Srinagar: Mukesh Choudhary led the charge for Rest of India with 5/78 as the visitors ended day two 17 runs in arrears in their second innings, after restricting Jammu and Kashmir to 278 in the Irani Cup match here on Friday.
Rest of India lost Shikhar Mohan (2) early on in the reply to reach 24 for one at the close of play, after J&K took a lead of 41 runs in the contest dominated by fast bowlers.
After RoI were bowled out for 237 on the first day, the home team batters too found it tough against the opponents’ fast bowlers.
Having lost two wickets already in seven overs before stumps on day one, J&K were bowled out or 278, with a big chunk of the first innings’ total coming from skipper Paras Dogra (75), Abdul Samad 57, and an immensely valuable 64 from Lone Nasir Muzaffar at No. 9.
Choudhary gave RoI the early advantage when he rocked J&K twice in initial exchanges.
A sharp in-swinger found its way between a huge gap in J&K No. 4 Shubham Khajuria’s inside edge to crash into the wickets. Choudhary then bounced out Qamran Iqbal with a sharp bouncer on the leg side, which kissed the batter’s glove before settling into skipper Rishabh Pant’s gloves.
Iqbal confidently called for DRS intervention thinking otherwise, but the replays showed a huge spike at the point of contact between his right hand glove and the ball, reducing J&K to a precarious 37/4.
The next in Choudhary’s wickets column was Kanhaiya Wadhawan (12), whose half-hearted attempt to poke at a devilry angling away from him found the edge and carried to R Smaran at first slip.
Dogra and Samad joined forces to take their side out of the woods, putting on 101 for the fifth wicket before another mini collapse hit J&K’s innings.
Veteran Dogra cracked six fours and a six to make 75 off 143 balls, while Samad smashed five hits to the fence and one over it to make 57 off 88 balls.
But Mukesh Kumar broke the stand when he had Samad reaching out for one to be caught by Sanat Sangwan, and Choudhary then removed Wadhawan without much delay.
Abid Mushtaq (0) and Sahil Lotra (2) failed to trouble the scorers, falling to Mukesh and Akash Deep (3/43) respectively, as J&K skidded to 166 for eight.
This was when Muzaffar took charge, peppering the field with eight fours and three sixes to make 64 off 58 balls. He put on 64 runs with Dogra for the ninth wicket, and another 48 with Sunil Kumar (2 not out) for the 10th.
Sunil then snaffled out the wicket of Mohan when RoI began their second innings to keep the visitors in check.
Brief Scores: Rest of India 237 & 24/1 in 15 overs (Sanat Sangwan 10 not out, Sudip Kumar Gharami 10 not out; Sunil Kumar 1/9) trail Jammu and Kashmir 278 in 64.2 overs (Paras Dogra 75, Abdul Samad 57, Lone Nasir Muzaffar 64; Mukesh Choudhary 5/78, Akash Deep 3/43) by 17 runs. PTI DDV
