India C only trail by 73 after the end of the first day’s play. If not for Harshit Rana and Axar’s twin strikes, India D would have found them in even more trouble.
It’s Axar Patel’s world, and we are all living in it. Boy, wasn’t he on fire in the India C vs D match. After his team was 76/8, southpaw took them all the way to 164 by scoring more than half of the runs (86). The next best scorer for India C was 13 runs by Srikar Bharat, Saransh Jain and Arshdeep Singh. But the day didn’t start there.
After winning the toss, India C decided to have a bat. This decision didn’t exactly work in their favour as Anshul Kamboj struck in the very first over. Vijaykumar Vyshak joined the party soon after, and by the time both of their opening spells ended, India D had them five down.
Shreyas Iyer was the first domino to fall. Devdutt Padikkal, Yash Dubey, Ricky Bhui and Srikar Bharat followed him back to the pavillion soon. India C were 48/6, and it looked like they could get bundled under 100. Saransh Jain aided Axar a little bit, but a run-out derailed things. Harshit Rana scored a golden duck; the score at that point read 76/8.
Axar then joined hands with Arshdeep Singh and put on 82 runs together. Axar naturally did the heavy lifting, but the only reason India C even crossed the 100-run mark was because of this partnership. Unfortunately, Axar missed out on a ton but did his job.
Harshit Rana started things great. He sent both of India D’s openers, Sai Sudharsan and Ruturaj Gaikwad, back, and the game was on. But Aditya Thakare and Arshdeep Singh couldn’t support him. In the 14th over, captain Shreyas Iyer turned to Axar Patel.
Already on high, Axar struck in his second over. Then again in his third. Both set batters, Aryan Juyal and Rajat Patidar, were back. It looked like we would have the day end with at least a couple more wickets. But Abhishek Porel and Baba Indrajith decided otherwise and remained unbeaten until stumps.
Duleep Trophy, Match 2: Brief Scores
India D: 164/10 (Axar Patel 86, Arshdeep Singh 13; Vijaykumar Vyshak 3/19, Himanshu Chauhan 2/22)
India C: 91/4 (Abhishek Porel 32, Baba Indrajith 15; Harshit Rana 2/13, Axar Patel 2/16)
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