Opener Tanmay Agarwal cracked his 13th Ranji century (164, 192b, 12x4, 3x6) and captain Tilak Varma cracked his third ton (101, 15b, 6x4, 5x6) of the season to help Hyderabad post a challenging 383 for five against Nagaland on the first day of the Ranji Trophy Plate Group semifinal at Rajiv Gandhi Stadium here on Friday.
Electing to bat, Hyderabad’s in-form opener G. Rahul Singh (5) was beaten in flight and line and length from off-spinner Tahmeed Rahman to be bowled in the 4th over of the innings.
But that joy proved to be short-lived as K. Rohit Rayudu joined the free-stroking Tanmay and the two put on 143 runs for the second wicket during a partnership.
Rohit Rayudu seemed to be in a hurry, smashing three sixes very early in his innings but failed to get going again after looking good for a big knock, sweeping left-arm spinner Lemtur Imliwati to backward short-leg fielder in the 37th over. In fact, Rayudu couldn’t thrive on a dropped chance when he was on 58 by wicketkeeper Sumit Kumar of pacer Jaganath Srinivas.
Then, Tilak, was lucky to be dropped on one with pacer Jaganath Srinivas failing to latch on to a skier after a poorly executed lofted shot. To the dismay of his teammates, the bowler ran right in front of the mid-off fielder and dropped the catch eventually despite a diving effort. And, that proved costly as the India star soon showcased with his trade-mark strokes - the backfoot punches through the off-side being the pick of them.
Not surprisingly, both Tanmay and Tilak completed centuries and as it had become the feature this season. There were no celebrations by either of the batters on crossing the three-figure mark again; Tanmay didn’t even raise the bat to acknowledge the feat.
There was some relief to Nagaland camp when both the well-set Tanmay and Tilak Varma fell to catches in the deep when they tried to accelerate the scoring rate.
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