Ranji Trophy round-up: Prithvi Shaw smashes his fifth first class century, Pant finds form

Mumbai’s teenaged sensation Prithvi Shaw continued his rich vein of form as he smashed his fifth century in seven first-class matches. Despite the effort, Mumbai stuttered their way to 248/6 at the end of Day 1 of the Group C Ranji Trophy clash against Andhra on Friday.

The 41-time champions lost two early wickets as opener Jay Bista (4) and star batsman Shreyas Iyer (0) departed with medium pacer Paidikalva Vijaykumar striking twice in the fourth over.

Shaw, though, kept Mumbai steady after the initial wobble. The 18-year-old went onto score 114 runs and was at the crease for 173 deliveries. He struck 14 boundaries and one six.

Shaw struggled for partners as Mumbai’s middle-order crumbled. Siddhesh Lad, who had helped Mumbai salvage a draw in their 500th game, kept Mumbai’s hopes of a competitive score alive with a gritty knock of 86.

Medium pacer Bandaru Ayyappa was the wrecker in chief as he finished with figures of 3/87.

Brief scores (Group C):
Madhya Pradesh 224/7 in 80 overs (Ankit Sharma 75*, Ankit Dane 63, K Vignesh 3/27) vs Tamil Nadu.
Mumbai 248/6 in 90 overs (Prithvi Shaw 114, Siddhesh Lad 86, Abhishek Nayar 21*, B Ayyappa 3/87) vs Andhra Pradesh.
Baroda 281/3 in 90 overs (Kedar Devdhar 104, Deepak Hooda 51, Vishnu Solanki 46*) vs Odisha.

Pant roars back to form

Rishabh Pant showed his natural flair for strokeplay with an attractive 99 in company of a reliable Nitish Rana (110*) as Delhi were comfortably placed 260 for 4 against Maharashtra on truncated first day of the Group A encounter.

In all only 62 overs of play was possible after light deteriorated in the final session.

Pant, who has not had any significant contribution during the current season did not get bogged down by the fall of wickets as his 99 off 110 balls had eight boundaries and six huge sixes.

Pant was finally snapped at slips by rival captain Ankit Bawne off Chirag Khurana but not before he has entertained one and all at the Airforce ground with his exhilarating strokeplay. He was especially severe on off-break bowler Khurana, whom he hit for four sixes – all down the ground.

Pant has had some issues against slow bowlers but he cleared the cobwebs in his mind as he used his feet to good effect against the spinners.

“I was never under any kind of pressure contrary to what people believe. There are times when you don’t get runs. It wasn’t as if I was trying to score quickly. I played 110 balls and all were not hit for boundaries and sixes. It means I defended well. Also I share a comfort level with Rana which reflects whenever we bat together,” Pant said after the day’s play.

Pant-Rana duo came together in the 16th over with Delhi in a spot at 55 for 3 with Gautam Gambhir (1), Anuj Rawat (20) and Dhruv Shorey (7) and added 168 runs for the fourth wicket.

Brief Scores (Group A):
Delhi 260/4 (Nitish Rana 110*, Rishabh Pant 99; Chirag Khurana 2/71) vs Maharashtra.
Hyderabad 289/8 (BP Sandeep 84, AT Rayudu 83; Arup Das 3/90, Rahul Singh 3/54) vs Assam.
Karnataka 327/3 (Mayank Agarwal 90, Dega Nischal 90*, Karun Nair 62, Manish Pandey 63*) vs UP.

Punjab bowled out for 147 in Bhajji’s FC comeback

Bengal bowlers showed enormous discipline to skittle out Punjab for a paltry 147 before reaching 76 for no loss as they completely dominated the proceedings during a group D encounter.

Harbhajan Singh, playing his first four-day game in over 21 months, will hardly be pleased with the performance of his batsmen as they could only play 46 overs during the day.

Opener Shubhman Gill scored 63 off 102 balls with nine boundaries but none of the other Punjab batsmen could cross 20.

Medium pacer B Amit (3/31 in 9 overs) and left-arm spinner Pradipta Pramanik (3/41 in 17 overs) were the wreckers in-chief.

Once Jiwanjot Singh (13) was trapped leg-before by an arm ball from Pramanik, Punjab never had any worthwhile partnerships.

Shubhman and keeper Abhishek Gupta (15) did add 33 runs for the fifth wicket but that was certainly not enough as wickets fell at regular intervals.

When Bengal batted, their young openers – left-handed Abhishek Raman (42*) and Abhimanyu Easwaran (33*) safely negotiated the Punjab attack.

Bengal need another 72 runs to take first innings lead. Skipper Harbhajan bowled six overs on the day and went for 27 runs.

Brief Scores (Group D):
Punjab 1st Innings 147 (Shubhman Gill 63; Pradipta Pramanik 3/41, B Amit 3/31) vs Bengal 1st Innings 76/0 (Abhishek Raman 42*, Abhimanyu Easwaran 33*).
Chhattisgarh 1st Innings 130 (Diwesh Pathania 4/45) vs Services 1st Innings 39/0.
Goa 1st Innings 239 (Keenan Vaz 72, Akshay wakhare 4/50) vs Vidarbha.

Dharmendrasinh Jadeja picks up six-for

Dharmendrasinh Jadeja took a six-wicket haul to enable Saurashtra bundle out Kerala for a meagre 225 on the first day of their Group B match against Kerala.

At stumps, Saurashtra were 37/0 with Robin Uthappa unbeaten on 20 and Snell Patel on 16.

Opting to bat upon winning the toss, Kerala lost their openers early but Rohan Prem (29) and Sanju Samson (68) managed to steady the boat.

The duo put on an 82-run stand together to take the team past 100-run mark.

However, Prem’s dismissal triggered a collapse and Kerala kept losing wickets at regular intervals and even the well-set Samson failed to put up a resistance, falling for 68 off 104 balls, which included six boundaries and three sixes.

Salman Nizar (28) chipped in with some runs down the order but Kerala’s innings folded in 78 overs. Jadeja finished with impressive figures of six for 112.

Brief scores (Group B):
Kerala 1st innings: 225 all out (Sanju Samson 68; Dharmendrasinh Jadeja 6/112) vs Saurashtra 1st innings 37/0.
Rajasthan 1st innings: 153 (Chintan Gaja 8/40) vs Gujarat 1st innings: 90/1 (Samit Gohil 46, Priyank Panchal 34*).
Haryana 1st innings: 119/7 (Himanshu Rana 35; Mohammed Mudhasir 4/34, Ram Dayal 3/35) vs J&K.