Patidar ton helps MP take lead

Best Batting Performances

Skipper Rajat Patidar led from the front with a fine 107 not out as Madhya Pradesh marched to a lead of 73, with four wickets still in hand, against Punjab on Day 2 of their opening Ranji Trophy fixture in Indore.

Sanat Sangwan (211*) and Ayush Doseja (209) both went on to post double hundreds as Delhi declared on 529/4 against Hyderabad. The duo converted their overnight unbroken partnership into a mammoth 319-run stand, setting the base for Delhi's early dominance.

Likewise in Goa, Abhinav Tejrana (205) and Lalit Yadav (213) went on to make double-centuries on Day 2 to set the base for the home team's mammoth 566 in the first innings.

Deepak Hooda's unbeaten 101 formed the basis of Rajasthan's strong reply on Day 2 after Chhattisgarh ended with 332 in their first innings. Hooda came onto the crease in the 10th over itself, with his team reeling at 26/2, and went on to stitch useful partnerships with Abhijeet Tomar Kartik Sharma in taking his team past the 200-run mark by stumps.

Ishan Kishan converted his unbeaten century from Day 1 to a 173, setting the platform for Jharkhand's strong first innings total of 419. Sahil Raj, with a patient 77 off 183 at no. 8, gave company for a fine 214-run stand.

Like Kishan, over in Bengaluru, Vidarbha opener Aman Mokhade too failed to convert his big hundred into a double - getting out early on Day 2 for 183, but lower-order contributions took the side to 463 nonetheless.

Overnight batter Shams Mulani missed out on a century by nine runs but J&K skipper Paras Dogra stepped up once more with an unbeaten 112 to bail his team out of early trouble. Reduced to 32/3, Dogra steadied the ship to take J&K to a respectable 273/7 when the stumps were drawn in Srinagar.

Shaik Rasheed, unbeaten on 94 overnight, went on to complete a fine hundred as he added valuable stands with the middle-order to take Andhra's first innings score to 470 with his 136 off 284 balls.

Parth Vats' century was the only shining light in Haryana's second successive dismal batting show in the opening fixture against Railways. His hundred at No. 7 eventually took the team's lead to 244 by stumps.

Sudip Chatterjee (98) narrowly missed out on a century, but Sumanta Gupta is 18 away from his as together they starred on Day 2 to take Bengal to a comfortable 61-run lead against Uttarakhand, four wickets still in hand.

Services wicketkeeper, too, was unfortunate to miss out on a deserving hundred by four runs but his defiant stand with Pulkit Narang (69) helped Services to 359 in their first innings from a bothersome 246/6 overnight.

Unbroken 166-run stand between openers Abhishek Desai (80*) and Aarya Desai (79*) has helped Gujarat start strong in reply to Assam's first innings total of 310 in Ahmedabad.

Chirag Jani joined the long list of batters to miss out on a triple-figure mark, but his 90 off 148 helped Saurashtra start strong in reply to Karnataka's 372, before ultimately losing their way in a collapse of 4 for 31 to end the day at 200/4.

Best Bowling Performances

Vipraj Nigam, with his 4 for 136, was able to restrict some of the damage for Uttar Pradesh as he struck at regular intervals to trouble Andhra's middle-order, eventually helping in restricting them below 500 that they once looked set to cross on the opening day.

Chandigarh's bowlers had a field day against Goa, but Vishu Kashyap still had a memorable day - claiming 7 for 173 in the first innings after a hard couple of days in the field.

After a 16-wicket opening day, it was Himanshu Sangwan (4 for 31) and Kunal Yadav (3 for 52) who shone on Day 2 to reduce Haryana to 201/9 in their second innings despite Vats' century. Earlier in the day, Haryana's Sumit Kumar completed his fifer to finish with highly impressive figures of 10-4-16-5 in the first innings.

Devendra Singh Bora was the pick of the bowlers for Uttarakhand, claiming all of the top-four in a hard day's work for his team even though it couldn't prevent Bengal from taking a first-innings lead.

To his three-fer on the opening day, Swapnil Singh added the scalps of both the late-order half-centurions to ultimately finish with 5 for 104 in Tripura's first bowling innings against Services.