Patidar Fifty Leaves Bengal Behind In Ranji Trophy
In the ongoing mini-festival of cricket, Rajat Patidar delivered a marvelous half-century to keep MP in the driver’s seat against Bengal. He showcased his best skills in the semifinals of the Ranji Trophy on Thursday.
Continuing his outstanding form has taken center stage in MP’s second chapter with an elegant 63 not out after his team made 78 runs in the first-innings lead. After performing at his peak in the recent IPL season for Royal Challengers Bangalore. Himself home after smashing ten boundaries in his 109-ball unbeatable knock.
In his top match, they are reaching finals for the first time since 1998-99 MP now has an overall lead of 231 runs along with the skipper Aditya Shrivastava showing faith in Patidar. Coming on the field after Shubham Sharma (22) retired hurt after getting the ball directly on his arm by Akash Deep’s delivery just before the tea.
Patidar has mixed caution with aggression as bowlers of Bengal struggled to get the breakthrough. Moreover, MP slowly tilted the momentum in their favor in the final session. There is no pressure from the Bengal bowlers on a spread-out field as the duo cleverly collect ones and twos to take the stress off them. Moreover, after resuming the day on 197 for five, veteran Manoj Tiwari (102), who was overnight 84, completed his 29th outstanding hundred.
On this journey, he was well-supported by Bengal and RCB all-rounder Shahbaz Ahmed (116). Moreover, after his maiden first-class hundred after resuming an overnight personal score of 72. These two duos formed a strong backbone. Sloppy batting display by Bengal as eight of their batters failed to get double-digit scores.
Skipper Abhimanyu Easwaran (22) was the second batter to register double-digit runs, and Bengal was bundled out for 273 in 89.2 overs in reply to MP 341.