The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Tamil Nadu, Gujarat upbeat

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Wednesday, Nov 23, 2005

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Tamil Nadu, Gujarat upbeat

Sports Reporter

Rain threatens to spoil the proceedings

TIRUNELVELI: Tamil Nadu starts its opening fixture in the season's Ranji Trophy against Gujarat with a positive frame of mind in the Elite A group.

Both the coaches made all the right noises at the India Cements Sankar Nagar Turf Ground here on Wednesday. Although rain that started on Tuesday morning and continued till the afternoon was a real concern.

Although there was no practice session on Tuesday, Tamil Nadu coach B. Arun did not feel disappointed. "We had two practice sessions on Monday and in any case today was an off day for us," he said and added the team members are well prepared.

S. Sriram, who has been selected for the Board President X1 team to play against Sri Lanka will be replaced by R. Satish who will join the team soon. "Sriram is an experienced player and his services would definitely be missed, but still I am confident with our bench strength," Arun said.

Anshuman Gaekwad, chief coach of Gujarat said the mood in the dressing room was upbeat. "We are looking forward to the game and want to start the season on a winning note," he added.

The pitch was well covered and there was not much worry about the outfield as the alluvial soil would absorb the water at a much quicker pace, P.R. Viswanathan, ground in-charge said.

Match referee S.K. Bansal inspected the ground in the afternoon and was satisfied with the work of the ground staff. "The match should start on time, provided there are no rains," he said.

In other matches in the Elite Group A, Delhi takes on Mumbai at Delhi, Railways plays Karnataka at Delhi and Maharasthra meets Bengal at Pune. In Group B matches Punjab plays Services at Mohali, Uttar Pradesh takes on Haryana at Kanpur and Andhra meets Baroda at Anantapur..

Plate matches: Vidarbha vs Himachal Pradesh (Nagpur); Goa vs Orissa (Goa); Tripura vs Saurashtra (Agartala); Madhya Pradesh vs Rajasthan (Madhya Pradesh); Assam vs Kerala (Guwahati); Jammu & Kashmir vs Jharkhand (J&K).

The teams:

Tamil Nadu (from): Hemang Badani (capt.), L. Balaji, Dinesh Kaarthick, R. Ramkumar, Anirudha Srikkanth, S. Badrinath, C. Hemant Kumar, S. Sharath, D. Tamilkumaran, R. Jesuraj, R. Naresh, R. Satish, Aashish Kapoor, Vidyuth Sivaramakrishnan, K. Shri Vasudeva Das. Coach: B. Arun.

Gujarat (from): Mukund Parmar (capt.), Parthiv Patel, Nilesh Modi, Akash Christian, Niraj Patel, Kirat Damani, Bhavik Thakkar, Hem Joshipura, Lalit Patel, Siddharth Trivedi, Hitesh Majumdar, Asraf Makda, Hemal Watekar, Salil Yadav, Kalpesh Patel. Coach: Anshuman Gaekwad.

Umpires: A. Bhattacharya & B. Sharma. Match referee: S.K. Bansal.

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