Railways takes command and inches closer to glory
Railways have taken the vital first innings lead and consolidated their position thanks to an unbeaten 72 run partnership for the ninth wicket between Murali Kartik (47*) and Kulamani Parida (24*) to be on 318/8 at the end of the second day in the
Santhosh S
20-Apr-2001
Railways have taken the vital first innings lead and consolidated
their position thanks to an unbeaten 72 run partnership for the ninth
wicket between Murali Kartik (47*) and Kulamani Parida (24*) to be on
318/8 at the end of the second day in the Ranji Trophy final played
against Baroda at the Gujarat State Fertilizer Corporation Ground,
Baroda, on Friday.
Railways have gone ahead by 75 runs and still have two first innings
wicket intact. Baroda fought hard to reduce Railways to 246/8 and were
looking at a possibility of batting again and scoring heavily to set a
fourth innings target. The pitch is taking a lot of turn and bounce
and could well make a lot of difference on day four and five. As of
now, it has been the faster men who have made the difference on a
pitch which still has something in it for the quickies.
Railways lost the wicket of TP Singh, given out lbw off the bowling of
AP Bhoite. Singh , who was unbeaten on 60 overnight, could only add
seven more runs to his personal score. Sanjay Bangar and Yerre Gowda
put together a valuable partnership of 88 runs for the third wicket in
30 overs. Zaheer Khan and Irfan Pathan were too wayward in the first
half of the day.
Baroda claimed six Railways wickets for just 50 runs. Bangar (62) was
caught by HR Jadhav off the bowling of Zaheer Khan. He faced 196 balls
striking six boundaries and two sixes. Skipper Abhay Sharma (8),
Shreyas Khanolkar (4) and S Sahu (0) fell to the pressure applied by
the Baroda team. Gowda who played yet another patient knock, made 65
runs off 143 balls with the help of nine boundaries. He was
brilliantly caught by Jacob martin at first slip off the last ball
before the Tea-break bowled by left-arm spinner Valmik Buch.
Soon after the Tea interval, Zaheer Khan trapped Sudhir Wankhede (14)
in front of the wicket. Railways at that stage were ahead by just
three runs with respect to the Baroda's first innings score of 243 all
out. Rakesh Patel limped off the ground with a leg injury, leaving
Zaheer Khan and Pathan to do all the fast bowling. Murali Kartik and
Parida were all at sea against some purposeful bowling, but held on to
do their job. Baroda bowler's failed to keep a good line and length
and were subsequently punished by the tailenders. Kartik who shuffles
around in his crease and could have been dismissed as he kept playing
and missing at balls outside the off stump. He has struck four strokes
past the ropes so far in his unbeaten innings. Parida too grew in
confidence as he stayed for more time in the middle. It would only be
appropriate to blame the Baroda bowlers than give credit to the
Railways tailenders.