Vidarbha were in a position of considerable strength at stumps on the opening day of their Central Zone Vijay Merchant Trophy (under-16) match against Madhya Pradesh at Nagpur on Friday. After dismissing MP for 135 runs, Vidarbha scored 83 without loss from 23 overs at close of play.

Electing to bat, MP lost wickets at regular intervals and it was only a valuable 31 by the No 8 batsman Amit Rajak which helped MP to get to three figures. Chandrasekhar Atram and Azhar Sheikh took three wickets each. By close of play, openers Fazal (20) and Akbar (57) had seen Vidarbha get off to a fine start. The more aggressive Akbar faced 74 balls and hit eleven fours.

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