New Zealand had a difficult day on the field as Mumbai piled on runs. (Source: Express photo by Praveen Khanna)
Mumbai were comfortably placed at 431/5 when umpires called stumps on Day 2 of their three-day warm-up against New Zealand at Feroz Shah Kotla. It was a brilliant performance with the bat by a second-string Mumbai unit and the inexperienced line-up certainly fired on all cylinders, at least with the bat.
The show was led by Arman Jaffer who injected fluency in the innings with a 69, Kaustubh Pawar held one end up with a patient ton, Surya Kumar Yadav blazed his way to hundred, and the final push came from the unbeaten stand between Siddhesh Lad and Aditya Tare.
It was a complete batting performance day for the defending Ranji Trophy champions. They couldn’t have got their preparations for the season ahead, to be played on neutral venues, better than this. It’s always a big boost for the players to score/take wickets against international players.
Apart from Rohit Sharma and Jay Bista, all Mumbai batsmen crossed the 50-run mark but coach Chandrakant Pandit feels failures are part of the game.
“Mumbai always likes to have international players scoring runs but then it’s part of the game…It would have been much better if Rohit would have scored a hundred. It would have helped the team and would have been good for himself as well,” said Pandit when asked about Rohit’s failure.
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Not only for New Zealand, who are preparing for the tour, the game is very important for Mumbai too. The domestic season in India is set to go for a major toss with introduction of neutral venues. The home advantage is out of the picture and adapting to different conditions will hold key for any side.
“It’s an important game for us also because it’s a long season ahead and we also need to do that much preparation. So it’s always good that we played international bowlers well,” said Pandit at the post-match presser.
All the attention was on Rohit but Jaffer quietly stole the limelight from his senior teammate with a fluent hand. Yet to make his first-class debut, Jaffer showed no nerves against an international attack. He was very confident against the spinners and was tight while facing the seamers. The 17-year-old fell short of 100 by 31 runs, but made a lasting impression.
“He has been scoring runs throughout the season. He played U-19 last year and then we tried him in U-23 also. Selection committee is quite happy to push the youngsters like Jaffer. It’s a very happy moment for Mumbai team. The way he played against international team shows tremendous temperament. The hunger to score runs was very nice,” said Pandit.
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