If you are looking at it purely from a big picture scenario, then Team India won today. For what else would the think-tank have wished for than looking at two of their premier one-day batsmen looking in very good form. First it was Yuvraj Singh with a century for India Seniors and then India A’s Mohammed Kaif weighed in with a breezy 49 (in 31 balls with 5x4 and 1x6) to help seal a emphatic six-wicket win.Earlier India A’s Zaheer Khan ran in hard and troubled all the batsmen and India A skipper Rahul Dravid too looked good in his late overs stay at the wicket.All in all. except for Irfan Pathan missing out, it was a good day in the office for the National selectors and coach John Wright who exchanged a smile in the end.Though the result hardly mattered in the end, the first day of the clash of 36 of India’s best in the Challenger Trophy proved that the break has done no harm to most of them. In fact, Kaif and Yuvraj have been one of the prime scorers in the domestic season since the end of the Bangladesh tour.Both have made their opponents pay in the recently-concluded Deodhar Trophy as well. So it was only natural that they took the charge today. Yuvraj, egged on by a modest Wankhede crowd, scored a sparkling 91-ball 100 studded with 15 boundaries.He featured in a rescue act for the second time in three days (after his Deodhar Trophy hundred last week against South Zone) as he helped Seniors recover from a precarious 52 for 3 after being put into bat.Helping him was Venugopala Rao who together put on 116 runs for the fourth wicket. It seemed a total of 280-9 in 50 overs would have been enough for the Seniors, but Saurav Ganguly’s men had not reckoned for the in-form India A batsmen on a perfect one-day track. Starting with the opening pair of Dheeraj Jadhav and Satyajit Parab till Kaif and skipper Rahul Dravid in the slog, it was symphony all the way.Only a fortnight ago, Parab and Jadhav had been smashing bowlers to feature in a record-breaking partnership at the same venue. And today was no different for them.The chase was never out of question once Parab and Jadhav laid the foundation with a 70-run opening stand.In the end though Kaif and Dravid were just too good, showing up the thin resources of Seniors’ bowling. Kaif, in particular, turned the tide by scoring heavily off Gagandeep Singh (16 runs in the 48th over) and left-arm spinner Rajesh Pawar (14 runs in the 46th over). Kaif and Dravid added 82 runs in just 9.2 overs as the chase was completed without much fuss in the end. SCOREBOARD
