Mongia guides India A to victory

The age old syndrome, squandering-a-strong-position, resurfaced yet again as it nearly hampered India ‘A’s run chase before they s...

The age old syndrome, squandering-a-strong-position, resurfaced yet again as it nearly hampered India ‘A’s run chase before they squeezed home by two wickets against England ‘A’ at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium here on Tuesday. The home side, thus, gained an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.

With just a wicket down for 189 in the 30th over chasing 229, it seemed just a matter of time before they cantered home. But the India ‘A’ batsmen engaged in some senseless cricket towards the end to find themselves in a rather dangerous position of 212 for six with a brittle tail remaining.

Before achieving the target with a quick single, they lost two more wickets. But the main feature of the home innings was a 105-run second-wicket partnership between Dinesh Mongia and S Sriram. On Monday, the Punjab-Tamil Nadu duo engineered a double century stand for the second wicket and today the two southpaws started from where they stopped. Once again it was Sriram who took charge of the situation and played much in the same manner as he played on Monday. Deft placements, fluent drives on either sides made the Chennaite’s batting look so simple till a moment of madness saw him throw away his wicket attempting a non-existing single. Sriram consumed just 40 balls to reach his fifty. At the other end, Mongia, who started off in express pace, curbed his stroke-making tendencies seeing Sriram timing the ball sweetly.

BRIEF SCORES

England A: 228 in 46 overs (Kevin Pietersen 131; Munaf Patel 3-42, R Powar 2-32) vs India A: 229-8 in 41.1 overs (D Mongia 88, G Gambhir 37, S Sriram 50, S Mahmood 4-51)

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