Mumbai's Sarfaraz Khan continued his scintillating form this season by scoring 169 at the Wankhede on the first day of their Ranji Trophy group stage match against Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday. Mumbai were 352/4 at stumps largely thanks to a 275-run stand between Sarfaraz and Aakarshit Gomel.
Mumbai were down to 72 for 3 at one point but Sarfaraz and Gomel's stand took them out of the doldrums and ended up giving them the advantage at the end of the opening day. Gomel was dismissed on 122 while Sarfaraz remained unbeaten and looks on course to scoring his third double ton in five matches. His last few scores read 301*, 226*, 78 and 25.
While Mumbai is already out of the contest, this season inarguably belonged to Sarfaraz, who has hit a triple hundred, double hundred and now a hundred.
Meanwhile, in Rajkot, Saurashtra bowlers led by skipper Jaydev Unadkat dished out a clinical show to restrict Tamil Nadu to 250/7 in their last Ranji Trophy Elite Group B match.
While the result of the game would not affect Saurashtra, as they have qualified for the knockouts already, it would have a bearing on Tamil Nadu's prospects as nothing short of a win would help the side.
For Tamil Nadu, the experienced Abhinav Mukund (86) and N Jagadeesan (61 not out) scored fifties.
Jagadeesan's knock ensured that the visitors reached the 250-run mark.
Tamil Nadu openers Mukund (86 off 112 balls) and L Suryaprakash (10) added 49 runs for the first wicket, before Dharmendrasinh Jadeja (1-72) removed the latter at the SCA Stadium in Khandheri.
One-down M Kaushik Gandhi (17) also failed to convert his start even as left-handed Mukund continued his good form and notched up his 50 in 67 balls.
However, Tamil Nadu slipped to 132/4 from 102/2, as Undakat (3-25) took two quick wickets.
First the left-arm pacer trapped V Ganga Sridhar (13) in front of the wicket and then removed a well-set Mukund in a similar fashion to put Tamil Nadu in a spot of bother.
Then skipper Baba Aparajith (20) and wicket-keeper Jagadeesan tried to rally the Tamil Nadu innings with their 42 run stand for the fifth wicket.
But as the two were looking good, Chirag Jani (2-44) broke the stand sending Aparajith back to the pavilion.
Tamil Nadu took tea at 181/5.
After tea, Unadkat took his third wicket, as Tamil Nadu were reeling at 181/6.
Then Jagadeesan played a responsible knock and he first got able support from R Sai Kishore (27).
Jagadeesan and M Mohammed (1) were at the crease when stumps were drawn.
In Bengaluru, Karnataka bowlers shot out Baroda for paltry 85 and then took the first innings lead.
