West Zone beat Central Zone by three wickets in Deodhar tie

Ahmedabad, Feb 25 (UNI) West Zone beat Central Zone by three wickets in the opening match of the Deodhar trophy at the Sardar Patel Gujarat stadium here today.

Off-spinner Ramesh Powar destroyed the opposition lineup, snapping up four wickets after Mohammad Kaif led Central zone opted to bat first.

Although the opening pair of Praveen Kumar and Fazal provided a solid start for the Central zone, a middle order collapse followed which ended any hopes of posting a huge total. They were finally restricted to 234 all out with two balls spare.

The spotlight, however, was on Irfan Pathan who is plagued by injury problems and is struggling to prove his form and fitness.

Selection Committee chairman Dilip Vengsarkar said the seamer's inclusion in the World Cup squad will depend on on the pacer's performance.

Parveen scored freely off Pathan and Rakesh Patel, smashing 51 off 42 balls, studded with three sixes.

The Central batsmen found it difficult to free their arms against Powar who varied his length beautifully. The in-form Mohammad Kaif was Powar's second big victim and he went on to take two more wickets to leave Central at 110 for 4.

Barring these four batsman, the entire middle order of Central Zone fell to Ramesh Powar, who took four wickets. The right arm spinner with his accurate bowling took all the first four wickets in his ten-over spell and gave away 25 runs only. Ramesh bowled his ten over quota from GMDC end.

For the local spectator it was a disappointing day as the local hero and Team India's all-rounder Pathan was unsucessful in the opening spell. In his first spell of five overs, the pacer gave away 30 runs in five overs. In the final overs, Pathan salvaged some pride by taking two wickets of R P Singh and Ali. Pathan's final bowling analysis read 8.4-0-48-2.

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