Karnataka set to foil Mumbai plans

The Wankhede Stadium on Saturday had a surprise visitor in legendary batsman Gundappa Viswanath and brother-in-law of Mumbai's own Little Master, Sunil Gavaskar. The yesteryear Karnataka batsman watched his side garner runs but in no hurried manner.

Replying to Mumbai's first innings total of 436, Karnataka were 175/2 with opener Ravikumar Samarth closing in on his maiden first-class century. Batting on 85 in his seventh Ranji match, Samarth put on 93 for the opening wicket with the experienced Robin Uthappa and another 73 for the second with Kunal Kapoor.

In fact, Karnataka are in no pressure to score quickly and go for a victory as they are sitting pretty with their quarterfinal place sealed. It is only Mumbai that's in a must-win situation and have two more days to take the remaining 18 Karnataka wickets if they are to secure a victory and hope for a knockout berth.

It was a toil for the bowlers for the second successive day on a pitch that has no life in it. The grassless strip prepared to help the home team post a big total and later assist their spinners to eke out a win, only promises more runs in the coming days.

So, having made a good beginning, Karnataka look set to overhaul Mumbai as they still trail by 261 runs with eight first innings wickets in hand. That seems to be a long way but considering the nature of the surface, it is achievable. Giving Samarth company at stumps is the prolific Manish Pandey.

Mumbai engaged their spinners for most part of the Karnataka innings – left-armer Harmeet Singh, offie Akshay Girap and part-timer Sidhesh Lad sent down 42 of the 60 overs between them – with the expectation that the pitch will assist them. There was the odd turn and the players involved say that it was "slow off the pitch" while Samarth later said that the "last hour was a little tough to bat as it started assisting spin".

But the overall behaviour of the pitch was batsman-friendly. Batsmen showing application and the hunger to stay at the crease would not get foxed by the bowlers unless they played a false stroke. Uthappa and Samarth began in a positive manner against Mumbai's most successful bowler this season Shardul Thakur and his new-ball partner Balwinder Singh Sandhu before the spinners came on. Uthappa did not play on rash stroke, driving and sweeping as if they were child's play, looking rock solid in front-foot defence.

Samarth was shaky at the start before he settled down to play a long innings. Samarth was lucky twice, on 13 and 17. On the first occasion, he was given leg before wicket to Thakur by umpire Anil Chaudhary before the decision was reversed as it was found out that the bowler had sent down a no ball. Three overs later, when on 17, Samarth tapped back to bowler Sandhu, who claimed a catch and started to celebrate with this teammates before umpire K Bharatan withheld the appeal as the bowler had claimed it off the ground.

Karnataka did not show any urgency in scoring. But the loose deliveries were left punished. All along playing on the front foot, Uthappa, on 49, went on the back foot to play Harmeet across the line, failing to put bat to ball only to be trapped in front.

Number three batsman Kunal Kapoor and Samarth continued to grind the Mumbai spinners before the former was foxed by the angle with which Girap bowled from around the wicket. He played for the turn that was not there and was bowled while going for forward defence.

Otherwise, it was Samarth all the way. But for those two tense early moments, the 22-year-old Mysore born right-hander batted fluently against the medium-pacers while taking precautions against spin, using the horizontal bat to pick his runs behind square on the off-side.

Samarth approached Viswanath after the day's play and was advised by the batting great on the ways to build a tall score and to cut down on risky shots.

Earlier in the day, overnight batsmen Sidhesh Lad and Nikhil Patil duly completed their maiden first-class centuries. Both fell to identical scores of 106 and only had themselves to blame for not making big their centuries.

Mumbai batted for nearly two hours in the first session to add 94 before being all out. The fact that the Mumbai bowlers occupied the crease for at least 25 minutes each was proof enough that Lad and Patil failed to capitalise on their tons.

SCOREBOARD:
Mumbai (1st innings, o/n 342/5): S Lad c Gautam b Kumar 106, N Patil c Pandey b Aravind 106, S Thakur c Uthappa b Patel 15, A Girap c Samarth b Aravind 24, H Singh lbw b Kumar 12, BS Sandhu not out 9, Extras (B6, LB6, W1) 13
Total (all out, 117.1 overs) 436
Fall of wickets: 5-167 (Nayar), 6-357 (Lad), 7-386 (Thakur), 8-404 (Patil), 9-415 (Girap)
Bowling: R Vinay Kumar 23.1-6-88-4, A Mithun 20-7-74-0, S Gopal 15-1-73-1, S Aravind 27-3-91-2, U Patel 31-3-96-3, R Samarth 1-0-2-0.
Karnataka (1st innings): R Uthappa lbw b Singh 49, R Samarth batting 85, K Kapoor b Girap 35, M Pandey batting 0, Extras (B-2, W-1, NB-3) 6
Total (for 2 wkts, 60 overs) 175
Fall of wickets: 1-93 (Uthappa), 2-166 (Kapoor)
Bowling: S Thakur 11-2-45-0, BS Sandhu 7-3-8-0, H Singh 23-3-63-1, A Girap 18-0-53-1, S Lad 1-0-4-0