With sun shining brightly and his hair pulled back, India’s tall spearhead Ishant Sharma ran up the Feroz Shah Kotla wicket with ferocious pace. Even though the pitch didn’t offer him much, he did manage to come out as the top performer on day 1 of the second round Ranji Trophy encounter against Vidarbha on Thursday.
Still not looking fully fit, he did just about enough to scalp 3-wickets in his four spells and restrict Vidarbha to 222/6 in their Group A match. Having won the toss, Delhi captain Gautam Gambhir chose to field and that proved to be a good decision early on with the visitors succumbing to 16/2.
The hosts got off to a dream start with seasoned Wasim Jaffer getting run out of the very first ball of the match. Ganesh Satish (5) followed without much of a fight either.
Faiz Fazal (56) and Subramanium Badrinath (44) top-scored for Vidarbha and steadied the ship as they put together 89 runs for the third wicket.
Not coasting easily despite the partnership, Aditya Shanware (41) and Jitesh Sharma (37 not out) provided further relief as they put together 71 runs for the sixth wicket. Ishant dismissed Shanware with keeper Mohit Ahlawat taking the catch only 7 balls before close of play.
While fellow paceman Pradeep Sangwan (2/34) barely got the ball to bounce above shin, Ishant was getting it to rear awkwardly. Ganesh Sathish got one that bounced and the resultant slash was taken by Vaibhav Rawal at third slip. His second wicket was well set Fazal, who gloved it to Mohit Ahlawat behind stumps as it kicked up from length.
It was Jitesh, whose cheeky shots got the score moving after Vidarbha were stuck for better part of the day.
Brief Scores:
Vidarbha: 222 for 6 (Faiz Fazal 55, S Badrinath 44; Ishant Sharma 3/26) vs Delhi.
Sudeep takes Bengal to 312/9
Bengaluru: Wriddhiman Saha made a nice comeback from injury with a finely compiled 90 which complemented youngster Sudeep Chatterjee’s patient 145 as Bengal managed 312 for nine against defending champions Karnataka in their opening Ranji Trophy match.
Put into bat, Bengal slumped to 41 for four before left-handed Sudeep and India’s Test specialist Wriddhiman conjured a 173 run partnership for the fifth wicket in 48.1 overs to take Bengal to a respectable total.
Apart from the duo, the only other batsman to cross the 20-run mark was former captain laxmi Ratan Shukla, who scored 24. Six of the Bengal batsmen failed to even reach the double figures.
While Wriddhiman’s three hour and 20 minute vigil saw him face 132 balls hitting 10 fours and a six, Sudeep, who has been the find of Bengal, last season got his second first-class hundred, batting close to six hours. He faced 247 balls hitting 16 boundaries.
For Wriddhiman, the match was about testing his fitness on his comeback after he unfortunately missed the third Test against Sri lanka after scoring back to back 50’s in the first two Test matches.
The Bengal stumper was cautious to begin with having come in with Bengal positioned precariously. He slowly built his innings in company of Sudeep.
The lanky left-hander Sudeep’s batting is easy to the eye and his upright stance and drives off the frontfoot make him a good player to watch. He looked equally assured off both his front and backfoot while Wriddhiman was particularly strong through the on-side as well hit some glorious shots through the off. When anything short was offered, he rocked back promptly.
Earlier, R Vinay Kumar (3/30) removed the opening duo Naved Ahmed (3) and Abhishek Das (6) his third over with away going deliveries which were pouched behind the wicket by Robin Uthappa and CM Gautham.
Shreevats Goswami (2) was run-out while Manoj Tiwary played an irresponsible shot being holed out off HS Sharath’s bowling to Ravikumar Samarth at deep fine leg.
Brief Scores:
Bengal: 312/9 in 88 overs (Sudeep Chatterjee 145, Wriddhiman Saha 90, R Vinay Kumar 3/30) vs Karnataka.
ElSEWHERE:
Rajasthan: 147/5 vs Assam; Maharashtra: 231/5 vs Odisha; Tamil Nadu: 225/5 vs Madhya Pradesh; Punjab: 154 lead Mumbai: 103/2 by 51 runs; Gujarat: 250/5 vs Andhra Pradesh; Railways: 166 lead Baroda: 118/1 by 48 runs; Jharkhand: 168 lead Saurashtra: 205 by 37 runs; Kerala: 186/5 vs Hyderabad; J&K: 274/8 vs Himachal Pradesh; Services: 230/3 vs Goa.