Himachal Pradesh and Delhi showed their bowling prowess as the Ranji Trophy kicked off on Tuesday, December 13.
It was a touch captaincy start for Delhi's Yash Dhull as Delhi were bowled out for 191. He was rescued by an Ishant Sharma-led pace attack that left Maharashtra at 80 for 5 on the opening day of their Group B match.
After Dhruv Shorey (41) and Anuj Rawat (24) added 54 runs for the first wicket, Maharashtra pacers Manoj Ingale (5/43), Rajvardhan Hangargekar (3/58) and Ashay Palkar (2/67) caused the most of the damage for their opponents. However,
When Maharashtra batted, Simarjeet Singh (2/16) quickly got rid of Pavan Shah (3) and Kaushal Tambe (0) before Ishant Sharma (1/21) reminded fans of the yesteryear with a fast and full-angled delivery on the off-stump and Tripathi pushed hard to give Lalit Yadav a regulation catch in the third slip.
In the Group A game between Himachal Pradesh and Haryana, the Himachal seamers made full use of the early morning moisture as they buried Haryana for a lowly 46. Then, their batters took full advantage of the conditions to take control. Vaibhav Arora (4/15), right-arm medium pacers Sidharth Sharma (3/12) and rookie Kanwar Abhinay (2/1) shared the bulk of the spoils. The team's senior-most pro Rishi Dhawan also got a wicket.
At stumps, Himachal were on 246 for 1, riding on opener Prashant Chopra's century (137) and his 219-run opening stand with Raghav Dhawan (86 batting).
Meanwhile, Leading the line for Railways was leg-spinner Karn Sharma, who bagged eight wickets as they reduced Vidarbha to just 213 runs, after captain Faiz Fazal hit a century on Day 1 of their Ranji Trophy Group D match on Tuesday, December 13. Fazal's 112 off 219 balls was the best for Vidarbha as his teammate lost their wickets around him. He also fell to Sharma as the experienced campaigner bagged eight wickets.
Fazal hit 12 fours during his innings but only Atharva Taide and Sanjay Raghunath managed to reach double-digit figures among the other Vidarbha batters as the 35-year-old former India bowler ran through the opposition batting line-up.
In reply, the Railways were 22 for 1 in 6.1 overs at stumps.
Meanwhile, in another Group D match played in Mohali, opener Prabhsimran Singh smashed a double hundred as the Punjab batters took the Chandigarh bowlers to the cleaners post 363 for 3 on Day 1. Prabhsimran was well helped by Abhishek Sharma, who also hit a century as the duo put on 250 runs for the opening wicket in 57.4 overs to bring down the Chandigarh bowlers.
Chandigarh went on to break their opening stand towards the end of the second session with Gurinder Singh getting the wicket of Abhishek, who hit exactly 100 off 146 balls with the help of 11 fours and two sixes. Prabhsimran was the last man out on the day, caught by Sandeep Sharma off Rohit Dhanda (2/50), who also got rid of Naman Dhir (34). Prabh hit 28 fours and two sixes during his 278-ball innings which lasted almost the whole day.
In Kolkata: Uttar Pradesh 198 in 63.5 overs (Rinku Singh 79, Priyam Garg 53, Ishan Porel 5/35). Bengal 29/4 (Shivam Mavi 3.14).
In Sovima: Uttarakhand 282 in 78 overs (Kunal Chandela 92, Dikshanshu Negi 83, Akash Singh 3/45). Nagaland 9/0.
In Cuttack: Odisha 214/5 (Shantanu Mishra 61, Subhranshu Senapati 52, Lukman Meriwala 2/46) vs Baroda.
In Agartala: Gujarat: 271 all out in 75.3 overs (Priyank Panchal 111, Manisankar Murasingh 5/74) vs Tripura 1/0 in one over.
In Jammu: Madhya Pradesh: 251 for 6 in 90 overs (Yash Dubey 81, Rajat Patidar 62, Shubham Sharma 52; Auqib Nabi 3/45)
