Ranji Trophy Day 3 Round-Up: Jalaj Saxena takes 8 wickets again as Madhya Pradesh crush Railways; Karnataka eye second win

Saxena picked up his second 8-wicket haul in the match

Jalaj Saxena once again came with a brilliant spell and picked up 8 wickets as Madhya Pradesh thumped Railways by 9 wickets in their Group B encounter in Gwalior. The youngster had also taken 8/96 in the first innings, to reduce Railways to 256.

In the second innings, he came up with his career-best figures of 8/58 to completely floor the Railway batsmen for just 131, thus setting the hosts a narrow target of 112. The 28-year-old also hit the winning runs for his team as he remained unbeaten on 47, to push his side home. His amazing match figures of 16/154 earned him the man of the match award.

Madhya Pradesh 276 (Patidar 113, Rameez Khan 53, Karn Sharma 5-102, Anureet Singh 3-40) and 112/1 (Saxena 47*) vs Railways 256 and 131 (Saxena 8-58) in Gwalior.

Meanwhile, in a Group A encounter in Mysuru, defending champions Karnataka piled on more misery on Odisha as they declared at a score of 400/9 in their first innings. The hosts now lead by 168 runs and will be looking to quickly dismiss the visitors and earn their second outright win of the season.

Earlier in the day, Robin Uthappa and Karun Nair shared a 169-run stand for the fourth wicket even as the former narrowly missed out on scoring 150 as he was dismissed for a well-made 148. Nair, on the other hand, scored 73, as Karnataka easily crossed the 300-run mark before they declared at 400. In reply, Odisha were 0/1 in the second innings at the end of day’s play.

Odisha 232 (Podder 153, Gopal 4-75) and 0/1 vs Karnataka 400/9 dec (Uthappa 148, Agarwal 78, Nair 73, Basant Mohanty 2-58) in Mysuru.

Former Indian spinner Pragyan Ojha produced a wonderful spell and picked up 7 wickets for his team Bengal, as they gained an upper hand in their Group A encounter against Vidarbha. Ojha’s spell helped his team gain a crucial first-innings lead before they were shot out for 164 in their second innings, thus setting a target of 297 for the visitors.

Vidarbha 202 (Satish 36, Pragyan Ojha 7-58) and 3/0 vs Bengal 334 (Chatterjee 116, Easwaran 58, Mandal 56, Wakhare 4-71) and 164 (Wakhare 5-61, Wagh 3-27) in Kolkata.

UP made Mumbai toil hard on the field as they finished at 350/5 at stumps in Mumbai. Piyush Chawla scored a quickfire fifty and Umang Sharma too contributed with 53, as UP still trailed Mumbai by 260 runs in the first innings.

UP 350/5 (Piyush Chawla 54*, Umang Sharma 53, Raina 9) vs Mumbai 610/9 dec (Iyer 135, Rohit 113, Herwadkar 58, Bhuvneshwar 2-99) in Mumbai.

Irfan Pathan once again starred for Baroda, but this time with the bat, as he finished at 58 in the first innings. But the visitors stared at defeat as they were dismissed for just 252. In the second innings again, Baroda were in a spot of bother at 81/4 at stumps on day three, still trailing Gujarat by 172 runs.

Baroda 252 (Irfan Pathan 58, Waghmode 38, Axar 3-38) and 81/4 (Axar 2-19) vs Gujarat 505 (Panchal 128, Kalaria 68, Rujul Bhatt 65, Juneja 55, Irfan Pathan 6-47, Munaf 1-52) in Valsad.

Other Scores at the end of Day 3:

J&K 309 (Manhas 98, Nadeem 4-107) and 9/2(following on) vs Jharkhand 551/8 dec (Anand Singh 124, Kishan 109, Kaushal Singh 81) in Jamshedpur.

Assam 120 (Harshal Patel 3-36) and 122/4 (Arun Karthick 48, Ashish Hooda 2-53) vs Haryana 168 and 120 (Ashish Hooda 4-48) in Rohtak.

Goa 239 (Misal 106, Dharmendra Jadeja 3-41, Sanandia 3-51) and 242/4 (Asnodkar 104, Makwana 3-68) vs Saurashtra 258 (Jackson 38, Vasavada 38, RR Singh 3-46) in Rajkot.

Services 344/3 (Paliwal 106*, Yashpal 102*) vs Himachal Pradesh 531 (Dogra 226 Gangta 98, Pathania 3-108) in Dharamshala.

Tripura 224/7 (Warrier 3-68) vs Kerala 347 (Rohan Prem 118, Sachin Baby 70, Rana Dutta 5-50) in Malappuram.

Andhra 203 (AG Pradeep 78, KS Bharath 56, Bhui 35, Chandrasekhar 4-41, Rangarajan 3-72) vs Tamil Nadu in Chennai.