Chennai: Tamil Nadu are in sight of their first win of this Ranji season as they reduced Maharashtra to 75-8 on the third day of their Group B match after they set up a target of 193 at the M.A Chidambaram Stadium here on Monday.
18 wickets fell on the dramatic third day and after the hosts were bundled out for a paltry score, they fought back well and are now two wickets away from an outright win.
A lot more was expected from the Maharashtra batsmen even though the pitch was not the easiest to bat on. But they lost their first wicket in the first over after Laxmipathy Balaji had Satyajit Bacchav caught him off his own bowling. Balaji struck again in his next over to send Chirag Khurana back to the pavilion.
With two wickets down, opener Harshad Khadiwale and Dilip Atitkar tried to stitch a partnership for the third wicket, but their resistance was cut short by Yo Mahesh after he castled Khadiwale for 13.
Their batting collapsed like nine pins and no one could take the attack to the Tamil Nadu bowlers.
Ankit Bawne on 18 and Akshay Darekar on 6 were the unbeaten batsmen at stumps and will start the day hoping for a miraculous recovery.
Balaji, Aushik Srinivas, Malolan Rangarajan and Yo Mahesh picked up two wickets apiece for the hosts.
Earlier Akshay Darekar’s 4-61 and Chirag Khurana’s 4-27 helped the visitors bundle out Tamil Nadu for 149.
Only young Baba Aparaith (35 off 65 balls including four boundaries) and Dinesh Karthik (35 off 43 balls including four boundaries and a six)could pose some resistance to the Baroda bowlers.
By Indian Sports News Network