Now it’s Harpreet’s turn to score ton

Bengal bowlers toiled for the second consecutive day at the Brabourne stadium in the Ranji Trophy quarterfinal on Saturday. Madhya Pradesh stretched the second innings to 161 overs before declaring at 560 for nine on day four.

Ishwar Pandey, Jalaj Saxena and Chandrakant Sakure dismissed three batsmen to leave Bengal at 113 for three, trailing by 674 runs and looking at the difficult task of surviving at the crease for one more day.

MP captain Devendra Bundela is clear about intent, forcing the opponent to spend hours on the field. “We tried our best to demoralise Bengal. I will be disappointed if my bowlers don’t get them out. Five-day games give you a time to deal with the situation the way you want,” he said.

Harpreet Singh became the second century-maker (139 off 206 balls) for MP.

Harpreet has one century from 32 first-class matches so far, averaging 30.11 before this match.

The scores:

Madhya Pradesh — 1st innings: 348.

Bengal — 1st innings: 121.

Madhya Pradesh — 2nd innings: Aditya Shrivastava c Saha b Mandal 17, Jalaj Saxena c Saha b Dinda 20, Rajat Patidar c Dinda b Tiwary 137, Naman Ojha b V. P. Singh 52, Devendra Bundela c V. P. Singh b P. Ojha 72, Harpreet Singh c Saha b P. Ojha 139, Ankit Dane c Mandal b Easwaran 69, Ankit Sharma c Saha b V. P. Singh 25, Puneet Date not out 17, Ishwar Pandey c Tiwary b Dinda 0; Extras (nb-5, w-3, lb4): 12; Total (for nine wkts. decl. in 160.3 overs): 560.

Fall of wickets: 1-35, 2-43, 3-184, 4-298, 5-314, 6-463, 7-528, 8-555, 9-560.

Bengal bowling: Dinda 32.3-7-92-2, Veerpratap Singh 27-1-94-2, Mukesh Kumar 18-4-46-0, Mandal 17-3-47-1, Pragyan Ojha 38-4-169-2, Tiwary 0-1-51-1, Easwaran 15-0-45-1, Pankaj Kumar Shaw 3-1-12-0.

Bengal — 2nd innings: Abhimanyu Easwaran c Patidar b Pandey 16, Sayan Shekhar Mandal lbw b Saxena 39, Sudip Chatterjee c N. Ojha b Sakure 16, Manoj Tiwary (batting) 32, Wriddhiman Saha (batting) 6, Extras (b-2, lb-2): 4; Total (for three wkts. in 31 overs): 113.

Fall of wickets: 1-38, 2-69, 3-107.

Madhya Pradesh bowling: Pandey 10-3-33-1, Datey 7-2-25-0, Sakure 7-1-28-1, Saxena 6-0-21-1, Ankit Sharma 1-0-2-0.