Rishabh Pant notched up his second first class century in only his fourth game, a strokeful and unbeaten 155, to keep Delhi in the hunt for the first innings lead against Maharashtra in their Ranji Trophy Group B match here on Saturday.
The left-handed Pant, who kept wickets for Delhi for almost two days during Maharashtra's massive first innings total of 635 for 2 declared, came in to bat when his side was in trouble at 135 for 3 and remained unconquered in a close of play tally of 376 for 5.
Pant, who had represented the country in the last Under 19 World Cup in Bangladesh, batted in an aggressive fashion to strike 6 sixes and 21 fours off the 165 balls he faced till stumps on day three of the four-day match at the Wankhede Stadium.
Pant's heroics were possible as he was let off thrice by the butter-fingered Maharashtra fielders - on 33, 62 and 93 - and went on to stitch together century stands worth 124 and 117 for the fourth and fifth wickets with Dhruv Shorey (71) and Milind Kumar (45).
Delhi were 51 for two before the innings was steadied by an 84-run partnership between Shorey, who struck 7 fours in 158 balls, and Nitish Rana (44).
Rajasthan beat Assam
Visakhapatnam: Aniket Choudhary grabbed five wickets while his pace colleague Pankaj Singh took four as Rajasthan ripped through Assam second innings batting line-up in a sensational bowling display to register an innings win in their Group B Ranji Trophy match here on Saturday.
Assam, who had scored 195 all out in their first innings, lasted just 20.2 overs in their second essay as they were bowled out for 69 as Rajasthan won the match by an innings and eight runs.
Only three of the Assam batsmen reached double-digit scores and five batsmen were out for duck. The abject surrender of Assam batsmen against the Rajasthan pace duo of Aniket (5/35) and Pankaj (4/26) could be seen as Rashav Das top-scored with 16 while the next best was a 14 by Arup Das.
Meanwhile, Aniket Choudhary grabbed five wickets while his pace colleague Pankaj Singh took four as Rajasthan ripped through Assam second innings batting line-up in a sensational bowling display to register an innings win in their Group B match.
Assam, who had scored 195 all out in their first innings, lasted just 20.2 overs in their second essay as they were bowled out for 69 as Rajasthan won the match by an innings and eight runs.