Ranji Trophy: Pujara helps Saurashtra take massive lead

India top-order batsman Cheteshwar Pujara missed out on a successive double hundred but helped Saurashtra post a commendable 570 against Gujarat in the first innings of their Group B Ranji Trophy tie here on Friday.

Pujara (182) stitched together a 253-run stand for the second wicket along with fellow overnight centurion Snell Patel (156) as Gujarat's 17-year old left-arm spinner Siddharth Desai returned best figures of 4/154.

Pujara, who scored 204 against Jharkhand in Saurashtra's previous encounter, put on 69 runs with Jaydev Shah (46) and then 53 with Prerak Mankad, who made 62 off 77 balls.

There was also a useful contribution from Chirag Jani, who finished with an unbeaten 46.

At stumps on the second day, Gujarat skipper and veteran stumper Parthiv Patel was batting on 29 while opener Priyank Panchal was not out on 12 as the hosts trailed by 525 runs.

In a Group A match, the Karnataka batsmen continued their good work on the second day as well with India discard Stuart Binny converting his overnight score of 14 into a well-crafted 118 off 155. Mayank Agarwal (169 overnight) made 176 off 250 balls before Nitish Rana got him run out.

Karnataka were 348/4 after the first day's play.

Wicketkeeper-batsman C.M. Gautam fell four short of a half-century as the R. Vinay Kumar-led side amassed a mammoth 649 in their first essay.

In reply, Delhi's Unmukt Chand (8) and Gautam Gambhir (12) remained at the crease during stumps at Alur.

In Kalyani, West Bengal, Vidarbha rode on openers Sanjay Ramaswamy's 182 and Faiz Fazal's 142 to usurp Bengal skipper Manoj Tiwary's decision to win the toss and field first.

They posted 499 to push the hosts to the brink after Lalit Yadav took two quick wickets to send opener Abhimanyu Easwaran (0) and in-form Sudip Chatterjee (15) packing early.

At stumps, Bengal were reeling at 89/3 with Tiwary looking good for his unbeaten 36 off 52 deliveries and Koushik Ghosh batting on 1 in the Group D clash.

At Palam ground in New Delhi, Sachidanand Pandey brought Goa to their knees after scalping 3/23. The Sagun Kamat-skippered side were 150/6 at stumps on Day 2 after the Services were also bowled out for a modest 263 with Heramb Parab taking three wickets for 37 runs.

In Cuttack, Tamil Nadu built on Murali Vijay's 140 with Vijay Shankar notching up a hundred from his overnight score of 8 and Baba Aparajith remaining unbeaten on 109.

The Abhinav Mukund-led side posted 530/8 declared with Odisha openers Sandeep Pattnaik and Natraj Behera batting on 15 and 17 respectively and the team on 36/0.

At the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai, Baroda made the most of a poor show with the bat by the hosts who were skittled out for a paltry 171 on the first day.

Overnight opener Aditya Waghmode scored a century (138 off 309) while skipper Deepaak Hooda racked up a decent 75 before being dismissed by Vijay Gohil. At stumps they were 376/4 having taken a healthy lead of 205 runs.

Elsewhere in Lahli, Haryana recovered from being 115/7 down at stumps on the first day to post 223 riding overnight batsman H.V. Patel's fighting 83.

In reply, Rajasthan failed to pose any sort of challenge, getting shot out for just 74. Haryana now lead by 149 runs.

Maharashtra rode on overnight wicketkeeper-batsman Rohit Motwani's 189 to post 481 against the Railways. At stumps, the Railways were 88/0 with openers Saurabh Wakaskar (32) and Shivakant Shukla (47) at the crease.

--IANS

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