Tamil Nadu churn out sluggish cricket

KOLKATA: If Karnataka’s quick first innings wrap served as an early warning, Mumbai’s inexplicable implosion in Bangalore vindicated Tamil Nadu’s strategy to play almost snoozeinducing cricket. This might be a semifinal, but it still boils down to constructing a monumental first innings.

Tamil Nadu finished the first day of their Ranji Trophy semifinal against Maharashtra with only 192 runs but what keeps them ahead is the loss of just three wickets.

It won’t be surprising if Tamil Nadu bat in similar fashion for at least another session on the second day. That still leaves them 11 sessions to make a match out of this slow starter.

BAD START

No Tamil Nadu player was ready to speak, leave alone explain their sloth run-making but Maharashtra coach David Andrews was quick in praising his bowlers for bowling an immaculate line and length. It did dry up the runs but apart from Murali Vijay’s wicket, the bowling didn’t really set the stage on fire.

Terrible shot selection accounted for Abhinav Mukund and Baba Aparajith’s wickets. Vijay, however, got out to a beauty.

A slight hint of away movement from Domnic Joseph was enough for the best Test opener in recent months to be lured into fishing outside his off-stump.

The ball was still nipping around five overs after lunch but so determined was Dinesh Karthik’s intention of grinding out the rest of the day that Maharashtra hardly created a dent despite their best efforts.

BRIEF SCORES: Tamil Nadu 192/3 (Vijay Shankar batting 56, Dinesh Karthik batting 48) vs

Maharashtra.