The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Sunil Joshi scalps five

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Thursday, Dec 23, 2004

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Sport - Cricket

Sunil Joshi scalps five

By Our Special Correspondent

MUMBAI, DEC. 22. Just the other day Venkatapathy Raju bid adieu from the game to pave the way for a youngster, while another practitioner of left-arm spin, Sunil Joshi, who succeeded him in the Indian team, is still plying his art successfully for Karnataka.

Joshi is virtually out of the national reckoning now, having last donned the India cap some three-and-a-half years ago, but the veteran spinner is serving his State team well in the National championship.

On Wednesday at the Wankhede Stadium, Joshi used the available conditions well to restrict Mumbai to 273 for eight. Joshi bowled more than a third of the 90 overs and returned with figures of five for 100.

Similarly, Vinay Kumar, bowled with great heart, extracted bounce and was rewarded with two wickets.

Joshi and Vinay Kumar did not give much leeway for Mumbai's batsmen to take charge, though it must be said that the pitch provided considerable bounce and disconcerting turn.

The Karnataka batsmen can expect to find themselves hemmed in by fielders to spinners Sairaj Bahutule, Nilesh Kulkarni and Ramesh Powar, just as Joshi did in the second and third sessions on Thursday.

Mumbai won the toss, elected to bat and saw Wasim Jaffer held by an alert Robin Uthappa at wide gully, the edge actually finding its way off Joshi's chest and chin and falling to the left of Uthappa. Joshi left the field for medical attention, but returned to take over the bowling in the 15th over.

The Karnataka captain, Sujith Somasundar, tried the other two spinners, left-arm Santosh Vadeyaraj and off-spinner C. Raghu, but had to look to his experienced spinner to exploit the pitch.

Ramesh Powar had no clue to what happened as Joshi's delivery hastened off the pitch, took the outside edge and landed in the hands of Dodda Ganesh.

Joshi kept to a flat trajectory and hit the deck hard, but did try to tease and tempt Nilesh Kulkarni in the end overs. Joshi's best moments came in the post tea session when he picked up three wickets in eight overs, but it was Raghu who sent back a busy Nishit Shetty.

Good partnerships

For Mumbai Vinayak Mane, dropped on 40 by Naidu (off Joshi), spent nearly three hours at the crease. He and Vinit Indulkar raised 102 for the second wicket. Indulkar looked fluent in his near half-century effort and Shetty was his usual self, enterprising and always looking for runs. The fifth-wicket partnership between Shetty and Bahutule produced 63 runs, after which Joshi appeared to be in the mood to run through the Mumbai innings.

The scores:

Mumbai — 1st innings: V. Mane c Naidu b Joshi 67, W. Jaffer c Uthappa b Vinay Kumar 7, V. Indulkar b Vinay Kumar 47, A. Muzumdar c Vadeyaraj b Joshi 18, N. Shetty c Naidu b Raghu 65, S. Bahutule c Ganesh b Joshi 27, W. Mota c Naidu b Joshi 3, R. Powar c Ganesh b Joshi 5, V. Samant (batting) 17, N. Kulkarni (batting) 0; Extras (b-4, lb-4, nb-9): 17. Total (for 8 wkts. in 90 overs): 273.

Fall of wickets: 1-27, 2-129, 3-129, 4-173, 5-236, 6-244, 7-254, 8-260.

Karnataka bowling: Ganesh 11-0-29-0, Vinay Kumar 16-2-55-2, Uthappa 5-2-13-0, Joshi 33-6-100-5, Vadeyaraj 10-0-30-0, Raghu 15-1-38-1.

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