Confident Vidarbha to take on Odisha

Confident over back-to-back victories, Vidarbha will take on Odisha in the third round of the Vijay Hazare Trophy Group 'A' match to be played at Dadoji Konddeo Stadium in Thane on Saturday.

Carrying their success in the T-20 format of cricket, Vidarbha under the leadership of Faiz Fazal recorded convincing victories against Himachal Pradesh in the opening match and then against Andhra Pradesh. Vidarbha batsmen particularly opener Atharva Taide is in tremendous form. On Thursday he literally hammered Odisha bowlers by scoring unbeaten 164. In the process, he also became highest scorer for Vidarbha in Vijay Hazar Trophy. Against Himachal Pradesh also he batted well and scored 64 runs. At present, he is second highest run scorer (228 in two matches) after Maharashtra's Ruturaj Gaikwad (290). Apart from Taide other top-order batsmen are also scoring runs. Young Yash Rathod has been very impressive with two goods knocks including 76 not out against Himachal and then 44 against Andhra. Experienced Ganesh Satish who failed in the opening match made amend and scored 45 in the second match against Andhra. Although skipper Faiz Fazal has not played a big knock he gave a good start to Vidarbha in both matches. Stumper Akshay Wadkar too batted well in the opening match.

Among the bowlers, young pacer Yash Thakur ( 8 wickets in two matches) is on top among the most wicket-takers in the tournament so far. He has proved himself by taking a five-wicket haul against Himachal Pradesh ad then snapped three against Andhra. he is receiving good support from others bowlers including pacer Darshan Nalkande, office Akshay Wakhare and Aditya Sarwate. All in all Vidarbha players are doing an excellent job in all departments.

However, at the same time they should not forget that Odisha also have won two consecutive matches. In the first match against Andhra they recorded 63 run victory and then in the second match they got the better of Gujarat by three wickets. Their skipper Subhransu Sepapati has already scored a century (116) against Andhra Pradesh. Sandeep Patnaik and Govind Poddar are also among the runs. Both the teams would like to continue their winning streak.

Teams (from)

Vidarbha: Faiz Fazal (capt), Akshay Wadkar, Atharva Taide, Ganesh Satish, Apoorva Wankhade, Jitesh Sharma, Yash Rathod, Shubham Dubey, Siddesh Wath, Aditya Sarvate, Akshay Wakahre, Harsh Dubey, Akshay Karnewar, Lalit Yadav, Siddesh Neral, Aditya Thakre, Darshan Nalkande, Yash Thakur, R.Sanjay and Ganesh Bhosale.

Odisha: Subhranshu Senapati (c), Abhishek Yadav, Jayanta Behera, Subhankar Biswas, Rajesh Dhuper, Sujit Lenka, Subham Nayak, Pappu Roy, Sandeep Pattnaik

Govinda Poddar, Debabrata Pradhan, Prayash Singh, Sanjay Raghunath, Ashish Rai, Rajesh Mohanty, Abhishek Raut, Sunil Roul. Bikash Rout, Biplab Samantray,

Anurag Sarangi and Shantanu Mishra.