Williams' unbeaten 114 of no avail

Opener Cecil Williams' unbeaten 114 went in vain as Saurashtra completed a comfortable eight wicket victory over Baroda in the West Zone Ranji Trophy one day league match at the Municipal stadium in Rajkot on Sunday.

Opting to bat first, Baroda's innings revolved totally around Williams. The next highest score was NR Mongia's 22. And the highest partnership was 50 runs for the sixth wicket between Williams and skipper AP Bhoite. Williams faced 142 balls and hit six fours and three sixes. Thanks chiefly to his heroics, Baroda finished with 228 for seven off 50 overs.

Saurashtra however made light of what should have been a challenging target. Openers RC Vasanth Kumar and HD Jani put on 87 runs off 15 overs. Vasanth Kumar dominated the stand with a series of attacking strokes and his 67 was hit off just 49 balls, inclusive of 13 fours. Building upon the excellent start given by Vasanth Kumar, Jani and skipper Sitanshu Kotak added 83 runs for the second wicket off 18.3 overs before the opener was out for 54. He faced 90 balls and hit six of them to the ropes. Kotak in the company of PJ Bhatt steered Saurashtra to an easy victory with 3.1 overs to spare with an unbroken third wicket partnership of 59 runs off 13.2 overs. Kotak's unbeaten 56 came up off 102 balls with four boundary hits while Bhatt's 38 not out was scored off just 42 balls with five hits to the ropes.