Sachin Baby stood tall again and the former Kerala captain’s 12th First Class hundred (109 not out) denied host Bihar a win in the Ranji Trophy Elite Group B match at the Moin Ul Haq stadium here on Monday.
A delayed start curtailed the first session to just one hour, and it was eventful as Bihar dropped the match after giving a life to both overnight batters, Baby and Akshay Chandran.
Resuming at 62 for two, the visitor rode on crisis-man Baby’s knock to reach 220 for four when the captains agreed for a draw soon after tea.
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Bihar, as its captain Ashutosh Aman said later, was satisfied with the three points it got for the first-innings lead while Kerala, with another underwhelming show, got a point, leaving its qualification chances in jeopardy.
Baby punished Bihar for its largesse as he overcame the early nerves to carve out a fine century. Chandran (38) gave solid support to Baby as the duo added 85 runs for the third wicket and more importantly consumed time to stall Bihar’s victory bid.
Bihar needed early wickets and left-arm medium-pacer Vipul Krishna nearly gave his side the breakthrough when he induced an edge from Chandran, when the batter was on eight, but Babul Kumar dropped a simple chance at first slip.
Baby, on 38, had a moment of fortune when his mistimed loft off Ashutosh Aman sailed over Sakibul Gani at mid on.
Just after lunch, Baby, on 50, enjoyed another slice of luck when he square drove medium-pacer Raghuvendra Pratap on the up and saw Piyush Kumar spill a catch at point.
Baby then brought out the full repertoire of his strokes, and the loss of Chandran and Vishnu Vinod in quick succession didn’t seem to bother him. He struck consecutive boundaries off leg-spinner Himanshu. He tucked the bowler towards long on and ran hard to complete his hundred.
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