23 wickets tumble on Day 1 at Rohtak : The match between Bengal and Baroda played at CH Bansi Lal Cricket Stadium, Lahli, Rohtak, saw 23 wickets falling on Day 1.
Put into bat, Baroda survived only for 30.4 overs in their first innings and ended up scoring 97 runs. Only four batsmen, Kedar Devdhar (13), Aditya Waghmode (17), Atit Sheth (13) and Saga Mangalorkar (13) could score in double digits.
Bengal bowling spearhead, Ashok Dinda, literally ripped through the Baroda battling line-up giving them virtually no time to settle down. He was ably supported in his mission by Mukesh Kumar and young Amit Kulia.
Dinda finished the innings with an analysis of 12.4-2-45-6 while Mukesh Kumar had the numbers of 14-4-39-3. Young Kulia picked up the wicket of Waghmode, giving away 12 runs in his 4 over spell.
Having put down the opposition ‘on the mat’, Bengal could not capitalise on the opportunity of building up a huge first innings lead that could have helped them to go for an outright victory.
Starting very poorly they also found themselves in the similar situation. They kept on losing wickets, which fell like ‘nine pins’. Except Sayan Mondal (13) and Sudip Chatterjee (37), none of the batsman could reach double figure. In fact, as many as four batsmen, skipper Manoj Tiwari, Pragyan Ojha, Mahesh Kumar and Amit Kulia could not even open their account.
The 20-year old seamer, Atit Sheth seemed completely unplayable for the Bengal batsmen. Eventually he went on to pick up the wickets of Abhimanyu Easwaran (4), Sayan Mondal (13), Agniv Pan (9), Manoj Tiwari (0), Pankaj Shaw (2), Srivats Goswami (3) and Ashok Dinda (6), giving away 36 runs in 12 over spell.
Restricting Bengal to 76 runs, Baroda took a lead of 21 runs.
Batting in the second innings, Baroda went into the same mode as the first knock and went on to lose 3 wickets with 63 runs on the board at close of play.
Opener Kedar Devdhar with 34 runs and Akshay Brahmabhatt with 7 runs remained unbeaten at close of play.
For Bengal, Mukesh Kumar accounted for Aditya Waghmode (9) and Deepak Hoda (7).
Baroda are ahead by 84 runs with 7 wickets in hand. If Bengal can restrict them to a small total, they could reassemble and try to go for an outright win.
