The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Andhra banks on its top-order

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Sunday, Dec 25, 2005

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Andhra banks on its top-order

Sports Reporter

ANANTAPUR: Andhra will take on Haryana in the four-day Elite Group `B' Ranji Trophy match at the picturesque Rural Development Trust sports centre here from Sunday.

Andhra, with two points from three outings, is keen to do well. Coach Abid Ali is banking on the top-order batsmen to put up a healthy first innings total.

"So far so good. The players are learning from their past mistakes. Our batting clicked against the Services. We need to increase the run-rate to three to four per over in the initial stages," he said.

Keen to beef up the pace battery, the Abid Ali is likely to hand over the coveted ACA cap to Israel Raju.

Impressive stadium

Haryana coach Ashwani Kumar is highly impressed with the lush green outfield and felt the strip would help batsmen who wish stay in the middle for long and the medium pacers, who maintain good line and length.

"I played first class cricket in many grounds, all over the country. I find Anantapur stadium is one of the most beautiful venues in India," he said.

Haryana has garnered six points from four matches.

The teams (from):

Andhra: Y. Venugopala Rao (capt.), K.S. Shahabuddin, M.S.K. Prasad, T. Suman, A.K. Rayudu, Y. Gnaneswara Rao, A.S.K. Verma, D. Kalyan Krishna, Md. Faiq, K. Kumaraswamy, Israel Raju, Y. Lakshman Kishore, M.N. Vikram Verma, Balajikrishna Singh. Coach: Abid Ali. Asst. Coach: Krishna Rao.

Haryana: Amit Mishra (capt.), Joginder Singh, Gaurav Vashisht, Mahesh Rawat, Sachin Rana, Deepak John, Sumit Sharma, Saurabh Virmani, Sandeep Singh, Sunny Singh, Bageshwar Bisht, Pradeep Sahu, Jitender Malik, Tajinder Mann and Siddarth Verma. Coach-cum-Manager: Ashwani Kumar.

Umpires: Amish Saheba (Ahmedabad), P.S. Godbole (Nagpur). Match referee: Pankaj Patnaik (Cuttack).

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