Sanju Samson, returning as an opening batsman, played an aggressive inning of 43 runs in 15 balls to help Kerala win by eight wickets against Chhattisgarh in the Elite Group A match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 Trophy. Samson hit five sixes in his innings, due to which Kerala easily achieved the target of 121 runs to win in just 10.4 overs.
Batting first, Chhattisgarh team could score only 120 runs in 19.5 overs. Former Chennai Super Kings fast bowler KM Asif took three wickets for 16 runs. He gave a big blow to Chhattisgarh by dismissing Punjab Kings batsman Shashank Singh without opening the account.
For Chhattisgarh, only Sanjeet Desai (35 runs in 23 balls) was able to hit some big shots but the team’s innings failed to find rhythm. Samson led the chase at the top of the order and Kerala won with 56 balls to spare. Samson was being made to bat in the middle order after the return of Shubman Gill to the T20 team from the Asia Cup but he never looked comfortable in this position.
Against Chhattisgarh, he returned to the top order in a familiar style, hitting two sixes behind square and mid-wicket off fast bowler Ravi Kiran and three sixes over the deep mid-wicket boundary off left-arm wrist spinner Ajay Mandal, taking Kerala’s score to 72 runs by the fifth over. Kiran took the catch of Samson off the ball of Anand Rao.
Kerala then achieved the target easily. In another match of the group, the talented Riyan Parag was once again seen struggling. Ryan scored 14 runs in 19 balls due to which Assam team could score only 132 runs for seven wickets.
Railways won the match by three wickets. Sahil Jain made an important contribution in taking Assam beyond the score of 130 runs by playing an inning of 38 runs in 29 balls. Chasing the target, Railways lost seven wickets for 115 runs and the team needed 18 runs from the last 13 balls. Experienced captain Karn Sharma (24 runs in 16 balls) showed patience under pressure and gave victory to Railways with two balls remaining by hitting a six.