Chennai: For the second match in succession, Tamil Nadu conceded the first innings lead in their Ranji Trophy campaign on Sunday and this time they stumbled even after piling up a first innings total of 565 against Saurashtra.
Though the visitors were anchored by a chanceless innings of textbook shots from Cheteshwar Pujara (269), Tamil Nadu’s misery could be traced down to sloppy fielding. In their previous match against Uttar Pradesh, Abhinav Mukund dropped Piyush Chawla at gully and the lower-middle order player went on to score a hundred. Against Saurashtra, it was M. Vijay.
Saurashtra rode on a brilliant 353-run partnership, between Pujara and skipper Jaydev Shah (195), which could have been nipped in the bud had Vijay held on to a regulation catch at second slip on the penultimate day. Vijay was at it again on Sunday. This time he dropped Arpit Vasavada at 6. For the record, Vasavada’s cameo of 70 and his 157-run stand with Pujara for the fifth wicket ensured Saurashtra got three points against TN’s one.
After clubbing two big sixes, Shah fell just five short of his maiden firstclass double hundred, caught at gully off Aswin Crist, in the morning session, but only a wet day threatened to stop Saurashtra’s march. Bad light forced the players off the field and Saurashtra needed 131 when play resumed after an early lunch.
Sensing the urgency to score at a brisk rate, Pujara and Vasavada stepped on the gas.
A graceful Pujara raced to his ninth first-class double hundred with a square drive off J.Kaushik and the deficit was cut down to 36 when heavy rain brought the covers on, leaving the Saurashtra dressing room worried. After around an hour, the weather finally made way for the visitors to overhaul TN’s first innings total of 565.
Pujara’s marathon innings — a good match practice ahead of the South Africa tour — came to an end when he slogswept B. Aparajith to be caught at deep midwicket for 269.Saurashtra captain Shah said both the teams were hoodwinked by the presence of grass on the wicket.
“For sure, it developed into a batting track. Only a very few teams have chased a total like this. So I consider the result as a big win.
“A good start in the morning saw us through with Pujara staying calm in the middle. Had TN grabbed those (catches) chances, things could have been different,” he added.
Scoreboard Tamilnadu, 1st innings : 5 56 65 5 S Sa au ur ra as sh ht tr ra a ( (1 1s st t i in nn ni in ng gs s) ): : Bhushan Chauhan c Dinesh Karthik b L. Balaji 3, Sagar Jogyani (run out) 0, Cheteshwar Pujara c Aswin Crist b B.
Aparajith 269, Sheldon Jackson c Dinesh Karthik b R. Prasanna 28, Jaydev Shah c Aparajith b Aswin Crist 195, Arpit Vasavada
c Aswin Crist b Aparajith 70, Chirag Jani (not out) 0. Extras (b5, lb4, nb7) 16. Total (for six wicket in 161.4 overs) 581.
FoW: 1-2, 2-12, 3-66, 4419, 5-576, 6-581.
Bowling: Balaji 27-9-77-1, Aswin 19-2-76-1, Kaushil 29-4-108-0, Prasanna 81-26-1, Aushik 46-7-1550, Aparajith 22.4-3-71-2, Indrajith 9-0-50-0, Vijay 1-0-9-0.
