The Hindu : Andhra consolidates

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Nov 25, 2003

Sport

Sport - Cricket

Andhra consolidates

By Our Special Correspondent

VIJAYAWADA Nov. 24. If Kerala called the tune on Sunday, it was Andhra's turn on Monday. From an overnight 205 for four, the home side consolidated its gains to declare at 458 for seven on the second day of their Elite-A match here.

Neither Venugopala Rao nor I. Srinivas seemed stranded in the nervous nineties, testified by the latter reaching three figures with a cut off Oasis and Rao sweeping southpaw tweaker M. Suresh to make the magic mark.

As if to celebrate, Venu struck three more quick boundaries, featured by the square drive he leant into when patting Suresh's away-spinning delivery to the fence. Not much later, Venu departed, snapped up by second slip Hemanth Kumar off Sony Cheruvathore.

As is common with long partnerships, his companion Srinivas exited soon after and almost identically. Kerala stumper C.M. Deepak spilt a snick from Srinivas off Oasis, but the alert Hemanth scooped up the offering. Andhra's fifth-wicket stand was worth 243 runs and spanned a little over seven hours.

Elegance marked every stroke R.V. Ch. Prasad executed, particularly stylish being his swatting the Kerala attack backward of square. To reach his half-century, Prasad lofted Ananthapadmanabhan over the long-off ropes, off the first ball after tea.

K.S. Shabuddin, besides being the Andhra attack's spearhead, played with the authority of an accomplished batsman, cracking four boundaries and a six to reach 36 off 39 balls.

In the seven overs faced, the visitor posted as many runs but lost C.M. Deepak for no score.

Brief scores: Andhra 458 for seven declared (Y. Venugopala Rao 115, I. Srinivas 116, R.V. Ch. Prasad 82 not out, K.S. Shabuddin 36 not out; Sunil Oasis four for 61, Sony Cheruvathore three for 75) vs Kerala seven for one.

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