Jammu and Kashmir beat Himachal by 4 wickets.

Chamba 30 October: Allround performance by Ashwani Gupta (30 & 3for 21) and half century knock by Dhruv Mahajan enabled Jammu Kashmir to beat Himachal by four wickets in the second tie of Ranji Trophy one day being played Police Stadium here today.

Himachal opted to bat and were in deep trouble as their three main batsman were back in pavilion with just 32 runs on board. Sangram Singh (34) & Yashwinder Singh (20) repaired the innings to some extent before Yashwinder Singh was run out in mix up. Rahul Panta (17) and Arun Verma (26*) also contributed to their team total while no other batsman played to his potential . Ashwani Gupta was most successful with his tight off spin bowling as he captured three wickets by giving away just 21 runs. Sanjay Sharma and Vijay Sharma were another wicket taker for J&K as both dismissed two batsman each at the cost of 19 & 22 runs respectively.At last Himachal bundled out at a partly total of runs in 49.5 overs .

Chasing a modest total of 145 runs in 50 overs Jammu Kashmir got two early jolts as opener Rakesh Gill (4) was trapped in front of wicket by Shakti Singh and Kanvaljeet (1) was run out at team total of 29. Ranjit Bali (25) and Ashwani Gupta (30) then played with cool heads and rotated strke occassionly. Himachal new ball bowler Shakti Singh (2 for 28) and Parveen Sharma bowled extremly well and did not allow Jammu Kashmir batsman to score freely. Parveen was unlucky to got any wicket as his deliveries beat the batsmen many times .

Dhruv Mahajan (50) who understood the value of run rate and scored briskly and hit knock five boundaries and a six in his knock of 82 balls. Vikrant Taggar also contributed 19 not out runs in winning chase. Jammu Kashmir achieved target in 47.2 overs. Nischal Gaur and Rahul Panta also got a wicket each.