Jaffer,Yadav rescue Mumbai

Wasim Jaffer,who remained unbeaten on 92 (175b,11×4 1×6),watching from the other hand,provided the perfect foil for Yadav and nullified the Punjab bowling attack using his experience in overcast conditions. In Yadav’s company,he began to open up and played some exquisite shots all over. He lofted Harbhajan over extra cover to reach his 81st first-class half-century.

The Punjab skipper tried everything to break the partnership but the pitch at Sector 16 Stadium,hosting a Ranji tie after four years,easing up. Yadav and Jaffer picked up the boundaries and transferred the pressure on the Punjab bowlers.

Harbhajan tossed the ball to Yuvraj Singh immediately after tea. Yadav was nearing his half-century when Yuvraj had him caught at short leg by Taruwar Kohli for 44,thus ending the 102-run partnership and again tilting the match in Punjab’s favour.

Jaffer approached his 49th first-class century and was batting on 92 when bad light interrupted play with 19 overs left in the day. Earlier,Punjab made full use of the overcast conditions and Siddharth Kaul in particular,looked menacing. After dismissing opener Aditya Tare for 11,the Punjab bowlers dominated the first session and took three more wickets to put Mumbai on the backfoot.

Brief scores: Mumbai 207/5 in 71 ov (Wasim Jaffer 92*,Suryakumar Yadav 44,Kaustubh Pawar 24; Siddarth Kaul 2/40,Yuvraj 1/18,Harbhajan 1/51) v Punjab

Ranji round-up

Group a:

Narwal’s five-for rattles Gujarat

SURAT: Sumit Narwal was the star performer for Delhi as his five for 56 from 15 overs pegged Gujarat back. Y Venugopal Rao held the innings together with a fluent 107 as Gujarat ended the day on 281/7.

Brief scores: Gujarat 281/7 in 90 ov (Venugopal Rao 107,Manpreet Juneja 50; Sumit Narwal 5/56,Ashish Nehra 2/47) v Delhi

IN MYSORE: Jharkhand 214/5 in 87.1 ov (Rameez Nemat 68,Saurabh Tiwary 43*; Sreenath Aravind 3/45) v Karnataka

IN NAGPUR: Haryana 235/4 in 90 ov (Sunny Singh 101*,Avi Barot 64; Sumit Ruikar 1/42) v Vidarbha

Group b:

UP 291/8 after Raina’s attacking century

Vadodara: UP skipper Suresh Raina kept himself in the selectors’ sights with an attacking century to haul his team to 291/ 9 against an inspired Baroda attack. Bhargav Bhatt’s 5/98 and Utkarsh Patel’s 4/74 almost derailed UP but Raina’s rescue act of 123 (154b,12×4,4×6) put them close to the 300-run mark.

BRIEF SCORES: UP 291/9 in 89.4 ov (Suresh Raina 123,Mohammad Kaif 39; Bhargav Bhatt 5/98,Utkarsh Patel 4/74) v Baroda

IN INDORE: Tamil Nadu 294/3 in 90 ov (S Badrinath 126*,Baba Aparajith 118; Amarjeet Singh 1/38,Ishwar Pandey 1/57 v MP

IN JAIPUR: Rajasthan 222/6 in 87 ov (Vineet Saxena 110*,Robin Bist 44; Saurashish Lahiri 2/24,Shib Paul 2/41) v Bengal

IN DELHI: Saurashtra 87/4 in 46 overs (Aarpit Vasavada 44*,Jaydev Shah 25*; Anureet Singh 3/24) v Railways

Group c:

IN KANNUR : Kerala 236/4 (Sanju Samson 115,Nikhilesh Surendran 66,Robert Fernandez 39*; Paidikalva Vijaykumar 2/34) v Andhra

IN SRINAGAR: Goa 281/8 in 90 overs (Keenan Vaz 99,Amogh Desai 71,Saurabh Bandekar 39*; Ram Dayal 3/66,Samiullah Beigh 2/45,Parvez Rasool 2/73) v J&K

IN GUWAHATI: Assam 181/5 in 90 overs (Sibsankar Roy 85*,Tarjinder Singh 41,Pallavkumar Das 31; Amol Shinde 3/49,Tirumalasetti Suman 1/4) v Hyderabad

IN AGARTALA: Tripura 141 in 71.3 overs (Abhijit Dey 66; Vikramjeet Malik 5/37,Rishi Dhawan 4/32) vs Himachal 26/1