Ahmedabad, Dec 25: Bombay quickly captured four Gujarat wickets
to take a firm grip on their Pepsi West Zone Ranji Trophy league
cricket match at the Sardar Patel Stadium here today.
At the end of the second day's play, Gujarat were desperately
placed at 87 for four in their first innings in reply to Bombay's
414.
Gujarat did well to restrict Bombay, overnight at 291 for
three, but their exultation soon dissipated when, with the excep-
tion of skipper Mukund Parmar, their batsmen fell to a mixture of
accurate bowling and irresponsible strokes. Parmar looked hand-
some when he coverdrove spinner Sanjay Patil, stroked Abey Kuru-
villa straight and cut Salil Ankola to the boundary. When Paras
Mmambrey, who was the finest of the Bombay fast bowlers, sent a
full toss, Parmar unhesitatingly smashed him past cover.
Parmar square cut Sairaj Bahutulle and pulled him for two fours
in one over and did the same to Ravi Shastri when the left-arm
spinner came on.
Parmar had nine fours in a responsible innings of 45 when he
got out. Parmar, the stabilizing factor in a Gujarat innings
that was tottering after Makhool Malam had been bowled by Mham-
brey and Umesh Patel was caught at forward shortleg off Patil,
went to a beautiful delivery from Mhambrey that pitched on the
offstump and shot in. Parmar put his bat up in a strokeless ges-
ture and the edge flew to Jatin Paranjpe at square leg. Parashar
Patel dug in 21 runs off 71 balls, guiding Mhambrey through the
slips and hitting Sairaj Bahutulle straight to the fence before
Patil got one through his defence to bowl him.
Paras Mhambrey troubled the batsmen the most with a steady line
and length. Like all the medium-pacers on this wicket, however
he could not get the ball to kick up.
Gujarat did well to restrict Bombay, Dhansukh Patel getting his
100th wicket in the Ranji Trophy when he bowled Sameer Dighe.
The Bombay wicketkeeper had played a big role in lifting Bombay's
total after Sachin Tendulkar departedin the day's fourth over,
caught by Bhavin Mehta off Dhansukh Patel. Tendulkar disappoint-
ed a fairly large crowd. He scored 13 runs off 84 balls and nev-
er looked confident.
It was left to Sairaj Bahutulle to prop up Bombay and he did it
in a flashy innings of 40, that had four boundaries and a six
pulled midwicket off Bharat Mistry. Sanjay Patil was leg before
to Dhansukh for 21 (two fours) in what was a disappointing morn-
ing for the Bombay batsmen.
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