Looking down the barrel at the end of Day 3, hosts Assam did a wonderful turnaround on the final day of their Ranji Trophy Group D opener to stave off defeat at the hands of Jharkhand in Guwahati on Monday.
Trailing Jharkhand’s first innings total by 51 runs at stumps on Sunday after following on, Assam batters pulled off a stunning comeback to reach 355 at tea on the day. In process, the home side set Ishan Kishan’s boys a 175-run target for an outright victory, which looked to be tough task with only the last session left.
Jharkhand, led by an explosive captain, tried their best to push for the win with Kishan (16 off 12 balls) coming out to open the innings with Nazim Siddiquie (3). But both were dismissed in quick succession in the third and fourth over, respectively. No. 3 Virat Singh (27* off 27) and Kolkata Knight Riders all-rounder Anukul Roy (24 off 16) put up 47 runs in six overs before the latter lost his stumps to Assam pacer Mukhtar Hussain in the first ball of 11th over with the scoreboard reading 74/3.
This led the Jharkhand camp to shake hands with their opponents thinking the target – still 101 to get from there – is not reachable in the remaining overs of the day.
Earlier, Assam’s batting was led by their captain Denish Das’s fighting 75, Akash Sengupta’s 92 and Mrinmoy Dutta’s 47-run cameo at No. 10. Sibsankar Roy could add only two to his unbeaten score of 15 but Das carried on from his 29 to reach 75 off 149 balls. But it was Sengupta and Dutta’s 88-run stand for the ninth wicket that took the game away from Jharkhand, who were in an advantageous position till the third day.
Jharkhand take home three points by the virtue of first innings lead while Assam had to be content with just one point, but avoiding loss would give them much solace before the next game.
Brief Scores (In Guwahati): Jharkhand 361 & 74/3 (Virat Singh 27, Anukul Roy 24; Mukhtar Hussain 2/28). Assam 180 & (f/o) 355 (Akash Sengupta 92, Denish Das 75, Mrinmoy Dutta 47; Utkarsh Singh 3/57, Manishi 3/61). Points: Jharkhand 3; Assam 1.
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