Arzan Nagwaswalla (16 not out, 22b, 1x4) held his nerve in the company of last man Priyajitsinh Jadeja to foil Andhra’s plot of ransacking Gujarat’s run chase and secured his side a one-wicket victory in the Ranji Trophy Elite Group B match at the Narendra Modi Stadium ground B in Ahmedabad on Monday.
Left-arm orthodox Lalith Mohan picked seven wickets, five of them coming in a marathon 19-over opening spell that left Gujarat staring down the barrel at 69 for six, to throw the home team’s pursuit of a modest-looking 144 runs into disarray.
Chintan Gaja (30, 58b, 3x4) looked on course to bail his side out for a second time in the contest. There seemed little room for edge-of-the-seat thrills during his 58-run seventh-wicket association with Jaymeet Patel (32, 87b). But Lalith forced Jaymeet into chopping one onto his stumps after Tea and rekindled Andhra’s hopes of a heist.
Gaja fell in the next over to a K.V. Sasikanth delivery that kept perilously low and castled him, leaving his side 13 short of its destination with just one wicket in hand.
However, Nagwaswalla worked around the field setting, picked the gaps and took Gujarat over the line.
READ | Gujarat beats Andhra, records ninth one-wicket win in Ranji Trophy history
The nail-biting finish was in the works from the second session when Andhra opted to open the bowling with the spin duo of Lalith and Tripurana Vijay. The spinners kept the scoring rate on a leash and Lalith accounted for openers Rishi Patel and Priyank Panchal inside the first six overs.
Manan Hingrajia and Umang Kumar took up a battle of attrition against the spin duo and added 38 for the third wicket. But just when Umang had set himself to move up in gears, hitting two sixes off Vijay over deep mid-wicket, Lalith got a delivery to crash into his off stump.
Hingrajia, who relied on padding deliveries pitching outside the leg-stump line, was foxed by one that went straight and was caught short of his crease by K.S. Bharat. Ravi Bishnoi’s promotion to number six lasted one delivery as a mix-up with Jaymeet ran him out.
Urvil Patel became Lalith’s fifth victim when he was caught at silly point off an outside edge, leaving the onus on Gaja and Jaymeet to pull their side from the brink.
Earlier in the day, Bharat reverted to his throw-caution-to-the-wind approach, lofting Siddharth Desai over covers in the first over of the day. A pull over square leg and swat down the ground got him 10 runs in Gaja’s over. Looking to pick Desai over mid off, Bharat holed out to the fielder on 47.
Hanuma Vihari could do little against Desai’s delivery that skidded low and castled him. But a 45-run seventh-wicket stand between Nitish Kumar Reddy and Vijay came to Andhra’s rescue, getting the side to 297 and helping it set up a target worth fighting for.
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