North and Central Zones advance to Duleep Trophy semis

Led by Ayush Badoni's unbeaten 204*, North Zone batters continued to pile misery on East Zone bowlers on the final day of the Duleep Trophy encounter.

Resuming Saturday's play on 388 for 2, with a mammoth 563-run lead in hand, North Zone decided to bat on till the end and accept a draw after piling on 658 for 4 in the second innings. Ankit Kumar, who resumed his innings on 168, added 30 runs to his overnight score before falling two runs short of his maiden first-class double century, to Mukhtar Hussain.

Nishant Sindhu and Badoni put on a 157-run stand before the former became Utkarsh Singh's first victim of the match. Utkarsh took the bulk of the bowling workload in the innings and was taken apart for 191 runs. Manishi, who had picked six scalps in the first innings, went wicketless.

North Zone, who have advanced to the semifinals, will now face South Zone.

Brief scores: North Zone 405 & 658/4 (Ayush Badoni 204*, Ankit Kumar 198) drew with East Zone 230 (Virat Singh 69; Auqib Nabi 5-28, Harshit Rana 2-56)

Jehu Anderson and Rongsen Jonathan scored half-centuries and helped North East draw their Duleep Trophy encounter against Central Zone. With the result of the contest obvious well in advance given Central Zone's massive first innings lead, there wasn't much for North East to fight for. Chasing 679 on the final day, victory was well out of sight for North East.

Central Zone declared their second innings on their overnight score of 331 for 7, hoping to bundle out North East on the final day. However, striking thrice in the opening session, Central Zone bowlers struggled to break past their middle order easily.

Jonathan and Anderson compiled a fairly well-paced 110-run stand for the fourth wicket, before Anderson departed on 64. Shubam Sharma's part-time spin came in handy as he struck twice in quick succession to offer Central Zone some hope of cleaning up North East for the second time in the match. However, Pheroijam Jotim and Ankur Malik defied the Central bowlers for 43 balls before both the captains decided to shake hands.

Central Zone will now face West Zone in the semis.

Brief Scores: Central Zone 532/4d & 331/7 (Shubham Sharma 122, Yash Rathod 78; Akash Choudhary 2-44) drew with North East Zone 185 (Karnajit Yumnam 48, Ankur Malik 42; Aditya Thakare 3-23, Harsh Dubey 2-20) & 200/6 (Jehu Anderson 64, Rongsen Jonathan 60; Shubham Sharma 2-10, Aditya Thakare 2-21).