Aided by a fine unbeaten 100 by Manish Kumar, Bihar ended their first innings at 240 on the opening day of the East Zone Cooch Behar Trophy (Under-19) Tournament against Assam at the NFRSA Stadium in Maligaon on Friday.

Opting to bat, Bihar made a slow start with openers Ratan Kumar (20) and Sandeep Vig (39) putting on 35 runs in 19.2 overs. Ratan was the first to be dismissed when he gave a catch to Rabin Das off S Bhattacharjee. Then Fardeen Khan (21) joined Sandeep to take the score on to 61 when Fardeen was bowled by Chandan Ruat in the 30th over. Amir Hashmi (15) was the next to be dismissed in the 36th over when he was run out.

Manish Kumar and Sandeep boosted Bihar's hopes by adding 51 runs for the fourth wicket in 20.2 overs. After Sandeep was bowled by Chandan Raut, Tej Pratap joined Manish to take the score to 160 when Rabin Das held a catch off Chandan Raut to dismiss Tej Pratap for ten. Thereafter Manish kept losing partners even as he kept scoring runs. Chandan Das, with figures of 5 for 49, ran through the Bihar lower order to leave Manish stranded at 100. During a 223 minute stay at the crease, Manish faced 163 balls while finding the boundary ropes 7 times.

Earlier the match started with Assam protesting against some of the Bihar players who they charged were overage. They had even sent a fax in this regard to the Board of Control for Cricket in India. Assam, who themselves were affected with the problem of overaged players, announced a fresh eleven the previous night after conducting medical tests.

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