New Delhi: Coming into Day 2 of the Ranji Trophy final, Jammu & Kashmir were already in a good position. They went on to steadily fortify it and move into a position of command, finishing on 527/6 in their first innings at stumps in Hubballi on Wednesday.
If Shubham Pundir and Yawer Hassan shone on the first day, captain Paras Dogra’s gutsy 70 after returning from the hit to his neck was the highlight on the second day. Karnataka took the second new ball at the start of play and their seamers made it talk. The trio of Vidyadhar Patil, Vijaykumar Vyshak and Prasidh Krishna bowled with precision and found movement. They kept it tight, and eventually both the set batters, Pundir (121) and Abdul Samad (61) played loose shots and fell in quick succession.
After Pundir and Samad’s 124-run partnership came to an end, Dogra combined with Kanhaiya Wadhwan (70) to steady the ship with a 110-run partnership. They both fell well short of a century but their time in the middle did keep Karnataka on edge.
Although J&K added only 243 runs losing four wickets on a truncated day that saw only 69 overs bowled, Sahil Lotra is set on 57 and Auqib Nabi, their pace spearhead who has made vital contributions with the bat, yet to come in.
Dogra had retired hurt on nine after being struck by a Prasidh Krishna short ball on Day 1. He returned at the fall of Samad in the 99th over. He was then subjected to consistent short pitched bowling, and sledging by the Karnataka fielders. Tension reached a breaking point when Dogra – 41 and playing in his 153rd first-class match – after having awkwardly fended a delivery that went to the boundary, came into contact with substitute fielder KV Aneesh and headbutted him. Both players were wearing helmet.
Following that Dogra and Mayank Agarwal got into a war of words, requiring the intervention of umpires Rohan Pandit and Ulhas Gandhe. After a while, Karnataka skipper Devdutt Padikkal was seen talking to the umpires, complaining about Dogra. The J&K captain has been fined 50% of the match fee for the incident.
“All that keeps happening and especially when you are playing a final or something, a bit of it happens,” Dogra told reporters after the day’s play. “It was just in a little heat of the moment. Not a big thing. Yeah, it is all settled now. That’s (a hot day) a different thing and it was momentary. We started talking and chatting after that so it’s all well.”
Karnataka did not take kindly to the headbutting and Krishna and the other pacers continued their short ball spree. Dogra, who took a couple of body blows on Tuesday, was peppered with bouncers again on Day 2. In the 140th over, Vyshak’s short ball hit him on the helmet grille and fell on the stumps, but the bails did not come off.
Much like in the first day, J&K batters went after the Karnataka spinners. As long as leg spinner Shreyas Gopal (1/130 in 33 overs) and left-arm spinner Shikhar Shetty (1/112 in 32 overs) were operating, the duo didn’t have problems.
After Wadhawan was caught by KL Rahul at slip off Shetty, Dogra added another 54 runs with Lotra, who had come in for the injured Vanshaj Sharma and helped himself to a half-century. Gopal eventually got his only wicket, bowling Dogra after beating his defence with a googly, the ball rolling on to the stumps.
Lotra and Abid Mushtaq, batting on 20*, have stitched an unbeaten 56-run partnership for the seventh wicket. After 156 overs, bad light halted proceedings with a little over an hour to go in the day, and then rain arrived too. Conditions did not get better and stumps were called early.
J&K look in good stead with six of their top seven scoring at least a fifty. With Auqib Nabi and Yudhvir Singh Charak to come, they have more batting to come.
“We haven’t set a target, to be honest. We can get the result from the first innings lead as well so we will try to bat as long as we can,” Dogra said.
“Mostly everyone (in the J&K camp) is satisfied but still we can go (bat) long. Everyone knows Karnataka is a good batting side. We would try to put as many runs as we can.”
