to take off and werebundled out for just 130 with the top scorer being Yadav (27).Following on, Goa fared a bit better scoring 294 with Yadav againcoming to the team’s rescue with a timely century. During his 136minute stay at the crease, Yadav faced 128 balls for his 102 which wasstudded with 14 fours and one six.