Powar slams unbeaten century
West Zone, aided by a maiden unbeaten 113 from Ramesh Powar, scored a mammoth 656 for seven before
declaring their first innings against East Zone on the second day of their four-day Duleep Trophy cricket match at the Nehru
stadium in Pune on Friday.
In reply, East were 50 for no loss off 14 overs.
Resuming at the overnight score of 384 for four, West crossed the 400 mark just before overnight not out batsman
Vinod Kambli, who added just 12 runs to his score of
105, departed first on the second morning. Paceman Javed Zaman uprooted the southpaw's off-stump.
Kambli's innings was studded with 15 fours and a towering six.
Kambli's departure brought Sairaj Bahutule to the crease. Bahutule and the other unbeaten batsman, Jacob Martin, pushed the score beyond the 450 mark. Martin, who was overcautious,
took 150 minutes to compile 39 runs, before he was run-out by East skipper Shiv Sundar Das.
A 109-run seventh wicket partnership between Bahutule (62), who was particularly harsh on East spinners Sukhbinder Singh, Sanjay Raul and slow-left arm Utpal
Chatterjee, and Powar took West past the 550 mark.
But just when Bahutule was looking comfortable, he was run-out in a mix-up with Powar, with Rohan Gavaskar doing the damage.
Bahutule's 62 contained eight fours and a six.
Powar looked in fine nick and went about his job in
whirlwind fashion, maintaining a near run-a-ball strike rate.
At the other end was Indian allrounder Ajit Agarkar, who
was rotating the strike, allowing the free-flowing Powar do
most of the scoring.
At tea, West were 624 for seven with Powar three short
of his ton and Agarkar on 17. The partnership at this stage
was already worth 62 runs, made off 15 overs.
Soon after tea, West declared their innings at 657 for
seven after Powar and Agarkar added 94 runs off just 64 balls
for the eighth wicket.
East's opening batsmen Shiv Sunder Das and Zhakir Jaffari
were batting on 22 and 23 runs respectively when stumps were
drawn.
Scoreboard
West Zone (1st innings) (overnight 384 for four)
W Jaffer c Dasgupta b Mohanty 00
N Mongia c S Singh b Zaman 07
H Kanitkar lbw b S Singh 42
S Tendulkar c sub M Gupta b Raul 199
V Kambli b Zaman 117
J Martin run out (S S Das) 39
S Bahutule run out (R Gavaskar) 62
R Powar not out 113
A Agarkar not out 32
Extras (b-11,lb-16,w-1,nb-17) 45
Total (for 7 wickets decl 164 over) 656
Fall of wickets:1/0, 2/19, 3/146, 4/371, 5/412, 6/453, 7/562
Bowling: Mohanty 26-11-78-1, Zaman 29-8-118-2,
Jaichandra 5-1-17-0, Sukhbinder Singh 36-3-162-1,
Chatterjee 35-8-120-0, S Raul 24-2-98-1, R Gavaskar 9-1-36-1.
East Zone (1st innings):
Z Jaffari not out 23
Shiv Sunder Das 22
Extras (NB-4,LB-1) 5
Total (for no loss) 50
Bowling: A Agarkar 5-0-9-0, Z Khan 4-1-21-0,
R Powar 2-0-5-0, I Siddique 2-0-6-0, S Bahutule
1-0-8-0.
Mail Cricket Editor
