GUWAHATI: Mumbai pacer Mohit Avasthi led his side's attack brilliantly with a 3/25 as Bengal choked in their small chase of 132 to suffer a 10-run defeat in their Elite Group B match of the Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 tournament at Barsapara Stadium on Saturday.
Defending 19 runs in the final over, Avasthi took two off two balls by dismissing the hard-hitting Shahbaz Ahmed (12) and Writtick Chatterjee (0) to seal a second win for the Ajinkya Rahane-led side.
But it was their other pacer Tushar Deshpande who turned it around in the middle overs by dismissing a well set Ritwik Roy Chowdhury (31) in the 17th over that triggered the collapse.
Eyeing a third win on the trot, Bengal were going steady at 98 for 4 in 16 overs, needing just 34 runs in 24 balls.
Roy Chowdhury and Kaif Ahmed (31 off 31 balls) were looking in complete control in a 54-run partnership after India Test wicketkeeper-batsman Wriddhiman Saha got out cheaply for 15 off 17 balls.
But all hell broke loose as Roy Chowdhury edged a Deshpande delivery behind the stumps, while Ahmed got out to Shivam Dube (1/14 from two overs) in the next over as Bengal could not recover from the jolt.
"Ritwik and Kaif batted well and built a good partnership... When the duo were batting it looked like the game was in our pocket but after their dismissal we couldn't get many big shots which may have won the game for us," Bengal assistant coach Sourasish Lahiri said.
"Mumbai bowled well too, especially while defending a low total, they did well," he said, giving credit to the Mumbai bowlers.
The win enabled Mumbai to climb past Bengal to second spot by virtue of net run-rate, while Karnataka consolidated their position atop the standings with three wins in a row.
Debutant seamer duo of Vijaykumar Vyshak (3/25) and MB Darshan (2/30) shared five wickets in between them to restrict Services to 109 for eight in their stiff chase of 143 in the first match here.
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