Opener Jiwanjyot Singh struck an unbeaten 77 to help Punjab fight back against Jharkhand on the third day of their Ranji Trophy quarterfinal match here on Tuesday.
In reply to Jharkhand’s first innings total of 401, Punjab was 150 for one at stumps.
Jiwanjyot and his opening partner Ravinder Singh put on 75 before the latter misread Shahbaz Nadeem’s rising delivery and edged to first slip after making 37.
The 22-year-old Jiwanjyot, in his first year of first class cricket, has scored four centuries and a half-century in seven matches, including 213 on debut against Hyderabad.
Resuming at 310 for six, Jharkhand’s Ishank Jaggi fell to spinner Sarabjit Singh after adding only six runs to his overnight score of 126. Jaggi put on 58 runs for the seventh wicket with Sunny Gupta (40 not out).
Nadeem chipped in with a quickfire 31 off 48 deliveries before Sarabjit struck again to have him caught at short-leg.
For the visitors, pacer Siddharth Kaul and Sarabjit Singh bagged four wickets apiece.
The scores:
Jharkhand — 1st innings: Akash Verma b S. Kaul 4, Rameez Nemat c U. Kaul b Harbhajan 100, Manish Vardhan b Ladda 31, Saurabh Tiwary lbw b Ladda 1, Ishank Jaggi c Mandeep b Ladda 132, Kumar Deobrat c U. Kaul b S. Kaul 20, Shiv Gautam c Amitoze b S Kaul 8, Sunny Gupta (not out) 40, Shahbaz Nadeem c Jiwanjot b Ladda 31, Shiv Shankar Rao b S. Kaul 8, Ajay Yadav (run out) 0; Extras: (b-13, lb-1, w-1, nb-6, penalty-5): 26; Total (in 149 overs): 401.
Fall of wickets: 1-10, 2-85, 3-97, 4-203, 5-270, 6-282, 7-340, 8-381, 9-397.
Punjab bowling: Manpreet Grewal 28-4-68-0, Siddharth Kaul 37-12-78-4, Taruwar Kohli 2-0-7-0, Sarabjeet Ladda 43-13-118-4, Amitoze Singh 3-1-2-0, Harbhajan Singh 36-5-109-1.
Punjab — 1st innings: Jiwanjot Singh (batting) 77, R. Inder Singh c Vardhan b Nadeem 37, Taruwar Kohli (batting) 26; Extras (w-4, penalty-6: 10; Total (for one wkt. in 58 overs): 150.
Fall of wicket: 1-75.
Jharkhand bowling: Ajay Yadav 6-3-6-0, Shankar Rao 9-1-52-0, Shahbaz Nadeem 23-8-35-1, Sunny Gupta 20-3-51-0.
Keywords: Ranji Trophy
