Weather holds key

But mild drizzle in the evening has left a question mark over prompt start of play at the Nahar Singh Stadium here, with a virgin track sporting a fair sprinkling of grass also holding interesting possibilities.

Haryana, who conceded first innings lead to Bihar in the previous match, will be looking to gain advantage of playing at home. They, however, are hampered by the absence of Ajay Jadeja and in-form opener Rajesh Puri who is yet to recover from the back strain he suffered making a match-winning century against Baroda.

With seasoned bat Nitin Goel also sidelined with injury, all-rounderIshan Ganda, a member of India’s under-16 World Cup winning squad in 1996, is likely to make his Ranji debut.

Hyderabad are better off with 13 points (innings win over Bihar and first innings lead against Madhya Pradesh in Bhilai). Haryana have logged 11 points (win over Baroda and three points from the previous tie against Bihar here).

The teams (from): Hyderabad — M V Sridhar (captain), Arvind Shetty, Daniel Manohar, Timothy Ravikumar, Nandakishore, Santosh Yadav, Yuvraj Singh, Narender Pal Singh, Kanwaljeet Singh, T Pawan Kumar, R Sridhar, Syed Meeraj and Kartik Ramaswamy.

Haryana: Vijay Yadav (captain), Jitender Singh, Parinder Sharma, Shafiq Khan, Amarjeet Kaypee, Ishan Ganda, Dhanraj Singh, Pankaj Thakur, Pradeep Jain, Monish Kumar, Vineet Jain and Sonu Sharma.

Umpires: A M Saheba (Ahmedabad) and C R Mohite (Baroda)