Arvind leads the way as Karnataka wrest control

 With a mix of youth and experience, Delhi’s batting had enough firepower to challenge a quality Karnataka bowling line-up. However, they produced an extremely mediocre performance with the bat to allow Karnataka gain the upper hand on day one of their Group ‘B’ Ranji Trophy encounter here at the Eden Gardens on Thursday.

Skipper Karun Nair’s decision to bowl first turned out to be a masterstroke as Karnataka, led by S Arvind, bundled out Delhi for a paltry 90. The senior left-arm pacer, coming into the side in place of R Vinay Kumar, made good use of his experience to return with four for 12 while Abhimanyu Mithun (2/29) and K Gowtham (3/26) also put up fine efforts to push Delhi to their lowest ever total against Karnataka in Ranji Trophy.

In response, openers R Samarth  (53, 107b, 8x4, 1x6) and Mayank Agarwal (56, 129b, 8x4)  struck half-centuries to guide Karnataka to 131 for three at stumps, gaining a 41-run lead in the process.   On a surface that offered a hint of movement for the pacers, the Delhi batsmen lacked application and played without a plan. None of their batsmen showed character to stay in the middle and create partnerships. On the other hand, the Karnataka bowlers were disciplined right from the start and maintained an attacking approach to bowl out Delhi in the first session itself.

Mithun struck off the fourth ball of the day, trapping Unmukt Chand (0) leg-before. Skipper Gambhir’s half-hearted pull took a top edge and landed in the hands of Nair at mid-on, giving Arvind his first wicket.

Dhruv Shorey struck two cracking fours through the cover region as the right-hander began a recovery act with Nitish Rana but Karnataka struck again through Mithun. Rana attempted a shot away from the body to a short delivery and completely missed it to see his stumps rattled.

Rana’s fall brought the in-form Rishabh Pant to the middle. The youngster’s ploy to counter-attack worked only to a certain extent and despite two dropped chances, Pant was sent back for 24. He was dropped by Agarwal at slips off Mithun off the first ball he faced and the left-hander was also dropped by Gowtham at point, again off Mithun. Despite the reprieves, Pant never looked like staying for long and after a couple of lusty blows over the fence, he was dismissed, caught at slips, by Gowtham.

The off-spinner then bagged the important scalp of Shorey and Arvind produced a menacing second spell of 6-5-5-3 to wrap up the Delhi’s innings before lunch.  

The Karnataka openers then proved there were no demons on the pitch with an 87-run partnership. Samarth essayed another classy innings while Agarwal shed his natural attacking style to register a patient knock.

Delhi though slightly pulled things back in the final session when they picked up two wickets in the form of Uthappa and Agarwal but they will have to remain disciplined to get back in the game on the second day.

score board

DELHI (I Innings): Unmukt Chand lbw Mithun 0 (3m, 4b), Gautam Gambhir c Nair b Arvind 2 (24m, 16b), Dhruv Shorey lbw Gowtham 24 (82m, 48b, 5x4), Nitish Rana b Mithun 13 (47m, 41b, 2x4), Rishabh Pant c Samarth b Gowtham 24 (30m, 20b, 1x4, 3x6), Milind Kumar c Samarth b Arvind 0 (28m, 21b), Manan Sharma c Samarth b Gowtham 15 (46m, 27b, 3x4), Varun Sood lbw Arvind 0 (6m, 3b), Ishant Sharma b Arvind 5 (9m, 11b 1x4), Vikas Tokas st Gautam b Shreyas 4 (22m, 23b, 1x4), Pawan Suyal (not out) 0 (4m, 1b). Extras (LB-2, W-1) 3. Total (all out, in 35.5 overs) 90.

Fall of wickets: 1-0 (Unmukt), 2-10 (Gambhir), 3-40 (Rana), 4-52 (Shorey), 5-65 (Pant), 6-73 (Milind), 7-73 (Sood), 8-79 (Ishant), 9-90 (Manan).

Bowling: Abhimanyu Mithun 8-2-29-2, S Arvind 11-7-12-4 (w-1), Stuart Binny 6-2-21-0, K Gowtham 9-3-26-3, Shreyas Gopal 1.5-1-0-1. 

KARNATAKA (I Innings): R Samarth c Pant b Tokas 53 (137m, 107b, 8x4, 1x6), Mayank Agarwal c Chand b Tokas 56 (223m, 129b, 8x4), Robin Uthappa c Chand b Suyal 5 (65m, 43b), Karun Nair (batting) 3 (19b), Abhimanyu Mithun (batting) 7 (16b, 1x4). Extras (LB-5, NB-2) 7. Total (for 3 wkts, 52 overs) 131.

Fall of wickets: 1-87 (Samarth), 2-114 (Uthappa), 3-124 (Agarwal).
Bowling: Ishant Sharma 10-3-34-0, Pawan Suyal 12-4-27-1 (nb-1), Manan Sharma 13-2-25-0, Vikas Tokas 15-4-35-2 (nb-1), Varun Sood 2-0-5-0.

Ranji trophy scores

Group A: At Bilaspur: Bengal: 332/5 in 89 overs (SS Mondal 135, SD Chatterjee 51, AS Pan 70, Manoj Tiwary 45; Sandeep Sharma 2-70, VI Choudhary 2-66).

At Rohtak: Gujarat: 187 all out 56.4 overs (Parthiv Patel 61, CJ Gandhi 30, RB Kalaria 28; Anureet Singh 2-55, DN Bansal 6-46, RL Mali 2-61) vs Railways: 63/7 in 26 overs (RP Singh 2-11, Mehul Patel 4-22).

At Raipur: Madhya Pradesh: 239/2  (Aditya Srivastava 87, Mukul Raghav 25, Rajat Patidar 83, D Bundela 36) vs Mumbai.

At Dharamsala: Uttar Pradesh: 207/1 in 90 overs (Tanmay Srivastava 53, Samarth Singh 115 batting, Umang Sharma 36 batting) vs Tamil Nadu.

Group B: At Thumba: Vidarbha: 254/3 in 90 overs (RR Sanjay 83, Faiz Fazal 44, Ganesh Satish 93 batting, R Jangid 31; S Purkayastha 3-86) vs Assam.

At Vadodara: Jharkhand: 209 all out 73.5 overs (Pratyush Singh 33, Ishank Jaggi 49, Kaushal Singh 56; Pankaj Singh 5-60, Nathu Singh 2-65) vs Rajasthan: 26 for no loss in 12 overs.

At Vizianagaram: Saurashtra: 285/3 in 90 overs (SD Jogiyani 28, Cheteshwar Pujara batting 79 batting, Sheldon Jackson 105, Jaydev Shah 36 batting) vs Maharashtra. 

Group C:

At Mumbai: Jammu & Kashmir: 205/6 in 90 overs (SP Khajuria 90, Parvez Rasool 45; DP Vijaykumar 2-40, D Siva Kumar 2-32, BA Bhatt 2-71) vs Andhra.

At Guwahati: Haryana: 178 all out in 54.1 overs (RP Sharma 45, HV Patel 34; Pankaj Rao 2-47, AJ Mandal 4-26, A Tamrakar 2-54) vs Chhattisgarh: 68/1 in 24 overs (Rishabh Tiwari 30, SS Gupta batting 25).

At Cuttack: Goa: 333/2 in 90 overs (S Amonkar 101, SK Kamat 177, SS Kauthankar 35; DG Pathania 2-87) vs Services.

At Kalyani: Tripura: 305/2 in 90 overs (BB Ghosh 146, UU Bose 40, SK Patel 111 batting) vs Himachal Pradesh.

At Bhubaneswar: Kerala: 223/4 in 90 overs (BJ Thakkar 38, Rohan Prem 41, Sachin Baby batting 51, Jalaj Saxena 58 batting) vs Hyderabad.