Srinagar: Going after a target of 270 to earn first inning lead, hosts J&K got all out for 168 runs in their first inning to hand visitors Chhattisgarh first inning lead points in the rain hit match of Ranji Trophy tournament at GGM Science College Jammu on Thursday.
After being in waiting for two full days due to bad weather, J&K finally got chance to bat as Chhattisgarh declared their first inning on the score of 270 for the loss of four wickets. It was the same total they had scored on the first day of the match and then match was affected by bad weather for next two days.
With J&K having nothing to lose, they went after the total but the wicket was favoring bowlers and they kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Standing at number one place in points table J&K would have hoped to earn extra three points from the drawn match in order to make their position strong at the table. However, they couldn’t achieve what they wanted as the whole team got all out for 168 in 32.1 overs. J&K lost first wicket on the score of 22 in shape of Ahmed Banday . After the fall of first wicket, J&K promoted hard hitting batsman Abdul Samad up the order. Before he could free himself and go after the bowlers J&K kept losing wickets at other end. From 22 for one, J&K were reduced to 44 for four. Suryansh Raina, Shubham Khajuria and Parvez Rasool all lost their wickets in space of four overs. Khajuria and Parvez got out for duck. Next to go was Samad who scored 33 from 30 deliveries. The whole side got out for 168, handing Chhattisgarh 102 run lead. For J&K, Samad top scored with 33 while as Fazil Rashid remained not out on 27 and Waseem Raza scored 29. For Chhattisgarh, Sumit Ruikar took four wickets while as V Pratap Singh and Ajay Mandal took three each.
Earlier in its first inning, Chhattisgarh on the first day of the match had scored 270 for the loss of four wickets. Harpreet Singh with 116 run knock was highest scorer for them. Due to rain followed by low visibility in Jammu, no play was possible in the match on second and third. Instead of resuming their inning Chhatisgarh on Thursday decided to declare their inning. J&K tried to go after the score to earn extra two points but couldn’t make it as they got all out. From the match Chhattisgarh got three points while as J&K got 1 to take their tally to 33 points on the table.
“We had nothing to lose only to gain for going after the target. If we batted slowly and played for draw without finishing our inning we would still have got same one point. By going after the first inning score we had chance of earning three points from the match. However, we lost wickets early on which didn’t helped our cause,” said J&K official.