India Pistons on Saturday joined Chemplast, Pentasoft and India Cements to setup an all Chennai semi-final line up in the Moin Ud Dowlah Gold Cup Tournament. India Pistons made it to the semifinals despite losing the last league contest against Indian Oil Corporation. They went through by virtue of a better run quotient.

Electing to bat first, Pistons in their quota of 50 overs put up 213 for 9. Pistons owed its score to KS Sahabuddin (64 not out) after the top order struggled to find their footing and were tottering at 110 for 7 in the 29th over. Shabuddin added 66 valuable runs with P Muthupandian (20) for the eighth wicket in 15.2 overs. Then with WD Balaji Rao, he added a further 37 runs for the ninth wicket when Pistons ran out of overs to end up at 213. Shabuddin during his 82 minute stay at the crease faced 65 balls and sent five balls to the signboards and twice managed to clear the ropes.

In reply, Indian Oil Corporation started on a bad note when RS Sodhi struck thrice in his first three overs. He had Amit Dani (1) caught by Vasudevan in the second over of the innings and then in his third over, he dismissed Mithun Beerala (7). Hemant Kinicker (29) took the score to 80. But it was captain Mandhar Phadke (43) who held the IOC innings together with three useful partnerships with Jai P Yadav, RV Pawar and IR Siddique. After his dismissal Siddhique in the company of Zaheer Khan took IOC to victory.

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