Shivam, Tushar put Mumbai in driver's seat vs Railways

All-rounder Shivam Dubey's smashing hundred complemented by pacer Tushar Deshpande's late evening burst saw Mumbai gain upperhand against Railways on the second day of the Ranji Trophy group A encounter on Friday.

After Siddhesh Lad (99) missed out on a hundred, Dubey (114) struck his maiden century in only his second first-class game as Mumbai scored 411 in their first essay.

The Railways were down in the dumps at 115 for 6 with Deshpande (3/29 in 11 overs) struck a double blow with the semi-new ball.

Dubey on his part took a wicket while senior seamer Dhawal Kulkarni also got a wicket.

For Railways, their senior pro Arindam Ghosh is at the crease having crawled his way to 39 off 115 deliveries.

At the start of the day, Lad, who hit a couple of boundaries to reach into the 90's was bowled by left-arm spinner Avinash Yadav with a just a run required for his coveted three-figure mark. Lad faced 189 deliveries and hit 14 boundaries.

However left-handed Shivam played a counter-attacking knock, hitting 13 fours and four sixes in 139 balls.

He was severe on the spin troika of Harsh Tyagi (4/83), Avinash Yadav (3/99) and Madhur Khatri (0/77 in 17 overs).

Dubey shared a 56-run seventh wicket stand with skipper Kulkarni (22) and then upped the ante alongside tailenders to get his side passed 400-run mark.

He was the ninth batsman to be dismissed after Tyagi found a nick which was pouched by rival skipper Mahesh Rawat.

Nicely warmd up after his hundred, Dubey then came on as first-change bowler to remove opener Saurabh Wakaskar (22) after Deshpande and Kulkarni got rid of Nitin Bhille and PS Singh respectively.

Reduced to 62 for 4, Rawat (30) and Ghosh added 49 runs for the fifth wicket before Deshpande struck twice at the fag end of the day.

Brief Scores
Saurashtra 1st innings 475 (Sheldon Jackson 147, Snell Patel 91, Harvik Desai 78, Cheteshwar Pujara 56, Mohd Shahnawaz 4/97). Chhattisgarh 1st Innings 88/0 (Sahil Gupta 51 batting)
Baroda 1st innings 290 (Yusuf Pathan 69, Siddharth Desai 5/109); Gujarat 1st Innings 264/6 (Samit Gohil 63, Rujul Bhatt 70, Bharghav Bhatt 3/69)