Abey Kuruvilla won the toss and elected to bat considering that the team batting first had run out victors in the previous six matches played in the tournament. The calculation went wrong as Rohan Raje and Amit Dani quickly got rid of openers Yogesh Pawar and Kumar Subramaniam with just five runs on the board and when Anoop Rewankar was bowled by Rohan D Y Patil were clearly on the back foot. The slide continued as Mandar Dalvi too fell to Rohan Raje and when Yogesh Takawale fell at 45 D Y Patil were in dire trouble. Had it not been for Shoaib Shaikh who put on 29 with Rohit Rane for the sixth wicket and Abey Kuruvilla putting his head down and scoring 28 off 29 balls DY Patil would have well been bowled out for less than a hundred. Rohan Raje returned to dismiss Abey Kuruvilla and Aditya Dhole to restrict the opponents to 128 runs off 19.5 overs.

National who were without Rajesh Sutar owing to his father getting ill, began on a disastrous note losing Nikhil Patil followed by man of the series Dinesh Salunkhe dismissed for a duck with the score reading seven. Amit Dani too returned with a personal contribution of four and Atul Ranade got out for 19 leaving National tottering at 27 for 4. A good partnership of 33 runs ensued between captain Jude Singh and Mandar Phadke but Jude fell trying to drive leg spinner Pravin Tambe to be caught square of the wicket on the off by Shoaib Shaikh. Virendra Kambli joined Mandar Phadke and both played sensibly to add 41 runs for the sixth wicket. Mandar paid the penalty while trying to heave Aditya Dhole and losing his middle stick. The equation became little difficult towards the end with 21 needed off the last 12 balls. Shoaib Shaikh who was entrusted the job of bowling the penultimate over ended conceding 13 runs. Rohan Raje finished the argument with a boundary and a six off Mandar Dalvi, the slow left arm spinner who had to be employed by Abey after he ran out of other bowling options.