Published: Sep 10, 2016, 09:29 PM (IST)
Edited: Sep 11, 2016, 12:06 PM (IST)
India Blue had a near perfect Day 1 against India Red in the Duleep Trophy 2016-17 final being played at Greater Noida. India Blue were lead ably by skipper Gautam Gambhir with the bat along with Cheteshwar Pujara. Pujara went on to make most of his opportunity cracking his second hundred in this edition Duleep Trophy. Both of these players are eyeing a place in the Test team with a long season coming up for India this provided the best opportunity for them to make an impression. India Red lead by Yuvraj Singh looked out of sort in their bowling and fielding. To make matters worse Dinesh Karthik and Rohit Sharma played a cameos to hand India Blue a healthy run-rate by the end of day’s play. Going into stumps on Day 1 India Blue were 362 for 3 with Pujara not-out on 111 & Karthik not-out 55 with India Red bowling 90 grueling overs. Full Cricket Update, Duleep Trophy Final, India Red vs India Blue, Day 1
Starting the innings Gambhir and Mayank Agarwal started slowly for India Blue. Both players looked to play out India Red bowlers in Pradeep Sangwan and Nathu Singh. Nathu was expected to bounce out India Blue batsmen with the pink ball which was not to be. Initially being slow Gambhir picked up his scoring rate and started scoring off more freely, reminiscing his old self. As soon as Amit Mishra and Kuleep Yadav came on to bowl Gambhir took a liking to them and started displaying his fluent footwork. Gambhir took a fond liking to his former Delhi Daredevil teammate Mishra, taking him of 41 runs off 45 balls.
Gambhir got to his fifty in 62 balls which included six four’s. Gambhir after his fifty slowed down and watched Agarwal take on the role of the aggressor. Agarwal soon started to open up his arms and took a liking to India Blue bowlers. Agarwal got to half-century in 93 balls, his 10th First-Class fifty. Agarwal soon departed after achieving his half century as India Red skipper Yuvraj Singh called upon Stuart Binny to bowl. Binny struck in his very first ball after Agarwal miss timed a drive into the hands of a diving Shikhar Dhawan to get out on 57.
Agarwal and Gambhir added 144 runs for the first wicket.Coming in next was Pujara who had already struck a hundred in his Duleep Trophy. Pujara was steady to start his innings and slowly build up on it. Pujara scored cracked a lovely boundary to bring up his 10,000 First-Class runs. Gambhir was soon to depart after nearly reaching his first First-Class hundred in two years.Gambhir was out to his Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) teammate Yadav for 94 runs. Gambhir in a bid to get to his hundred in style perished getting his stumps rattled.
Next to come in was Rohit Sharma, who has been selected in the Mumbai Ranji Squad to play New Zealand in their warm-up game in New Delhi. Rohit was quick to get off the blocks getting for the mark via a boundary. Rohit then slowed down in the middle as Pujara was looking in great touch. Rohit made a 56-ball 30 before holding off to Shikhar Dhawan at covers. This handed Mishra his first wicket after toiling hard all day long. Coming in next was Dinesh Karthik.
Karthik played a swashbuckling cameo of 55 runs along with Pujara. Karthik started off his innings with a boundary but was lucky to survive the next ball. Post that it was the Karthik show who smashed almost every bowler out of the park.Karthik like every other India Blue batsmen went after Mishra, Kuldeep and Binny. Karthik added 40 runs off them in just 48 balls. Karthik was the perfect foil to Pujara who was stuck in the 90’s for a long time.
Both Pujara and Karthik added 120 runs for the fourth wicket playing out 23.3 overs. Karthik was first to achieve his milestone of getting his fifty in 58 balls. This is also his second consecutive half-century Pujara was soon to reach his 100 off 153 balls, which included 12 fours’. This was also his 33rd First-Class ton.Pujara was unbeaten on 111 runs at the end of day’s play, with Karthik remaining unbeaten on 55 runs.
Earlier, Gambhir had won the toss on a seemingly good batting pitch. India Blue announced two changes in the team with Rohit Sharma and Ravindra Jadeja coming in the playing XI from the previous match replacing Siddhesh Lad and Mohit Sharma. Yuvraj Singh led India Red also made as many as three changes in the playing XI with Shikhar Dhawan, Stuart Binny and Amit Mishra coming in.
Brief scores:
India Blue: 362 for 3 ( Gautam Gambhir 94, Cheteshwar Pujara 111* ; Stuart Binny 1 for 54) vs India Red.
