Tamil Nadu found two unlikely batting heroes in R. Prasana and Yomahesh before a brave Abhinav Mukund returned to the action to ensure the first innings lead against an inconsistent Delhi at the Ferozeshah Kotla ground here.
The Ranji Trophy Elite League game produced gripping action on the second day when Tamil Nadu, in pursuit of Delhi's first innings score of 212, battled to reach 281 for eight at close for a lead of 69 runs.
Resuming at eight without loss, Tamil Nadu, at 88 for five, looked in serious trouble and more when Mukund left the field after being hit on the face by a rising delivery from Pradeep Sangwan.
Ashish Nehra, responding to an SOS from the host, ended M. Vijay's struggle. The opener misread an incoming delivery, offered no shot and gamely walked once the ball hit the pads.
Off the next delivery, new-man Arun Karthik found his stumps in disarray. On this day, Nehra bowled 16 overs in four measured spells, with his successive first spell stretching to six overs.
Following Nehra's twin-blow, Sangwan got into the act and hurt TN's chances by coming back hard at Mukund, on 39, after being hit for two on-side boundaries in the same over.
Sensing their chances, the Delhi bowlers toiled hard with a luckless Parvinder Awana showing more discipline than Sangwan. But it was Sangwan who bowled Vasudeva Das and had Dinesh Karthik caught behind chasing an away-going delivery.
Vikas Mishra trapped B. Aparajith to leave TN tottering. Thereafter, it was a show of TN's resilience and sense of purpose.
Prasana and Yomahesh, helped by some very poor fielding from Delhi, raised 86 runs for the sixth wicket. Prasana smashed 10 boundaries in his 59 before being leg-before to the part-time off-spin of Mithun Manhas.
Mukund joined Yomahesh and brought TN within six runs of gaining the lead before the latter, who hit eight boundaries, fell three runs short of his maiden half century in the competition.
Mukund, who added 50 runs after resuming his innings, has so far hit 15 boundaries.
The scores:
Delhi — 1st innings: 212.
Tamil Nadu — 1st innings: A. Mukund (batting) 89, M. Vijay lbw b Nehra 14, K. Arun Karthik b Nehra 0, Dinesh Karthik c Bisht b Sangwan 18, K. Vasudeva Das b Sangwan 0, B. Aparajith lbw b Mishra 6, R. Prasana lbw b Manhas 59, Yomahesh b Awana 47, L. Balaji b Negi 16, J. Kaushik (batting) 8, Extras (b-9, lb-11, nb-2, w-2) 24, Total (for eight wkts. in 94 overs) 281.
Fall of wickets: 1-35, 2-35, 3-63, 4-78, 5-88, 6-174, 7-207, 8-268.
Delhi bowling: A. Nehra 18-4-70-2, P. Awana 20-7-31-1, V. Mishra 26-11-53-1, P. Negi 2-1-5-1, P. Sangwan 18-5-64-2, Y. Nagar 1-0-4-0, M. Manhas 9-1-34-1.
Other scores:
Elite Group A:
At Mohali: Saurashtra 542 in 162.4 overs (Bhushan Chauhan 68, Sagar Jogiyani 164, Shitanshu Kotak 166 n.o., Jayesh Odedra 53, M.S. Gony six for 143) vs. Punjab 59 for three in 12.4 overs.
At Sambalpur: Orissa 482 in 160.3 overs (Natraj Behera 53, Niranjan Behera 54, Biplab Samantray 171, Abhilash Mallick 99, Piyush Chawla five for 105) vs. Uttar Pradesh 54 for one in 21 overs.
At Delhi: Rajasthan 521 for eight decl. in 172 overs (Robin Bist 167, Ashok Menaria 230, Anureet Singh five for 153) vs. Railways 32 for one in eight overs.
Elite Group B:
At Vadodara: Haryana 390 in 129.4 overs (Rahul Dewan 164, Nitin Saini 112, Murtuja Vahora five for 78) vs. Baroda 104 for one in 42.5 overs (Aditya Waghmode 51 batting, Rakesh Solanki 44 batting).
At Kolkata: Bengal 496 in 143.1 overs (Arindam Das 105, Manoj Tiwary 267, Sourav Ganguly 47, Ishwar Pandey four for 115) vs. Madhya Pradesh 136 for one in 34 overs (Naman Ojha 60 batting, Jalaj Saxena 46).
Plate Group A:
At Vijayawada: Andhra 265 in 91.4 overs (Hemal Watekar 69, G.K. Chiranjeevi 61, T. Atchuti Rao 49, Vikramjeet Malik five for 58) vs. Himachal Pradesh 267 for four in 82 overs (Paras Dogra 106, Varun Sharma 69 batting).
At Kochi: Tripura 139 vs. Kerala 223 for five in 91 overs (Abhishek Hegde 40, V.A. Jagadeesh 57, Sachin Baby 52 batting, Udit Patel four for 50).
At Delhi: Vidarbha 508 for six in 180 overs (Akshay Kolhar 41, Aniruddha Chore 157, Shiv Sundar Das 87, Ranjit Paradkar 54, Sairaj Bahutule 80 batting) vs. Services.
P late Group B:
At Guwahati: Assam 227 in 105.4 overs (Sibsankar Roy 80, Anwar Ahmed four for 38, A. Lalith Mohan four for 70, Ibrahim Khaleel four catches & three stumpings) vs. Hyderabad 175 for one in 55 overs (Akshath Reddy 82 batting, D.B. Ravi Teja 48).
At Jammu: Goa 281 and 71 for one in 17 overs (Sher Yadav 43 batting) vs. Jammu and Kashmir 260 in 74.2 overs (Adil Rishi 40, Hardeep Singh 109, Amit Yadav four for 54).
At Nasik: Maharashtra 460 in 114 overs (Chirag Khurana 123, Sangram Atitkar 62, Nikhil Paradkar 87, Rohit Motwani 78, Shahbaz Nadeem four for 94, Shiv Gautham six catches & one stumping) vs. Jharkhand 195 for seven in 57 overs (Rameez Nemat 79, Saurabh Tiwary 42).
