Young Mumbai batter Sarfaraz Khan followed up his triple ton with a sparkling double ton against Himachal Pradesh in a Ranji Trophy round 7 tie in Dharamsala on Monday, 27 January.
Sarfaraz got to his 2nd successive hundred in just 199 balls as he completely dominated the hosts and remained unbeaten on 226, powering Mumbai to 372/5 at the close of the first day.
Meanwhile in Kolkata, middle-order batsman Anustup Majumdar put Bengal back in control with an unbeaten 94 at the iconic Eden Gardens.
The hosts were once reeling at 100/4 against Delhi before Majumdar stopped the visitors from making any further inroads as Bengal ended the first day at 286/5.For Delhi, Vikas Mishra picked up three wickets.
An all-round bowling show helped Andhra bundle out Kerala for a paltry 162 at Ongole before the hosts closed the day at 57/1.
For Andhra, Shoaib Md Khan was the pick of the bowlers with figures of 5/62 while Yarra Prithviraj and KV Sasikanth picked up three and two wickets respectively.
Prateek Jain's (4/14) four-fer saw Railways being reduced to 98/6 against Karnataka in Delhi. Skipper Arindam Ghosh was batting on 32 when stumps were drawn for the day.
A four-fer by Siddharth Desai (4/40) and Roosh Kalaria's 3/31 saw hosts Gujarat wrapping up Vidarbha for just 142. Later, Gujarat were 88/1 at stumps in Surat.
Three wickets each by Rituraj Singh and Aniket Choudhary saw the entire Hyderabad side back in the pavilion putting on a mere 171 runs in their first innings against Rajasthan, who were 2/0 at stumps on Day 1.
Jaydev Unadkat’s 6/34 saw Baroda succumbing at just 154 in their first essay against Saurashtra, who however, lost wickets in the same fashion after ending the day at 114/6 and trail by 40 runs in Vadodra.
In Elite Group C matches, Manoj Ingale's 6/34 helped Maharashtra bundle out minnows Tripura for 121 runs in Agartala before the visitors closed the day at 127/5 with skipper Ankit Bawne and Vishant More batting on 39 and 30 runs respectively.
Some satisfactory top-order show saw hosts Odisha reaching 215/3 at the close of play against Assam in Cuttack. For the visitors, Ranjit Mali picked up a couple of wickets conceding 51 runs.
Some quality bowling helped Haryana wrap up Uttarakhand for just 109 runs in their first essay in Dehradun. However, the hosts hit back in the same style as they rode Agrim Tiwari’s four-fer to reduce Haryana to 50/5 when the day ended.
Jharkhand's Rahul Shukla's 6/76 had at one time reduced the Services to 155/7. However, a gritty 38 by Pulkit Narang and Raushan Raj, who both remain unbeaten, saw the day ending at 232/8 in Delhi.
Skipper Harpreet Singh's 116 helped Chhattisgarh close the first day at 270/4 in Jammu.
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