Mohammed Shami bowled 15 dot deliveries in his sixth consecutive SMAT T20 match while unheralded Karan Lal smoked 94 in just 47 balls as Bengal hammered Bihar by nine wickets in a Group A match in Rajkot. Bihar without their teen prodigy Vaibhav Suryavanshi, managed 147 for 6 in 20 overs with Sayan Ghosh (2/32) being the pick of the bowlers. Bengal knocked off the chase in just 14 overs with Lal smashing nine fours and six sixes.
However all eyes were on Shami, who was economical once again with figures of 1/18 in 4 overs after 0/16 in 4 against Meghalaya. Shami has now played six T20 games in 11 days and bowled 23.3 overs out of a maximum of 24 overs. He has so far got five wickets with three coming against Hyderabad.
It is still not certain whether Shami will be summoned for the Border Gavaskar Trophy.
Brief Scores: Bihar 147/6 in 20 overs (Sayan Ghosh 2/32, Mohammed Shami 1/18). Bengal 150/1 (Karan Lal 94 not out, Sudip Kr Gharami 32 not out). Bengal won by 9 wickets.
Earlier, on Sunday, India's star pacer Mohammed Shami set up Bengal's comfortable win against Meghalaya with a measly spell in their Group A contest in the Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 Trophy. Elsewhere, Naman Dhir returned excellent figures of 5/19 to fashion Punjab's narrow seven-run win against Hyderabad in Group A, while Jharkhand recorded a thrilling one-wicket victory against Haryana in which Harshal Patel (2/16) and Yuzvendra Chahal (1/13) shone with the ball.
Shami continued to take giant strides in his comeback trail as he produced a sharp spell of 4-0-16-0 to help Bengal restrict Meghalaya to a modest 127 for six.
Bengal won by six wickets and 49 balls to spare at the Niranjan Shah Stadium.
Arien Sangma (37) and Larry Sangma (38) staged a recovery for Meghalaya with the bat.
In reply, Bengal stuttered when three of their batters got out for ducks but Abhisek Porel's 31-ball 61, with nine fours and two sixes, combined with Writtick Chatterjee's 25 not out, took them past the target.