Former champions Tamil Nadu tasted their first success of the season trouncing Himachal Pradesh by 180 runs on the final day of the Elite Group A Ranji Trophy match in Chennai on Wednesday.
Set to score a daunting 308 to win on a turning wicket, the visitors, resuming at five for no loss, did not offer even a semblance of fight and were bundled out for 127 runs in 58.3 overs.
With this win, Tamil Nadu gained five points.
In contrast to their performance in the first innings, it was total surrender by the Himachal batsmen, who failed to negotiate the varied turns of left arm spinner R Ramkumar and off spinner S Suresh Kumar, who struck at regular intervals to hasten the end.
From the moment medium pacer Yeo Mahesh trapped opener Sandeep Sharma in the third over of the day, the rest of the batting order collapsed like nine pins, as the spinners did the star turn for the home team.
Suresh Kumar picked four wickets and Ramkumar claimed three wickets as the match ended an hour after lunch on the final day.
Scorecard:
Tamil Nadu (1st innings): 234
Himachal Pradesh (1st innings): 223
Tamil Nadu (2nd innings): 296 for six decl
Himachal Pradesh (2nd innings, overnight 5/0):
M Gupta c Vijay b Ramkumar 23
S Sharma lbw b Mahesh 6
P Dogra c Mahesh b Ramkumar 19
M Bisla c Vijay b Kumar 7
A Mannu lbw b Kumar 24
B Sharma b Ramkumar 7
S Singh b Kumar 19
V Bhatia c Suresh b Kumar 9
A Thakur (run out) 1
V Malik c Mukund b Amarnath 2
J Mehta not out 0
Extras: (b-7, lb-3) 10
Total: (all out in 58.3 overs) 127
Fall of wickets: 1-17, 2-46, 3-58, 4-64, 5-73, 6-115, 7-124, 8-125, 9-127
Bowling: VY Mahesh 9-4-30-1, P Amarnath 7.3-3-19-1, R Ramkumar 21-12-26-3, C Suresh 10-4-11-0, SS Kumar 11-1-31-4
