Excelsior Sports Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 24: Defending champion Gujarat were 15/0 at stumps on day-1 after Jammu and Kashmir managed to score 257 runs in their first innings of the Ranji Trophy Group-B match at Lalabhai Contractor Stadium, Surat in Gujarat.
Earlier, Jammu and Kashmir won the toss and elected to bat. Batting first, J&K’s new find young opening pair of Shubham Khajuria and Ahmad Omar Banday scored magnificent half-centuries in a partnership of 99 runs in 30.3 overs, before Shubham was dismissed at his individual score of 54 runs off 86 balls, studded with 9 boundaries. He was caught by Rujul Bhatt after the bowling of leg-spinner Piyush Chawla, who also trapped Pranav Gupta for naught before medium pacer Chintan Gaja dismissed Banday for brilliant 54 runs off 111 balls including 9 splendid boundaries. Both the openers applied themselves to almost a perfection and showed serenity, promise and composure to give their team a solid foundation.
However, early dismissals of Pranav (0) and skipper Parvez Rasool (4), the team was struggling at 116 for the loss of 4 wickets, before a 50-run partnership between Ian Dev Singh (22) and Puneet Bisht (29) took the score to 166 in 53.1 overs when Bisht was dismissed by left-arm spinner Hardik Patel, who also dismissed Ian in his next over, restricting J&K to 169/6 in 55.3 overs. However, useful contributions by Bandeep Singh (29), Mohammad Mudhasir (35) and Manik Gupta (20) helped Jammu and Kashmir to reach a respectable total on a wicket which is assisting spinners from the word go. While Mudhasir hit 4 massive sixes in his brisk knock, Bandeep and Manik played some crispy shots in their knocks.
Now it is up to J&K’s spin bowling trio of Rasool, Manik and Amir to make full use of this strip.
Piyush Chawla was the wrecker-in-chief for Gujarat, who took 5 important wickets by conceding 92 runs in his 24 overs, while Hardik Patel took 3 wickets by giving away 57 runs in his 20.2 overs. Chintan and Rujul also claimed one wicket each.
At stumps, Gujarat openers, Samit Gohel and Priyank Panchal were batting on 8 and 7 runs respectively.
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