Bhubaneswar: Orissa bowlers struck in the last session with three wickets after an aggressive century by in-form teenage opener Prithvi Shaw (105, 1583b, 18×4) to reduce Mumbai to 264 for the loss of six wickets on day one of their Group C match at the KIIT Stadium here Wednesday.
After winning the toss, Orissa decided to bowl first. Veteran pacer Basant Mohanty (2/43) justified the decision, when he clean bowled Akhil Herwadkar(14, 17b, 3×4) to complete his 300 wickets in the first class cricket. But after that it was a Shaw show.
The 17-year old added 136 valuable runs for the second wicket with experienced Ajinkya Rahane (49, 122b, 8×4). In fact at times, it was the youngster who looked far more at ease against the Orissa bowlers than India player Rahane.
Basant returned for his second spell to remove Shaw with an in-cutter that found the batsman plumb in front. From then on, the Orissa bowlers found their rhythm to tighten the screw on the opposition batsmen.
Rahane, looked fluent till the extra pace of Suryakanta Pradhan(1/69) stunned him. Trying to negotiate the bounce, the batsman could only manage a faint tickle to be snapped up behind the stumps by Saurabh Rawat.
Biplab Samantray(2/26) then accounted for Surya Kumar Yadav (23, 78b, 3×4) and Siddesh Lad (33, 78b, 6×4) and when Sandeep Patnaik took a blinder to dismiss Abhishek Nayar (4,11b, 1×4) of spinner Dhiraj Singh (1/40), Mumbai were suddenly on the back-foot
Skipper Aditya Tare (28, 65b, 3×4) and Akash Parkar (3, 20b) were at the crease when stumps were drawn.
Orissa skipper Govind Poddar lauded the bowlers for their efforts. “Had we taken two more wickets, we would have been in command. We will try our best to dismiss them within 300 Thursday,” he stated.
Brief scores: Mumbai 264/6 (Prithvi Shaw 105, Ajinkya Rahane 49, Biplab Samantray 2/26) vs Odisha. Match to continue.
Other Group C matches
(At Vadodara): Baroda 304/5 (Vishnu Solanki 116, Abhijit Karambelkar 75 batting; Gurinder Singh 2/61) vs Tripura.
(At Vizianagaram): Madhya Pradesh 219/5 (Subham Sharma 60, Harpreet Singh 47 batting; Y Prithvi Raj 3/35) vs Andhra Pradesh.
All the matches to continue, Thursday.
