Vidarbha, having beaten Maharashtra convincingly by 10 wickets in round six, takes the Group A pole position with 27 points and is poised to enter the knockout stage having registered four wins and losing just one match and playing a draw. Opponents Haryana, too, is in the race to make the quarterfinals after thrashing Jharkhand by an innings and 205 runs. With three wins, one loss, and two draws, Haryana has 24 points. An outright win might pole-vault the Ashok Menaria-led side into the knock-outs.
Services is tied on 22 points with Saurashtra and has its qualification chances with an innings and 196 runs against Manipur. It next faces Maharashtra, which is all but out of race along with the likes of Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Manipur
Vidarbha are looking for at least three points on the first innings lead. But Saurashtra's last match is against Manipur and they would like to go for outright victory and that too with a bonus point.
Therefore, Vidarbha can't remain complacent against Haryana. Vidarbha's crushing ten wicket victory over Maharashtra in the previous match has increased the confidence of the players ahead of the crucial last league match. The top batters including professional Karun Nair 376 rus in six matches), skipper AkshayWadkar (331), Dhruv Shorey (206) and Atharva Taide (294) are in great form. Vidarbha has included former skipper Faiz Fazal in place of Sanjay Ramaswamy for the last match to strengthen the squad.
Among the bowlers, pacer Aditya Thakare(29 in six ) and left arm spinner Aditya Sarvate (25) will be the key. Umesh Yadav is also in good form. Vidarbya is likely to play with three pacers and two spinners. Talking to media persons skipper Wadkar said, " We will go for outright victory and maintain our top position in group 'A'".
Teams
Vidarbha:Akshay Wadkar (Captain & WK), Atharva Taide, Dhruv Shorey, Karun Nair, Yash Rathod, Mohit Kale, Harsh Dubey, Lalit Yadav, Aditya Sarvate, Yash Thakur, Aditya Thakare, Darshan Nalkande, Siddhesh Wath (WK)
Akshay Wakhare, Faiz Fazal, Umesh Yadav and Danish Malewar.
Haryana: AnkitKumar, Yuvraj Singh, Himanshu Rana, Ashok Maneria, Nishant Sindhu, Rohit Sharma, Rahul Tewatia, SumitKumar, Piyush Dahiya, Anshul Kamboj, Kapil Hooda, Mayank Shandilya, Aman Kumar, Yashu Sharma and Jayant Yadav.