Centurion Mayank Siddana and Gurkeerat Mann help Punjab raise a massive total while bowlers claim early wickets to push Mumbai on the back foot. With maiden centuries, Kuldeep Yadav and Saurabh Kumar boost UP to a mammoth score. And while the UP bowlers wreck the middle-order, Kedar Devdhar and Irfan Pathan revive Baroda.
Against Madhya Pradesh, Shreevats Goswami slams maiden double century to put Bengal in front. Abhinav Mukund misses out on hundred by one run against Gujarat in the last round of the league phase of Ranji Trophy 2016-17.
Group A Round 9 – Day 2 Round-up:
Punjab vs Mumbai in Rajkot: Punjab 1st inn 468/10 in 169.5 overs (M Siddana 115, G Mann 93, S Yadav 4/47, T Deshpande 2/71); Mumbai 1st inn 8/2 in 7.2 overs (K Pawar 1*, K Passi 1/0, M Grewal 1/6) Trail by 460 runs.
Gitansh Khera and Mayank Siddana resumed the Punjab innings on 216 for four and had added 40 runs to the overnight score when the former was sent back by Royston Dias. Siddana, who had resumed his innings on 11, however continued to hold up one end. He found an able partner in stand-in captain, Gurkeerat Mann. The pair formed a 178-run partnership until the skipper was sent back by Tushar Deshpande for 93 at the stroke of Tea. With a run added to the total, the medium-pacer claimed the centurion for 115 in the last session to reduce Punjab to 435 for seven. Suryakumar Yadav then followed up with the wickets Siddharth Kaul and M Grewal while Vishal Dabholkar claimed Rajwinder Golu to bowl Punjab out.
Mumbai were then left reeling on eight for two at stumps. Shreyas Iyer was sent back by Grewal for zero while Armaan Jaffer was out lbw to Kamal Passi at the stroke of stumps. When play ended for the day, opener Kaustubh Pawar was batting on one.
Baroda vs Uttar Pradesh in Nashik: UP 1st inn 481/10 in 115 overs (K Yadav 117, S Kumar 105, I Ahmed 41*, S Manglorkar 3/89); Baroda 1st inn 242/5 in 63 overs (K Devdhar 120*, IK Pathan 51*, I Ahmed 3/58) Trail by 239 runs
Kuldeep Yadav and Saurabh Kumar’s centuries down the order, followed by Imitaz Ahmed’s 41 not out lifted Uttar Pradesh to a massive 481 before being bowled out on the second day. Resuming on 85 and 77 respectively, Kuldeep and Saurabh added 39 runs to the overnight total until S Manglorkar struck to end the stand for 192. Pacer claimed Saurabh for 105 while Kuldeep was run out 43 runs later. Imitiaz Ahmed however, went on to add 39 runs with Ankit Rajpoot until the latter was bowled by Swapnil Singh to bowl UP out.
Baroda then lost Aditya Waghmode with 82 runs on the board. Imitiaz Ahmed bowled the opener while Ankit Rajpoot followed up with the wicket of A Brambhatt. Imitiaz then accounted for Deepak Hooda and Pinal Shah while Praveen Kumar sent back V Bhosale as UP reduced the team to 151 for five.
Captain Irfan Pathan then joined opener Kedar Devdhar, who had held up one end as the wickets crumbled at the other. The pair stitched a partnership to stem the fall of wickets and stabilized the innings.
Devdhar was batting on 120 with Irfan on 51 as they took Baroda to 242 for five at stumps.
Madhya Pradesh vs Bengal in Palam, New Delhi: Bengal 1st inn 475/9 decl (S Goswami 225*, A Easwaran 80, P Datey 4/105); MP 1st inn 19/1 in 9 overs (R Patidar 13*, M Raghav 5*, A Dinda 1/4) Trail by 456 runs
After Bengal resumed their innings on 185 for four, A Eswaran was the first wicket to fall on Day 2. The No 3 bat was trapped leg-before wicket by Chandrakant Sakure to end the fifth wicket stand for 114. S Goswami, however continued to anchor the innings with the lower order. Although Puneet Datey had Writtick Chatterjee and Ashoke Dinda a little later to reduce Bengal to 207 for seven, Goswami found able allies in Pragyan Ojha and Veerpratap Singh.
Goswami was involved in a 57-run partnership for the eight-wicket with Ojha followed by a 92-run stand with Veerpratap Singh. The Bengal wicketkeeper surpassed his previous first-class best of 112 runs as he posted his maiden double-century. He was unbeaten on 225 when Manoj Tiwary declared the innings on 475 for nine in the last session of the day.
Dinda then claimed Aditya Shrivastava off the first ball to give his side their first breakthrough. Rajat Patidar and M Raghav then took MP to 19 for one until stumps.
Tamil Nadu vs Gujarat in Belgaum: Gujarat 1st inn 307/10 in 112 overs (A Patel 44, T Natarajan 3/86); TN 1st inn 154/2 in 66 overs (A Mukund 99, K Gandhi 43*, R Kalaria 2/34) Trail by 153 runs
Gujarat were bowled out for 307 runs on the second day after resuming their innings on 267 for seven in the morning. Axar Patel was the first to depart; sent back by Aswin Crist for 44 while Hardik Patel was bowled by T Natarajan five runs later with the team on 295 for nine. A while later, Abhinav Mukund accounted for CT Gaja to end the team’s first innings.
With TN on 13, Rush Kalaria accounted for L Suryapprakash, but Abhinav Mukund and Kaushik Gandhi ensured the team with a solid foundation to script a reply for Gujarat’s first innings total. The pair added 141 runs to the total when the captain was bowled for 99 by the bowler. With TN on 154 for two, Gandhi was batting on 43 with Baba Indrajith yet to open his account when play ended for the day.
