Ranji Trophy: Karnataka-Railways match ends in a draw; J&K start with win over Pondicherry
CHENNAI: Karnataka and Railways played out a draw in a Ranji Trophy Elite Group C match while Jammu and Kashmir began on a winning note, trouncing Pondicherry by eight wickets on Sunday.
Resuming at 63 for one, Karnataka slipped from 179 for 2 to 223 for 9 before skipper Manish Pandey declared, leaving the opponent with a 278-run target from 41 overs for an improbable victory.
The Railways finished at 69 for 4.
With Mayank Agarwal batting on 39, the focus was on how much the India Test batter could get. Having missed out in the first innings, the right-hander played with a lot of restraint and reached a half-century.
It took a good catch by Akshat Pandey to see the back of Agarwal for 56.
R Samarth batted fluently for his 83 (170 balls, 8 fours) and was involved in a half-century stand for the third wicket with K Siddharth, who hit a ton in the first innings.
After the exit of Siddharth at 179 and then Samarth at 192, the Karnataka innings saw wickets fall quickly and slid to 223 for 9 before Pandey declared. For Railways, medium-pacer Amit Mishra finished with 4 for 58 while captain Karn Sharma took three wickets.
Railways, in the second innings, slumped to 14 for 3 with debutant Vijayakumar Vyshak (2/16) sending back Mrunal Devdhar (20) and Arindam Ghosh (0).
Vivek Singh (18) batted resolutely along with Mohammad Saif (27 not out) to ensure there were no further alarms.
Karnataka picked three points for their efforts while Railways earned one point.
In the other match of the day, veteran spinner Parvez Rasool finished with a six-wicket haul, dismissing the last Pondicherry batsman to star in Jammu and Kashmir’s win.
Resuming at the overnight score of 113 for 9, Pondicherry added 11 runs to the score before Sagar Trivedi (37) became Rasool’s sixth victim in the second innings.
Needing 42 runs to begin the season with a win, J&K lost the openers – Qamran Iqbal (8) and Jatin Wadhwan (9) before Shubham Pundir (21 not out) and Ian Dev Singh (6 not out) saw the team home.
