New Delhi, Dec 8 : Opener Abhinav Mukund's rather obdurate but invaluable knock of 84 (221b, 8x4) lifted Tamil Nadu to 240 for five in reply to Karnataka's first innings tally of 290 on the second day of the four-day Ranji Trophy match as Delhi's Parwinder Awana and Rajat Bhatia reduced Saurashtra to 152 for six here Monday.
Tamil Nadu's hopes of overhauling Karnataka total on the morrow hinge on skipper Ramaswamy Prasanna who was unbeaten in 51 (115b, 7x4) at stumps.
With Karnataka bowlers pegging away with accuracy, runs were hard to come by and the early loss of wickets, those of opener Mukesh Gandhi (12) and Baba Aparajith (5) saw Tamil Nadu batsmen grafting for runs with their cautious approach.
Mukund added 90 runs with former India stumper Dinesh Karthik (38) for the third wicket and just as the partnership seemed to prosper, the latter was declared caught behind off seamer HS Sharath with replays suggesting there was no contact with the ball going down the leg-side.
Meanwhile, at Delhi's Roshanara Club Ground, Awana (61) and Sumit Narwal (65) contributed significantly to push the home team's total to 442. Delhi had an overnight score of 260 for six with Gautam Gambhir (unbeaten 123) and Awana still batting.
Skipper Gambhir's brilliant innings ended at 147 when he was run out by Chirag Jani. Shivam Sharma (9) also lost his wicket but Narwal joined Awana and the duo scored at a brisk pace to trouble the Saurashtra bowlers. Sudeep Tyagi accounted for Narwal while Awana fell to Kamlesh Makwana.
Later, medium pacer Awana returned to bowling and ran through the visitors' top three with an aggressive line and length. Chirag Pathak (1), Sagar Jogiyani (12) and Arpit Vasavda (38) all lost their wickets to the probing deliveries from Awana.
Experienced medium fast bowler Bhatia toppled Sheldon Jackson (11), Jaydev Shah (34) and Jani (3) to put Delhi in a commanding position.
In Jaipur's Sawai Mansingh Stsdium, Rajasthan were reduced to 172/8 and they are trailing by 168 runs against Gujarat. Rush Kalaria and Ishwar Chaudhary took three wickets apiece to down the home team, which had started the day on a bright note.
After the first day's core of 280/4, it seemed that the visitors will put up a big score but Shailender Gehlot and Pankaj Singh put their team back in contention. However, Rajasthan lost wickets regularly to run into trouble.
Brief Scores:
Hyderabad vs Andhra - Hyderabad 1st innings 522 allout (Chama Milind 95, Dwaraka Ravi Teja 96; Duvvarapu Sivkumar 4/84) vs Andhra 1st innings 121/0 (KS Bharat 71, DB Prasanth 50).
At Guwahati,Assam Vs Tripura - Tripura 1st innings 135(M. Murasingh 47; S Roy 3/6, K Das 3/41) & 2nd innings 2/0 vs Assam 1st innings 275 (Kunal Saikia 64, Jalamuddin Syed Mohammad 51; M. Murasingh 5/70, Abhijit Sarkar 47/3).
At Vadodara, Bengal vs Baroda - Bengal 1st innings 455 all-out (Sudip Chatterjee 192, Shreevats Goswami 87; Swapnil Singh 5/99, Munaf Patel 2/75) vs Baroda 1st innings 86/3 (Kedar Devdhar 32 not out, Dhiren Mistry 26; Laxmi Ratan Shukla 4/2, Veer Pratap Singh 39/1).
At Delhi, Delhi vs Saurashtra - Delhi 1st innings 442 allout ( Gautam Gambhir 147,Sumit Narwal 65; Sudeep Tyagi 95/3, Dharmendrasinh Jadeja 85/2) vs Saurashtra 1st innings (Divyaraj Chauhan 40 batting, Arpit Vasavada 38; Parwinder Awana 3/20, Rajat Bhatia 3/24).
At Bengaluru, Karnataka vs TamilNadu - Karataka 1st innings 290 all-out (Chidambaram Gautam 94, Kunal Kapoor 87; Jagannathan Kaushik 4/53, M Mohammed 3/80) vs Tamil Nadu 1st innings 240 for five (Abhinav Mukund 84, Ramaswamy Prasanna 51 not out; HS Sharath 2/22, Shreyas Gopal 1/15).
At Wayanad, Goa vs Kerala- Goa 1st innings 367 all-out ( Amogh Sunil Desai 75, Darshan Misal 67; Basil Thampi 4/110, Nizar Niyas 3/74) vs Kerala 1st innings 60/2 (KB Pawan 28, Amit Verma 9 not out).
At Pune, Maharastra vs Odisha - Odisha 1st innings 311 all-out ( Nataraj Behera 66, Biplab Samantray 106; Shrikant Mundhe 4/103, Dominic Joseph 3/57) vs Mahrastra first innings 126 for no loss (Harshad Khadiwale 76 not out, Chirag Khurana 48 not out).
At Mumbai, Mumbai vs Jammu and Kashmir - Mumbai 1st innings 236 all out. (Suryakumar Yadav 57; Waseem Raza 3/29, Ram Dayal 3/51) vs Jammu and Kashmir 1st innings- 254 all out (Shubham Khajuria 107, Ian Dev Singh 70; Vishal Dabholkar 3/30, Dhawal Kulkarni 47/2) Mumbai 2nd innings 66/4 (Kevin Almeida 27, Suryakumar Yadav 17 not out; Ram Dayal 2/31, Umar Nazir 2/8).
At Patiala, Punjab vs Haryana- Punjab 1st innings 273 all out ( Yuvraj Singh 59, Amitoze Singh 45; Jayant Yadav 6/85, Amit Mishra 3/72) vs Haryana 1st innings 283 all out ( Jayant Yadav 51 not out, Abhimanyu Khod 42; Rajwinder Singh 3/62, Sarabjit Ladda 3/90) Punjab 2nd innings 21 for no loss (Manah Vohra 11, Jiwanjot Singh 10).
At Delhi, Madhya Pradesh vs Railways - Madhya Pradesh 1st innings 181 all-out (Jalaj Saxena 41 ,Rameez Khan 41; Anureet Singh 5/43) vs Railways 1st innings 253 for 7 (Arindam Ghosh 113 not out, Avinash Yadav 50; Puneet Datey 3/69, Avesh Khan 2/41).
At Jaipur, Rajasthan Vs Gujarat - Gujarat 1st innings 340 all-out. (Priyank Kirit Panchal 68, Bhargav Merai 74; Pankaj Singh 3/55, Shailender Gehlot 3/67) vs Rajasthan 1st innings (Arijit gupta 44, Rajesh Bishnoi 36; RB Kalaria 3/47, Ishwar Chaudhury 3/52).
At Delhi Services vs Himachal Pradesh- Services 1st innings 226 all out. (Deepak Punia 64; Vikramjeet Malik 3/33, Rishi Dhawan 3/57) vs Himachal Pradesh 1st innings 225 for six( Ankush Bains 67, Rashmi Parida 54; Suraj Yadav 2/55, Abhishek Sakuja 2/30).
