Ranji Trophy: Himachal beat J&K by 10 wickets, grab 7 points

Dharamsala: Riding on a superb bowling performance on the final day, Himachal Pradesh on Sunday notched up a 10-wicket win over Jammu & Kashmir to bag seven points from their Ranji Trophy Group C match here.

Bipul Sharma (3/50) and Akash Vasisht (4/71) shared seven wickets as Himachal Pradesh shot out Jammu & Kashmir for 276 in their second innings, leaving the hosts with just 16 to get for an outright win.

Ankush Bains (3) and Paras Dogra (4) then came out to complete the formalities at the Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association Stadium.

Himachal Pradesh had scored 554 in their first innings, in reply to J&K's 293.

Resuming at an overnight score of 85/1, SP Khajuria (73) and PA Sharma (43) continued to go strong for Jammu & Kashmir and added 77 runs today before Vasisht broke the partnership, dismissing the first down batsman in the 65th over.

Four overs later, Vasisht struck twice within a space of four balls to dismiss opener Khajuria and Rarvez Rasool (0) and reduce J&K to 177 for four in 68 overs. While Khajuria was caught and bowled, Rasool was cleaned up by Vasisht.

J&K could not recover from the sudden lose of wickets as ID Singh was also clean bowled by Gangta. Next batsmen Bandeep Singh (3) and Adil Reshi (0) also were back to the pavillion with Vasisht being the destroyed in both occassion.

R Dayal (28), Samad Bhat (17), M Mudhasir (15) and Umar Nazir (5) tried their hands but it proved to be too little.

Brief Score:

Jammu & Kashmir: 293 & 276 (SP Khajuria 73; AP Visisht 4/71)

Himachal Pradesh 554 & 16/0 in 5 overs (P Dogra 4; Waseem Raza 0/1).