Central hold edge over West

MUMBAI, JANUARY 30: Two sides -- West Zone and Central Zone who were contenders for the Deodhar Trophy till the penultimate round will now...

MUMBAI, JANUARY 30: Two sides — West Zone and Central Zone who were contenders for the Deodhar Trophy till the penultimate round will now battle to avoid the cellar when they clash at Wankhede Stadium on Monday. Both teams’ defeats on Friday has reduced the contest to one of academic interest.The interest in the encounter would centre on individual excellence keeping the forthcoming Challenger Trophy in mind.

The Nayan Mongia-led hosts’ attack lacks sting owing to the absence of the experienced medium-pace duo of Paras Mhambrey and Iqbal Siddiqui to injuries. In contrast, Central have been bolstered by the return of all-rounder Sanjay Bangar, who will be playing his first match of the limited-overs tournament after recovering from a side strain sustained a fortnight ago.

Bangar’s return notwithstanding, the ability of the Central Zone lads to jell as a team, and a variety in attack gives them an edge over West, whose strengths have mainly revolved around the batting bravados of Vinod Kambli and AmolMuzumdar.

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The local interest would be on the two young medium-pacers, left-arm Zaheer Khan and Amit Dani, both of whom have graduated from National Cricket Club. While Zaheer’s decision to play for Vadodara has paid rich dividends, Dani too hasn’t been far behind dishing out a sterling display (5-1-7-5) against Saurashtra in a West Zone one-day league match.

A hard track with a fair sprinkling of grass should spur them against the Gyanendra Pandey-led team, whose batting depth and grit poses a fitting challenge.

The teams (from): West Zone: Nayan Mongia (captain), Sitanshu Kotak, Wasim Jaffer, Nilesh Modi, Connor Williams, Amol Muzumdar, Jatin Paranjpe, Vinod Kambli, Abhijit Kale, Ajit Bhoite, Hitesh Parsana, Nilesh Kulkarni, Zaheer Khan, Amit Dani and Rajesh Garsondia.
Central Zone: Gyanendra Pandey (captain), Gagan Khoda, Sanjay Bangar, Jyoti Yadav, Jai Prakash Yadav, Amay Khurasia, Devendra Bundela, Manoj Mudgal, Harvinder Singh Sodhi, Ashish Winston Zaidi, Murali Karthik, PKrishnakumar, Raja Ali, Abbas Ali, Preetam Gandhe and Anshu Jain.
Umpires: SV Ramani & KR Shankar.

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