GUWAHATI, Dec 22: Veteran Amol Mazumdar (82 n.o.), the highest run getter in Ranji Trophy, guided his new team Andhra Pradesh to a fighting 214 for the loss of eight wickets after a troubled beginning in the first innings of the Ranji Trophy Group C match against Assam.
On the opening day of the four-day match at the Nehru Stadium here today, put into bat on a green top wicket, the visitors had a disastrous start losing three wickets at team�s total of 26. But experienced Amol built up some useful partnerships with Bodapati Sumanth (57) for the fourth wicket and Rajesh Pawar (37) for the seventh wicket which yielded 80 and 65 runs respectively. These two partnership virtually took Andhra to a respectable position.
Amol, who came to bat at number 5, stayed at the crease for 323 minutes and faced 180 deliveries. The Mumbai veteran enjoyed a life at his individual score of 35 when he was dropped by wicketkeeper Rajdeep Das off Dhiraj Goswami. At that point Andhra�s score was 106 for 4. But after that he did not make any mistake and remained unbeaten when stumps were drawn for the day.
Assam speedsters, Arup Das in particular, made a bright start in the morning taking advantage of the moisture. Both the openers were back to the pavilion without scoring. Arup captured three wickets while Abu Nechim Ahmed bagged two. Spinner Syed Mohammad also came out with two scalps and other spinner Arlen Konwar got one. Now Arlen is just one short from his 200-wicket mark.
sCORECARD
Andhra 1st innings: MUB Sriram b Arup Das 0, DB Prasanth lbw b Arup Das 0, KS Sahabuddin b Arup Das 10, B Sumanth c Goswami b Ahmed 57, AA Muzumdar not out 82, AG Pradeep lbw b Syed Mohammad 20, D Shivkumar c Rajdeep Das b Ahmed 0, RV Pawar c Tarjinder Singh b Konwar 37, T Vamsi Krishna c & b Syed Mohammad 3, SM Basha not out 0. Extras: (lb 2, w 1, nb 2) 5. Total: (8 wickets; 74 overs) 214. Fall of wickets: 1-0, 2-3, 3-26, 4-106, 5-135, 6-136, 7-201, 8-214. Bowling: Abu Neschim Ahmed 19-5-63-2, Arup Das 22-9-56-3, Dhiraj Goswami 15.5-2-37-0, J Syed Mohammad 8-3-26-2, A Konwar 7.1-0-19-1, PP Das 2-0-11-0.
