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Latest Test sensation KL Rahul to give Ranji tie a miss

Defending champions Karnataka will have to guard against complacency when they take on Madhya Pradesh in their Group A fifth round encounter in Indore from Tuesday.

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Apart from Lokesh Rahul (in pic), Karnataka will be without all-rounder Stuart Binny
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Defending champions Karnataka will have to guard against complacency when they take on Madhya Pradesh in their Group A fifth round encounter in Indore from Tuesday.

Karnataka have been playing like true champions, winning handsomely each of their first four matches that coaches J Arun Kumar and Mansur Ali Khan will have to remind his players to take it a little easy so that when the knock-out stage arrives, they do not run out of steam.

Karnataka will be without all-rounder Stuart Binny, who departs on Tuesday with the other ODI players for Australia for the tri-series followed by the World Cup. Karnataka will also be without KL Rahul, the new Test batting sensation who has only on Monday returned from Down Under where he scored his maiden century in only his second appearance.

It remains to be seen how many of the India players who have returned from the Test leg in Australia will play this round, though there have been reports that Cheteshwar Pujara will play for Saurashtra against Vidarbha in Nagpur.

However, Karnataka have been a force to reckon with, having the right combination in both the batting and bowling departments and ably led by R Vinay Kumar. It is learnt that Rahul will turn out for his state for the remainder of the Ranji season from the next round (January 21-24) in Mysore against Baroda.

Karnataka have been so dominant in Group A that they have accumulated 25 points, more than double the points the second-placed Baroda (12) have.

Baroda, meanwhile, showed good form in their last match against Uttar Pradesh in Lucknow when a fit-again Irfan Pathan made a strong comeback to guide the team to a 10-wicket win. The spotlight will be on Irfan and his brother Yusuf when Baroda take on Railways in New Delhi.

Last week's win against UP was Baroda's first win in four games, but they surprisingly climbed to the second spot in the highly-competitive elite group that has teams like Mumbai, Jammu and Kashmir, Tamil Nadu and the bottom-placed Bengal.

Mumbai is the lone team that will be taking a break from this nine-team group.

Yusuf, who has been struggling with his batting till now, came good with the ball after an inspirational show from younger brother and picked up six wickets to flatten the UP side on their home turf. Baroda will have to make do for the rest of the season without Ambati Rayudu, who will be on national duty in the tri-series and the World Cup.

Railways, led by wicketkeeper-batsman Mahesh Rawat, are yet to win a game, but have managed 9 points from the four matches.

Elsewhere, in Group B, captain Gautam Gambhir and senior mate Virender Sehwag have been instrumental in taking Delhi to the top of their group and will once again look to dominate proceedings when they face lowly-placed Odisha in Delhi on Tuesday.

With 23 points from four matches including three victories, Delhi will be looking to consolidate their pole position if the weather in the national capital holds up in the four-day encounter at the Feroz Shah Kotla.

Sehwag has scored two centuries while Gambhir and Unmukt Chand have managed one each to make the side's batting look unbeatable. Once a strong pillar of Indian batting, Sehwag showed glimpses of his might in a 181-ball 147, laced with 16 fours and a six, in the last match in Lahli but the game ended in a disappointing draw with the weather forcing the final day's play to be abandoned.

Delhi still managed to bag three points on the basis of their first-innings lead.

—With PTI inputs

PLAYING TODAY
GROUP A: Bengal vs Jammu & Kashmir in Kolkata, Madhya Pradesh vs Karnataka in Indore, Railways vs Baroda in Delhi, Tamil Nadu vs Uttar Pradesh in Chennai

GROUP B: Delhi vs Odisha in Delhi, Gujarat vs Punjab in Ahmedabad (Live on Star Sports 2, 9.20 am), Maharashtra vs Rajasthan in Pune, Vidarbha vs Saurashtra in Nagpur

GROUP C: Andhra vs Tripura in Ongole, Himachal Pradesh vs Jharkhand in Dharamsala, Hyderabad vs Assam in Hyderabad, Services vs Goo in Delhi

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