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West continues its domination

G. Viswanath

Rajkot: Virat Kohli’s bright knock in the first hour of the third day promised much before left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja tamed the North Zone skipper. Bowling his second over, Jadeja turned the ball across the face of the bat to hit the off stump for a flummoxed Kohli to leave the field and virtually bring the contest to an end in the Duleep Trophy semifinal at the Race Course Ground here on Thursday.

At stumps West Zone was ahead by an overall 531 runs with nine wickets in hand. West did not enforce the follow-on after dismissing North for 294 about an hour after the tea interval. With only six hours left in the match, West, having gained the first innings lead, is assured of a place in the final.

But it would be a depleted West that will take on the winner between Central and South Zones because the national selectors chose five batsmen — Rohit Sharma, Abhishek Nayar, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane and Parthiv Patel — in the BCCI President’s XI squad for the two-day warm-up game against South Africa at Nagpur.

West held the upper hand once it raised a formidable 769 in the first innings and then dismissed three batsmen on the second evening.

For much of the first hour on Thursday Wasim Jaffer operated with left-arm seamer Irfan Pathan and Munaf Patel, scattered men on the off-side hoping that Kohli would make a mistake while essaying firm front-foot drives. Kohli outsmarted his counterpart with a series of cover and straight drives, all off Pathan and Patel and raced to his 50 off 48 balls.

His partner Vikramjit Singh Malik, too, cut and square drove hard.

With the North score reading 102 for three, Jaffer introduced Jadeja and not off-spinner Ramesh Powar, who would have probably revelled on a surface that would have afforded bounce.

Jadeja struck off the first ball when Malik whipped a shot towards mid-wicket for Pujara to convert an easy overhead catch. Seven balls later Kohli departed.

After Kohli’s departure, Mithun Manhas and Rajat Bhatia engaged themselves in trouble-free cricket for a little over two hours each and raised an exact hundred runs for the sixth wicket before Parthiv Patel picked up Manhas’s leg-side deflection with an outstretched left hand.

Soon Bhatia miss-hit a shot straight back to Jadeja. Pravinder Awana offered company to Uday Kaul for an hour and 10 minutes before the second new ball claimed in the 81st over saw the North first innings folding up for 294.

The scores: West Zone — 1st innings: 769.

North Zone — 1st innings: Ravi Inder Singh c Jaffer b I. Pathan 0, S. Dhawan c P. Patel b M. Patel 2, R. Dewan lbw b M. Patel 0, V. Kohli b Jadeja 56, V.S. Malik c Pujara b Jadeja 41, M. Manhas c P. Patel b Nayar 49, R. Bhatia c & b Jadeja 53, U. Kaul (not out) 43, M. Gony (run out) 3, A. Awana c P. Patel b I. Pathan 28, V. Mishra c Sharma b I. Pathan 0; Extras (b-2, lb-1, nb-16):19.Total (in 82.1 overs):294.

Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-2, 3-7, 4-102, 5-108, 6-208, 7-224, 8-229, 9-289.

West bowling: M. Patel 21-5-61-3, I. Pathan 15.1-1-69-3, Kulkarni 13-0-59-0, Jadeja 21-4-54-3, Powar 10-0-42-0, Nayar 2-0-6-1.

West Zone — 2nd innings: C. Pujara (batting) 23, A. Rahane b Awana 0, P. Patel (batting) 31; Extras (nb-2): 2.Total (for one wkt in 14 overs): 56.

Fall of wicket: 1-10.

North bowling: Awana 4-1-16-1, Malik 4.1-1-13-0, Kohli 2-0-17-0, Mishra 2.5-1-9-0, Dewan 1-0-1-0.

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