It was a forgetful outing for Sikkim as Hyderabad completely dominated the opening day of the four-day Ranji Trophy Plate Group League match at the NexGen Cricket Academy Ground here on Friday.
Electing to bat, Sikkim was bowled out for 79 in the face of another impressive show by left-arm pacer Chama Milind and left-arm spinner Tanay Thyagarajan. In reply, Hyderabad scored a commanding 381 for three at close of play.
While Milind, who struck to a decent line and made the batters play at most of the time, picked a four-wicket haul, Tanay returned with his career-best haul of six for 25 and more importantly the duo ensured Sikkim was bowled out in the extended lunch break.
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To their credit, Milind exploited whatever help the pitch offered to the pacers and Tanay stuck to the basics, bowling an impeccable line and length. The ball did kick up disconcertingly quite a few times in the pre-lunch session and surprisingly that was not the case after the lunch break.
Then, when Hyderabad batted, openers Tanmay Agarwal, cracking his 11th Ranji century in his 55th game and also recording his career-best score of 137 (125b, 11x4, 5x6), and Rahul Singh (83, 64b, 10x4, 5x6) put on 132 runs in just 18 overs.
Though Rahul too looked good to score a century after playing some big hits, couldn’t resist the temptation to go for a reverse sweep and ended up giving a simple catch. And, Tanmay, on 95, was lucky to see a lone slip fielder drop a sitter off slow bowler Md Saptulla.
Then, Tanmay and Rohit Rayudu (75, 111b, 3x4, 2x6) strung together a 138-run stand for the second wicket to pile on the agony for Sikkim.
Tanmay finally perished, holing out to deep mid-wicket and soon Rayudu also walked back to the pavilion.
In the final session, captain and India star Tilak Varma batted fluently (70 batting, 66b, 5x4, 3x6) to see Hyderabad finish the day 302 runs ahead with seven wickets in hand.
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