Baroda's Deepak Hooda ripped the Punjab attack to shreds on day one of the third round of the Ranji Trophy match at Ferozh Shah Kotla in Delhi. Hooda's unbeaten 190 helped Baroda post a huge score of 358/6 at the close of play.
Maharashtra found yet another batting hero in Naushad Sheikh (118 not out) against Rajasthan. Haryana restricted Andhra to 217/6 with leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal starring with the ball.
Bengal, though, disappointed with the bat but finished on a high by scalping four Railways wickets. A resurgent Tamil Nadu continued to impress. Dinesh Karthik was in terrific form once again and missed out on a three-figure score by five runs against Madhya Pradesh. Gautam Gambhir's Delhi also impressed, taking an upper hand against Odisha.
Hooda's pyrotechnics
Deepak Hooda, the young Baroda batsman, has already been sounded out as a future India international and the he did his reputation no harm with a terrific unbeaten 190.
For Punjab, medium-pacer Sandeep Sharma stood out with a the ball, scalping four wickets. Having conceded a whopping 358 runs on day one, Punjab's best hopes of getting back into the game lies in running through the Baroda tail. Yuvraj Singh and his team are faltering after a solid start to the season.
Aravind continues to impress
In the previous round, Delhi batsmen were all at sea playing left-armer Sreenath Aravind. Here, it was the Assam who struggled with his canny line and slippery pace. Despite taking a five-for, Aravind's support cast failed to lend him support. Assam's Amit Verma was unbeaten on 125, scoring over Aravind's 5/49.
Bengal falter but pick themselves up
Bengal have been impressive in the tournament so far but Railways, led by pacers Amit Mishra and Anureet Singh, made the batsmen hop, skip, and jump and the crease.
Bengal's talisman Sudip Chatterjee seemed to be batting on a different surface from the rest of his teammates and his sturdy 85 saved the day for his team. After folding out for a modest score of 205, Railways started well but Ashok Dinda and Co. picked up four wickets in quick succession to hand the advantage back to their side.
Brief scores:
Himachal Pradesh 8/2 (Prashant Chopra 4; Chama Millind 1/4) vs Hyderabad
Kerala 194/8 (Rohan Prem 62; Pankaj Kumar Rao 3/35) vs Chhattisgarh
Baroda 358/6 (Deepak Hooda 190 not out; Sandeep Sharma 4/64) vs Punjab
Tamil Nadu 262/4 (Dinesh Karthik 95; Chandrakant Sakure 2/47) vs Madhya Pradesh
Bengal 205 (Sudip Chatterjee 85; Anureet Singh 4/66) lead Railways 37/4 (Mrunal Devdhar 17; Ashok Dinda 2/17) by 168 runs
Gujarat 276/8 (Parthiv Patel 60; Imtiaz Ahmed 4/48) vs Uttar Pradesh
Odisha 237 (Subhranshu Senapathi 76; Varun Sood 3/23) trail Delhi 46/0 (Gautam Gambhir 26 not out) by 194 runs
Maharashtra 280/3 (Naushad Sheikh 118 not out; Pankaj Singh 2/38) vs Rajasthan
Assam 268/6 (Amit Verma 125 not out; Sreenath Aravind 5/49) vs Karnataka
Vidarbha 105 (Jitesh Sharma 21; Vikash Singh 4/24) trail Jharkhand 146/1 (Pratyush Sharma 80 not out; Rajneesh Gurbani 1/28) by 41 runs
Andhra 217/6 (Prasanth Kumar 74; Yuzvendra Chahal 3/57) vs Haryana
Tripura 283 (Rajat Dey 87; Shadab Jakati 4/67) vs Goa
Services 287/3 (Gahlaut Rahul Singh 127 not out; Parvez Rasool 2/68) vs Jammu & Kashmir
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