da jogodeouro： Despite losing two wickets late in the day, North Zone posted a goodscore of 263 for four wickets off 88 overs at close of play on thefirst day of their five day Duleep Trophy final against West Zone atthe Eden Gardens in Calcutta on Friday
Partab Ramchand17-Dec-1999Despite losing two wickets late in the day, North Zone posted a goodscore of 263 for four wickets off 88 overs at close of play on thefirst day of their five day Duleep Trophy final against West Zone atthe Eden Gardens in Calcutta on Friday.Winning the toss on a good batting track, North Zone were given asound start with openers Ashu Dani and skipper Vikram Rathour puttingon 87 runs off 24 overs. Both Dani and Rathour were lucky to get onereprieve each and they got away with some edged shots. But theycontinued to go for their strokes and set the foundation for a goodtotal. Left arm spinner Nilesh Kulkarni broke the stand by bowlingDani for 43. Dani faced 86 balls and hit five fours.Rathour and Reetinder Singh Sodhi then consolidated the position witha second wicket partnership of 88 runs from 28 overs. Rathourprogressed smoothly to 74 when he was caught by Kale off Kulkarni. Theformer India batsman faced 146 balls and hit ten fours and asix. There was no real respite for the West Zone bowlers however forSodhi and the in form Pankaj Dharmani came together for a third wicketassociation that added 75 runs from 28.3 overs.Late in the day, medium pacer Iqbal Siddiqui struck twice to put thebrakes on North Zone. First, he had Dharmani caught by Wasim Jaffarfor 39. Dharmani faced 87 balls and hit seven fours. In his followingover, Siddiqui had Sodhi caught by PH Patel for 67. Sodhi had faced188 balls and hit 12 of them to the ropes. Rajiv Nayyar (5) andNavdeep Singh (6) were at the crease at stumps.On an unfriendly wicket, the West Zone bowlers stuck to their taskmanfully. Mhambrey bowled well but went wicketless. Siddiqui wasrewarded with those late wickets but the best bowler was Kulkarni whosent down 35 overs to bag two wickets for 51.