Pujara remains lone ‘thorne’ in Delhi’s outright victory

Nov 19: Cheteshwar Pujara scores unbeaten 148 to deny Delhi outright win

Resolute Cheteshwar Pujara battled hard all through the final day with the tail, scoring an unbeaten 148 against formidable Delhi attack, to deny Delhi a possible chance of pulling an outright victory against Saurashtra in the Ranji Trophy Elite league match here on Sunday.

19-year old Pujara stood like a wall and turned out to be the only throne in Delhi victory’s way, as the day once again came to an early end before the scheduled time due to bad light. Saurashtra resolve innings ended up on 254/9, pushing the hosts to settle for only three points.

In the morning Saurashtra was given the target of 327 after Delhi had declared at their overnight score of 295 for two, in quest of gaining five points via absolute win.

Delhi had a boisterous start as left-arm seamer Pradeep Sangwan scalped the first four Saurashtra batsmen in his sharp spell, and put visitors on the fence as they were tottering at 60 for four.

Saturday’s hero Sitanshu Kotak, Kanaiya Vaghela, Sagar Jogiyani and skipper Jaydev Shah were shown the way of pavilion by Sangwan and soon Ishant Sharma packed off Pratik Mehta.

Delhi was smelling the victory when Saurashtra was struggling at 63 for five, there was no ray of hope for Saurashtra but Sunday magician Pujara came out of the blue to sponge down Delhi’s dreams.

Ravindra Jadeja and Kamlesh Makvana stranded Pujara, as Saurashtra 106/8 was at the doorstep of certain defeat but Pujara made the impossible a possible by holding the fort from the other end. He in his essay studded 27 fours and faced 244 balls during his stay at the wicket.

First innings hero left-arm seamer Sandeep Jobanputra (35, 4x4, 6x1) now forced the heat on the hosts’ with his willow by giving Pujara a good company, as both of them added 119 runs for the ninth wicket to pile host’s misery.

Host Delhi tried their hard to stage a late fightback but their efforts went in vain. The ninth wicket crucial partnership was the main savoiur, which rescued Saurashtra from almost a certain defeat.

Delhi had to get rid of the last pair in the mandatory 15 overs but bad light dwindled their fortunes and came for the rescue of Saurashtra.

Delhi will now face defending champions Mumbai in their next match, starting from November 23 to 26 at Mumbai.

SCOREBOARD

Delhi (1st innings): 244

Saurashtra (1st innings): 213

Delhi (2nd innings):

Akash Chopra not out 124

Shikhar Dhawan st Jogiyani b Dhurv 114

Mayank Tehlan lbw b Jobanputra 9

Vikas Kohli not out 40.

Extras: (lb 6, w 1, nb 1) 8.

Total: (for two wickets decl, in 69 overs) 295

Fall of wickets: 1-199, 2-219.

Bowling: Sandeep Jobanputra 15-1-77-1, Sandip Maniar 12-0-64-0, Kanaiya Vaghela 12-2-42-0, Ravinder Jadeja 15-2-51-0 Kamlesh Makvana 13-3-40-0, Rakesh Dhurv 2-0-15-1.

Saurashtra (2nd innings) (target: 327 runs):

Kanaiya Vaghela b Sangwan 0

S Jogiyani b Sangwan 35

S Kotak lbw b Sangwan 6

Cheteshwar Pujara not out 148

J Shah c Bisht b Sangwan 0

P Mehta lbw Sharma 1

Ravinder Jadeja c Kohli b Sharma 13

Kamlesh Makvana b Sharma 0

Rakesh Dhurv c Kohli b Bhatia 2

Sandeep Jobanputra b Manhas 35

Sandip Maniar not out 5.

Extras: (b 1, lb 1, w 3, nb 4) 9.

Total: (for nine wickets, in 85 overs) 254

Fall of wickets: 1-0, 2-33, 3-56, 4-60, 5-63, 6-101, 7-101, 8-106, 9-225.

Bowling: Pradeep Sangwan 23-4-70-4, Ishant Sharma 24-80-79-3, Amit Bhandari 11-2-30-0, C Nanda 9-1-26-0, Rajat Bhatia 11-2-25-1, Mithun Manhas 7-0-22-1.