Ranji Trophy: TN skipper rues team's poor bowling in second session

Captain Baba Aparajith said Tamil Nadu bowlers were off target and leaked runs in the second session.

Baba Aparajith expected his bowlers to do better in the second innings.

Tamil Nadu skipper and coaching staff were unanimous in their view that the bowlers did not put their best effort on Thursday that has put Tamil Nadu in deep trouble and allowing Madhya Pradesh to take a seizable lead of 132 runs.

Captain Baba Aparajith said, “Natarajan bowled well in the morning but after lunch, I don’t think we bowled as well as we should have. We leaked a lot of runs in the second session and that has put us on the back foot.”

Assistant coach R. Prasanna was far less charitable saying, “except for the first session, we bowled poorly. We had a defensive field and needed to bowl tight but didn't do that giving width to the batsmen.”

Read: Rameez, Venkatesh put MP in driver's seat against TN

MP scored 107 runs in 25 overs in the second session at more than four runs per over.

Meanwhile, Venkatesh Iyer playing in his fourth match in Ranji Trophy, couldn’t have found a better time to score his maiden first-class half-century with his team struggling at 84 for 5 on a seaming wicket.

Speaking about his knock of 88, Venkatesh said, “It was difficult initially with the ball swinging but I just tried to be positive because I had to ensure I did not get bogged down as it would have affected the set batsman (Rameez Khan) as well.”