K. Shri Vasudevadas (69 batting) and R. Prasanna (53 batting) bailed out Tamil Nadu with an unbeaten 121-run partnership, as the visitors finished the first day at 261 for five in their Ranji Trophy Elite Group B match against Bengal at the Eden Gardens on Tuesday.
The two joined hands with Tamil Nadu tottering at 140 for five after the top-order had been prised out by the Bengal attack.
On a grassy pitch, the Bengal quicks — Ashok Dinda, Sami Ahmed and Ranadeb Bose — dictated terms with their pace and swing.
Opener Abhinav Mukund was the only one who proved equal to the task while making a quickfire 83.
Abhinav on song
Even as the others struggled, the 21-year-old left-hander looked in good nick as he touched the fence 13 times, scoring his runs off just 115 deliveries.
Murali Vijay (13) was the first to go after edging Sami to slip while B. Aparajith departed for a duck.
The crisis deepened as S. Badrinath (24) and Dinesh Karthik fell in quick succession to make it 102 for four.
Abhinav, easily the most prolific Tamil Nadu batsman, lost his concentration when he was 17 short of a century.
Abhinav, who also missed a hundred by one run in the previous match against Delhi, edged to the 'keeper off Dinda.
Costly misses
Vasudevadas and Prasanna, however, took to the fight to the Bengal bowlers with a dogged display.
They were lucky early on in their innings; Vasudevadas was dropped by Writam Porel at slip off Sami when he was on 13. Prasanna, when on 15, survived a caught and bowled chance off Bengal spinner Iresh Saxena.
The two made the host rue the missed chances as they survived the day and put Tamil Nadu on course for a healthy first innings total.
The scores:
Tamil Nadu — 1st innings: Abhinav Mukund c Goswami b Dinda 83, M. Vijay c Porel b Sami 13, B. Aparajith c Goswami b Dinda 0, S. Badrinath lbw b Bose 24, D. Karthik lbw b Saxena 2; K. Shri Vasudevadas (batting) 69, R. Prasanna (batting) 53; Extras (nb-2, w-1, lb-13, b-1): 17; Total (for five wkts. in 84 overs): 261.
Fall of wickets: 1-29, 2-32, 3-88, 4-102, 5-140.
Bengal bowling: Bose 18-5-45-1, Dinda 21-6-58-2, Sami 18-7-52-1, Shukla 11-1-45-0, Saxena 12-3-27-1, Jhunjhunwala 4-0-20-0.
Other scores:
Elite Group ‘A':
At Bhubaneswar: Karnataka 238 for six in 90 overs (C.M. Gautam 63 batting) vs. Odisha.
At Jaipur: Punjab 283 for three in 90 overs (Ravi Inder Singh 133, Karan Goel 116 batting) vs. Rajasthan.
At Ghaziabad: Railways 282 for five in 90 overs (Shivakant Shukla 98, Nitin Bille 123) vs. Uttar Pradesh.
Elite Group ‘B':
At Vadodara: Baroda 192 for seven in 90 overs (Rakesh Solanki 69) vs. Gujarat.
At Indore: Delhi 158 in 59 overs (T.P. Sudhindra four for 46) vs. Madhya Pradesh 86 for six in 24.5 overs.
Plate Group ‘A': At Kadapa: Vidarbha 200 for five in 90 overs (Hemang Badani 73, Ranjit Paradkar 66 batting) vs. Andhra.
At Thalassery: Himachal Pradesh 243 for two in 90 overs (Paul Valthaty 56, Abhinav Bali 120, Paras Dogra 59 batting) vs. Kerala.
At Agartala: Tripura 242 in 87.3 overs (Subhrajit Roy 85) vs. Services.
Plate Group ‘B':
At Guwahati: Assam 182 for three in 91 overs (Pallavkumar Das 50, Dheeraj Jadhav 62 batting) vs. Maharashtra.
At Hyderabad: Hyderabad 234 for four in 90 overs (Akshath Reddy 78, B. Sandeep 94 batting) vs. Jammu and Kashmir.
At Jamshedpur: Jharkhand 218 in 87 overs (Manish Vardhan 84, Ishank Jaggi 42, Deepak Chougule 45 n.o.) vs. Goa two for one in one over.
