Duleep Trophy final: Kishan’s hundred leads East’s run glut on Day 1
Skipper Ishan Kishan struck a flowing unbeaten 111, leading East Zone to a commanding 385 for four against a sloppy South Zone on the opening day of the Duleep Trophy final here on Sunday.
Kishan (14x4, 1x6) and Kumar Kushagra (63) were batting at stumps, and the fifth wicket pair has so far added 144 runs in just 26.4 overs.
The other contributors were teen phenom Vaibhav Sooryavanshi (44, 37b), Abhimanyu Easwaran (72), and Shikhar Mohan (85).
Kishan, who completed 4000 first-class runs, merged aggression and composure to a nicety in his 135-ball knock, and raised 94 runs for the fourth wicket with Mohan.
It came at an important juncture too when East were in trouble, the only time in the first innings so far, at 147 for three.
South could have had their rivals in a far deeper predicament but Kishan and Mohan averted the disaster on a pitch that remained true the whole day.
Kishan’s was a complete innings, sending the ball to all parts of the field through powerful pulls and imperious drives through the covers.
The left-hander reached his fifty in 71 balls and then the next 50 came off 51 balls, completing his 10th first-class hundred.
Kishan reached the landmark with a driven four off Shreyas Gopal, who was playing in his 100th first-class match.
At the other end, Mohan has a solid presence, showing a lot more maturity than his tender 21 years.
The feature of his innings was the judgment he showed to leave the ball outside off-stump. There was not even one single play and miss in his innings.
But his fifty was not all about defence as Mohan carted off-spinner Tripurana Vijay for a six and two fours in one over to showcase his range.
Just as he was nearing a well-deserved hundred, Mohan chopped left-arm pacer CV Milind, who replaced an injured Vidwath Kaverappa, on to his stumps.
In fact, it was the East’s first innings story in a nutshell, batters getting dismissed before the innings reached the full bloom.
Easwaran, who is often dubbed as an obdurate batter, looked in complete control, and at times even outpaced Sooryavanshi.
They milked 100 runs for the opening wicket in just 14.overs and East seldom let that momentum slip.
Sooryavanshi would curse himself for playing a rather reckless pull off Milind for substitute Tanay Thayagarajan to offer a simple catch in the deep.
It, perhaps, was the first time South bowlers tested the young left-hander with a short-pitched ball and it yielded instant results.
The whole sequence will teach the Bihar youngster to show more patience in the middle, particularly when nearly 10,000 spectators thronged the MA Chidambaram Stadium to watch the latest wonder kid in cricket.
Kushagra too played with determination as South withered under a barrage of runs.
Nothing more revealed the plight of South than the sight of lead pacer Mohammad Siraj going through three colourless spells.
The India quick’s outing on the day read - 5-0-41-0, 5-1-24-0 and 4-0-31-0 for an overall reading of 14-1-96-0. Siraj was clobbered around by Sooryavanshi (6, 4, 4), Easwaran (4, 4), Kushagra (6, 4) as the Hyderabad man struggled to make an impact.
He can partly blame a flat pitch for his ineffectiveness, but there was no real attempt from his side to alter the course of the happenings.
Unless, South find a way to pluck East’s remaining six wickets on Monday quickly they will be further buried under an avalanche of runs, and will find it tough to come out of it.
