The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Sanyal scores century for Railways

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Friday, Dec 28, 2007
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Sanyal scores century for Railways

Special Correspondent

Nagpur: The Railways batsmen showed steely resolve to get nearer to Kerala’s first innings total of 357 in the Ranji Trophy Plate group semifinal cricket match at the Vidarbha Cricket Stadium here on Thursday.

Harshad Rawle, Sanjib Sanyal (115, 300b, 18x4) and Mahesh Rawat made substantial contributions and made it an engrossing contest between the bat and the ball.

Lack of quality spinner

Kerala suffered from want of a quality spinner to support a decent set of seamers who toiled hard on a surface that played true and offered consistent bounce for the batsmen to feel secured and play some strokes.

Kerala cannot afford to be behind on the first innings by many runs in order to set a target and attempt to force a win on the fifth day.

Railways began its fightback from 41 for three in the 20th over through Rawle and Sanyal.

Hard chance

After offering a hard chance to Prashant Chandran in the last session on Wednesday, Rawle stuck to a task, mixing defence and aggression.

Sanyal on the other hand, kept himself busy, hit more shots and compiled a century.

It was off-spinner Sadanandan Anish — underused on Wednesday — who broke the 119-run stand between Rawle (66, 205b, 11x4) and Sanyal in a most emphatic manner.

He hit Rawle’s off stump.

Kerala still had close to 200 runs to defend when Railways’s fourth wicket fell, but Rawat (77, 145b, 10x4) did not allow the pressure to affect his nerves.

Useful stand

He and Sanyal added 116 runs for the fifth wicket, an effort that provided the first hints that the team that will progress to the final (to be played at the Brabourne Stadium from January 5) and makes the super league for the 2008-09 season will probably be decided on the final day.

Kerala skipper Sony Cheruvathur had to take the second new ball after using the first for 100 overs, but it took another 12 overs and two balls to end a splendid knock by Sanyal.

Tinu Yohanan struck twice after Railways crossed the 300-run mark and it looked as though Kerala may manage to take the first innings lead.

But Raja Ali and Murali Kartik played 15 overs and four balls to take their side within a couple of big blows of Kerala’s first innings.

The scores:

Kerala — 1st innings: 357.

Railways — 1st innings: S. Joshi lbw b Chandran 9, A. Pagnis c Anish b Chandran 2, S. Bangar lbw b Anish 13, H. Rawle b Anish 66, S. Sanyal lbw b Chruvathur 115, M. Rawat c & b Yohanan 77, K. Sharma c & b Yohanan 10, R. Ali (batting) 22, M. Kartik (batting) 7, Extras (b-9, lb-14, nb-3, w-1): 27, Total (for seven wkts. in 146 overs): 348.

Fall of wickets: 1-7, 2-20, 3-41, 4-160, 5-276, 6-303, 7-310.

Kerala bowling: Yohannan 31-9-70-2, Chandran 24-6-52-2, Cheruvathur 30-9-73-1, Gomez 6-2-13-0, Anish 34-11-63-2, Prashanth 12-2-37-0, Nair 8-4-12-0, Sebastian 1-0-5-0.

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