LAHORE - Left-arm-spinner Raza Ali Dar’s astonishing seven-wicket haul went in vain as Central Punjab went down by 19 runs to Northern in the National T20 2nd XI tournament at the National Stadium, Karachi on Tuesday.

In the first match, Northern opted to bat first after winning the toss, pacer Aizaz Cheema took two early wickets to peg Northern back. Faizan Riaz 34 (26 balls, five fours and one six) and Noman Ali 33 (19 balls, three fours and two sixes) brought Northern back in the hunt. Northern lost their last four wickets for 10 runs including a hat-trick for Raza on the last three balls of the innings.

Raza who had already taken four wickets, finished the innings off in style to return remarkable figures of 4-0-29-7 as Northern were dismissed for 162 runs. Central Punjab were restricted to 143 for nine in reply. Usman Salahuddin top-scored with a 21-ball 27, Mohammad Saad scored 24 while Nauman Anwar contributed 23 runs. Leg-spinner Osama Mir took three, while Raza Hasan and Sadaf Hussain took two wickets each.

In the second match of the day, Southern Punjab recorded a three-wicket win over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on the back of another match winning innings by opener Zeeshan Ashraf.

SCORES IN BRIEF:

NORTHERN: 162 all out, 20 overs ( Faizan Riaz 34, Noman Ali 33; Raza Ali Dar 7-29)

CENTRAL PUNJAB: 143 for 9, 20 overs (Usman Salahuddin 27, Muhammad Saad 24; Usama Mir 3-31, Raza Hasan 2-19)

KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA: 197 for 6, 20 overs (Nabi Gul 94, Kamran Ghulam 23; Muhammad Imran 3-22)

SOUTHERN PUNJAB: 199 for 7, 19.4 overs (Zeeshan Ashraf 52, Zain Abbas 47; Khalid Usman 2-36)