India opening batsman KL Rahul will be available for Karnataka’s Ranji Trophy semi-final clash against Bengal at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata on February 29.
Rahul had asked to be rested from Karnataka’s quarter-final match but is now available for the climactic stages of the Ranji Trophy. Karnataka had already been strengthened by the addition of Manish Pandey for the quarter-finals, with both Pandey and Rahul having returned from New Zealand after India completed the limited-overs leg of their tour, ESPNcricinfo reported.
Last year’s finalists Saurashtra will take on Gujarat in the other semi-final at Rajkot. The other prominent players who will be part of the last four include Parthiv Patel (Gujarat), Jaydev Unadkat (Saurashtra) and Manoj Tiwary (Bengal).
Gujarat, Bengal, Karnataka, and Saurashtra had finished on top of the combined Groups A and B table, and all four progressed to the semi-finals after dominating their respective quarter-final matches.
Rahul has been phenomenal with the bat in the limited-overs series against Australia and New Zealand. He scored one century and four fifty-plus scores in his last ten innings in ODIs and T20Is combined.