Published: Nov 30, 2018, 06:00 PM (IST)
Edited: Nov 30, 2018, 06:00 PM (IST)
In a remarkable turnaround, Bengal have put themselves in a comfortable position for an outright win against Tamil Nadu thanks to a five-wicket haul from Writtick Chatterjee. On Day 3 of their 2018-19 Ranji Trophy, Elite B, Round 4 encounter at the M A Chidambaram Stadium, Writtick’s maiden fifer in first-class cricket saw Tamil Nadu being bowled out for 141 in their second innings and thus ending up with a lead of 215 runs.
At at the close of play on Friday, Bengal had reached 87/2 after a brisk half-century from opener Abhishek Raman (53) and need 125 runs more to win.
After resuming their innings on 12/1 on the third morning in Chennai, Tamil Nadu were kept on the backfoot and weren’t allowed even a sniff of a recovery. Regular strikes kept them under the pump with spinner Writtick causing the majority of the damage. He first struck with the wicket of R Kishore (18) and then landed a major blow when he got rid of first innings centurion Baba Aparajith on 21. In that same over, he cleaned up Anirudh B for a two-ball duck leaving the hosts tottering at 83/6.
Aamir chipped in with two wickets before Writtick took his fifth scalp by removing the last man T Natarajan lbw for 1. N Jagadeesan was their top-scorer with 38 off 72.
Bengal will hope to knock off the arrears on the final day on Saturday with their captain Manoj Tiwary (13*) and Aamir (1*) being the two unbeaten batsmen.
Brief Scores: Bengal 189 and 87/2 (Abhishek Raman 53; Rahil Shah 1/22) need 125 runs more to win against Tamil Nadu 263 and 141
