Ignored Jadeja scores unbeaten 150, Jackson smashes 181

Ravindra Jadeja, who was ignored for the series against New Zealand, made a statement with an unbeaten 150 for Saurashtra on the first day of their Group B match against Jammu and Kashmir in the Ranji Trophy at Rajkot.

Jadeja, who has not played for India since the Test series in Sri Lanka two months ago, struck his eighth first- class hundred to take Saurashtra to 428 for four at stumps.

Jadeja shared a mammoth 281-run stand for the fourth wicket with Sheldon Jackson, who smashed 181 off 156 balls.

His blazing innings comprised 22 fours and seven sixes.

Jadeja, on the other hand, hit 18 boundaries and two sixes during his unbeaten effort.

The southpaw did not play in Saurashtra's Ranji Trophy opener against Haryana at Rohtak.

Test specialist and Saurashtra captain Cheteshwar Pujara was out for 13 today while new recruit Robin Uthappa was dismissed for 37 in only his second innings for the team.

Saurashtra was in a spot of bother at 59 for three before Jackson and Jadeja put their team in a commanding position.

Brief scores:

Saurashtra 1st innings: 428/4 in 90 overs (Jackson 181, Jadeja 150 batting).

 

Other Group B matches

Rajasthan (1st innings) 250/4 in 90 overs (Amitkumar Gautam 103 batting) against Jharkhand at Jaipur.

Kerala 1st innings: 208 all out in 20 overs (Sanju Samson 51; Piyush Chawla 5/69). Gujarat 1st innings: 60/2 in Nadia.

 

Rana, Rawat take Delhi to 318/6

Young guns Nitish Rana (89) and Anuj Rawat (74) continued their good form as Delhi reached 318 for six against Railways at stumps on day one of the Ranji Trophy group A encounter in New Delhi.

All rounder Mannan Sharma  (68 batting) also got his second fifty in as many matches.

Rana and Rawat carried on from where they had left off against Assam in the opening encounter after Delhi's top three Gautam Gambhir (2), Unmukt Chand (11) and Dhruv Shorey (16) were out cheaply with scoreboard reading 44.

Nitish, who faced 145 balls hit 12 boundaries as he again peppered the off-side field with cut shots and some flowing drives on the on-side.

Along with debutant Himmat Singh (45), Nitish added 109 runs for the fourth wicket.

As Nitish was looking good for his second hundred, he came down the track to a flighted delivery from Shivakant Shukla to be stumped 11 short of three figure mark.

Just like last match, the two left handers Rawat and Mannan batted with ease. The low bounce of the pitch and slowness made it easy to adjust.

Rawat again showed good temperament as he faced 152 balls before Anureet Singh (3/71) got him at the fag end of the day.

Brief score

Delhi 318/6 (Nitish Rana 89, Anuj Rawat 74, Mannan Sharma 68 batting, Anureet Singh 3/71) against Railways.

Other Group A matches

Assam 144 in 59.1 overs (Gokul Sharma 55; Shreyas Gopal 3/43). Karnataka 77/0 in 30 overs (Ravikumar Samarth 47 batting , Mayank Agarwal 26 batting) at Mysore.

Hyderabad versus Uttar Pradesh: No play due to wet outfield

 

Ghosh scores ton, Raman 94 to take Bengal to 283/2 on Day 1

Opener Koushik Ghosh struck his maiden first-class hundred on his return to the side after three and half years as Bengal were comfortably placed at 283 for 2 against Chhattisgarh in a Group D Ranji Trophy encounter in Raipur.

Playing only his second game for Bengal, left-handed Ghosh scored 114 off 221 deliveries adding 159 runs for the opening stand with another southpaw Abhishek Raman (94 off 177 balls).

Ghosh also added 98 runs for the second wicket with Sudeep Chatterjee (58 batting), who once again looked in fine nick having scored hundred in the opening round encounter against Services.

Chhattisgarh captain Mohammed Kaif used as many as eight bowlers but didn't get much help from a placid Veer Narayan Singh Stadium wicket.

Raman was unlucky to miss out on a maiden hundred as he was caught by Amandeep Khare off debutant shubham Singh's bowling.

Ghosh was unlucky to get run out during the final hour of play.

Skipper Manoj Tiwary, playing his 100th first-class game, is unbeaten on 14 alongside Chatterjee, who has hit six boundaries in 87 balls so far.

Brief scores:

Bengal 1st innings: 283/2 (Koushik Ghosh 114, Abhishek Raman 94, Sudeep Chatterjee 58 batting) against Chhattisgarh.

Other Group D matches

Goa (1st innings): 255 (Shagun Kamat 36, Pankaj Jaiswal 4/59) againstHimachal Pradesh: 2/0.

Punjab (1st innings): 161 all out (Abhishek Gupta 89, Yuvraj Singh 20, Lalit Yadav 3/47, S Neral 3/48) against Vidarbha (1st innings): 106/1

 

Smit Patel, Yashpal rescue Tripura

Smit Patel (99) and Yashpal Singh (96) missed out on centuries, but helped Tripura recover from 41 for 3 to reach 244 for 7 at stumps on the opening day of the Ranji Trophy Group C match against Tamil Nadu in Chennai.

Sent into bat by the home side, Tripura was dealt an early blow when Bishal Singh nicked the very first ball from K Vignesh to wicket-keeper Dinesh Karthik. Udiyan Bose, who made a century in the rain-affected opening game against Odisha, fell to L Vignesh for 2 to leave the team at 18 for 2.

R D Banik and Patel added 23 runs before the former was bowled by Rahil Shah for 17.

This brought together the experienced Yashpal Singh and Patel, the 'professionals' in the side. The duo gained in confidence gradually and defied the Tamil Nadu attack which included Test all-rounder Ravichandran Ashwin.

Patel, who was part of the India team that won the Under-19 World Cup in 2012 and Singh played several attractive strokes in their 162-run partnership.

The 24-year-old Patel fell while going for a big hit off M S Washington Sundar's bowling and was well caught by J Kousik, one short of a well-deserved ton.

Abhijit Dey fell five runs later, trapped leg-before by Sundar for a duck.

Yashpal Singh provided Ashwin his first wicket of the innings when he edged a catch to Dinesh Karthik for 96.

Gurinder Singh fell in the 88th over as Tamil Nadu hit back towards the end of play after a tough second session.

Brief scores Tripura 244 for 7 in 90 overs (Smit Patel 99, Yashpal Singh 96, K Vignesh 2 for 36, M S Washington Sundar 2 for 40) vs Tamil Nadu.

Other Group C matches

Madhya Pradesh 250 for 5 in 89 overs (Naman Ojha 99 batting, Ankit Sharma 63 batting, Wasim Ahmed 40, Akash Parkar 2 for 48) against Mumbai.

Baroda 247 for 7 in 90 overs (Kedar Devdhar 93, Vishnu Solanki 60, Swapnil K Singh 30 batting, B Ayyappa 3 for 46) against Andhra Pradesh.