Bhuvneshwar Kumar marked his return to first class cricket after almost 6 years with a blistering 5-wicket haul for Uttar Pradesh against Bengal in the Ranji Trophy 2nd round match.
At Stumps on Day 1, Bengal were wobbling at 95/5 after wiping out their opponents for a mere 60 in the first innings. However, Bhuvneshwar handed the reins of the match right to UP at the end of the day when he took the wickets of Sourav Paul, Sudip Kumar Gharami, Anustup Majumdar, Manoj Tiwary and Abishek Porel.
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In the match, Bengal captain Tiwary had won the toss and opted to bowl first on Kanpur with Uttar Pradesh’s Samarth Singh, Aryan Juyal and captain Nitish Rana the only ones to get to double figures.
Bengal’s Mohammad Kaif was the pick of the bowlers with figures of 4/14 while Suraj Jaiswal came next with 3 while Ishan Porel took two.
The Bengal batters couldn’t fare well in the day either with Shreyansh Ghosh batting on 37 and is accompanied by Karan Lal who is batting on 8. Bhuvneshwar was the one who took all 5 Bengal wickets with the visitors ending the day with a 35-run lead.
Kumar hasn’t been part of India’s Test squad since 2018 and was last seen against South Africa. With India set to play a 5-match Test series against England at home, starting from January 25, and Mohammed Shami’s fitness issues that might rule him out of the first 2 Tests, the pacer from Meerut will be hoping to catch the selectors’ eyes when the squad is announced.
Kumar hasn’t been part of India’s Test squad since 2018 and was last seen against South Africa. (X/BCCI Domestic) 
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