Orissa dominate first day

Services were reeling at 134 for five in their first innings on the opening day of the Ranji Trophy Plate group 'B' match against Orissa in New Delhi on Thursday.

Put in to bat, Services lost an early wicket and failed to build substantial partnerships subsequently to yield the initiative to Orissa on a day when play could start only after lunch owing to foggy conditions.

K D Chauda emerged as the top-scorer with 36 (92 balls, 5x4's) while Jaspal Singh contributed 34 after Services were reduced to two for one.

Orissa bowlers succeeded in expoliting the conditions and picking wickets at regular intervals. Sreekanth Jena claimed two scalps after Debashis Mohanty had given the visitors the early breakthrough by dismissing P M S Reddy for two.

Services (First Innings):
PMS Reddy lbw b Mohanty 2
A Singh lbw b Satpathy 26
K Chauda lbw b Mangraj 36
J Singh c Sukhwinder b Jena 34
S Verma batting 18
Jasbeer Singh c Mohanty b Jena 3
C D Thomas batting 7
Extras (b-3, lb-3, nb-2) 8
Total (for five wkts, 59.3 overs) 134

Fall of Wickets: 1/2, 2/65, 3/69, 4/110, 5/118

Bowling: D Mohanty 16-4-40-1, Deepak Mangraj 13-2-32-1, S Jena 15-5-23-2, S Satpathy 10-3-24-1, P Mullick 5-2-7-0, S Raul 0.3-0-2-0.

Bihar restrict Tripura

Bihar spinners Shahid Khan and Sunny Gupta claimed three wickets apiece to restrict Tripura to 180 for nine on the opening day of their four-day Ranji Trophy Plate group 'B' match at the Keenan Stadium in Jamshedpur on Thursday.

Opting to bat first after winning the toss, Tripura found the going tough as none of their batsmen could stay at the wicket for long and were left tottering at 180 for nine in 90 overs in their first innings when the stumps were drawn.

Openers Tirtha Ray (12) and Ritesh Jayswal (30) began well but could not build on.

They hardly had any problem facing the Bihar new ball bowlers Sumit Panda and Mihir Diwakar but S S Rao, who was brought in as the first change, did them in accounting for both the openers in quick succession.

S Mahesh, who came at the fall of the first wicket, made 34 with the help of six boundaries and was the top scorer for Tripura while Chetan Sachdev (30) and T R Arasu (29) made useful contributions.

Bihar spinners Shahid Khan and Sunny Gupta played their role of demolishers capturing six Tripura wickets between them.

Khan had taken three wickets for 51 runs in 29 overs while Gupta claimed his 3/39 in 19 overs.

Tripura 1st innings
Tirtha Ray c M S Dhani b S Rao 12
Ritesh Jayswal c R Kumar b S Rao 30
S Mahesh c M Diwakar b S Gupta 34
Arindam Sarkar lbw b Shahid 5
Chetan Sachdev c K Ghosh b Shahid 30
Timir Chanda st Dhani b S Gupta 6
Sandeep Dahad c & b S Gupta 6
T R Arasu c K Ghosh b Shahid 29
Ashish Kapoor c S Panda b M Goyal 10
S Sharma not out 5
Jayanta Debnath not out 0
Extras (lb-1, nb-12) 13
Total (for nine wkts in 90 overs) 180

Fall of wickets: 1/29, 2/63, 3/71, 4/97, 5/107, 6/117, 7/161, 8/166, 9/179.

Bowling: S Panda 12-3-27-0, M Diwakar 13-5-22-0, S S Rao 14-2-38-2, Shahid Khan 29-9-51-3, S Gupta 19-6-39-3 M Goyal 3-1-2-1.

Goa restrict Saurashtra to 220

Medium pacer Avanish Aware's six wicket haul helped Goa bowl put Saurashtra for 220 on the opening day of the Ranji Trophy Plate group 'A' match at the Rajendra Prasad ground in Margao on Thursday.

Electing to field, Goa tasted immediate success as they had Saurashtra struggling at 51 for two at lunch.

Jaydev Shah (26) who gave good support to Kanaya Wagale took the score to 100 before he fell to spinner Nitin Kalekar caught by Mandar.

Aware, who earlier took the wicket of Ashok Kamalia (13) then went on to dismiss the middle order Prakesh Bhutt (52), Firoz Bhaniya (1), Rakesh Dhru (22) and Niray Podera (0) to capture impressive figure of 6/85.

Saurashtra were mainly helped by opener Wagale's 86, who kept one side intact while the wickets were falling at a regular interval. He later fell to Aware caught by Robin with the team's score on 177.

Amit Vani who gave good support to Avinash Aware took two wickets while Anil Naik and Nitin Kalekar took one wicket each.

Saurashtra Ist innings:
A Kamalia c Robin b A Aware 13
K Wagale c Rahul b A Aware 86
S Kotakir b A Naik 1
J Shah c Mandar b N Kalekar 26
P Bhutt c Rahul b Aware 32
F Bhaniya c Rahul b Aware 1
R Dhru c Dani b Aware 22
N Podera c Rahul b Aware 0
N Doshi b Dani 9
S Maniyar b Dani 5
P Gosavi not out 4
Extras (lb-9, b-2, nb-8, w-2) 21
Total (all out in 88.2 overs) 220

Fall of wickets: 1-23, 2-47, 3-100, 4-159, 5-168, 6-177, 7-177, 8-206, 9-206.

Bowling: Avinash Aware 27-8-85-6, Amit Dani 18.2-4-36-2, Anil Naik 13-3-32-1, Nitin Kalekar 18-11-26-1, Shadab Jakati 8-3-13-0, Robin D'souza 6-2-17-0.