Misfiring Karnataka let Baroda off hook

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With their batsmen having come up short on the third day, Karnataka had to settle for just one point with Baroda picking up three for the first innings lead as their opening Ranji Trophy encounter ended in a draw, here on Monday.

Having crashed for less than 300 in their first match of the season, the visitors needed to come up with something special if they had to pull off an improbable victory.

As it transpired, Baroda, leading by 237 on the fourth morning were rocked by Stuart Binny and Abhimanyu Mithun who sent back Abhimanyu Chauhan and Irfan Pathan for the addition of just nine runs in the morning.

With the hosts at 124/6, Karnataka had an outside chance but their bowlers blew it as they let the hosts off the hook with Ketan Panchal (58) thwarting their best efforts while the last four wickets added a morale-sapping 125 to guide Baroda to 249.|

Unable to bowl them out, Karnataka watched in despair as Panchal and their first innings tormentor Gagandeep Singh, who had scalped five, add 65 for the eighth wicket but more importantly, keep them at bay for a good 20 overs before part-timer Amit Verma ended the resolute stand.

Having conceded a 122run first innings lead, Karnataka were left to chase an impossible 372 in 32 overs, Karnataka meandered to 102 for the loss of Robuin Uthappa (43) while KB Pawan (39) and Ganesh Satish (14) were at the crease when stumps were drawn.

With both their batsmen and bowlers fluffing their lines — even in the first innings, Karnataka, who had the hosts at 88/4 before allowing them to score 406 – Vinay Kumar’s team will need to come up with better goods if they are stay in the hunt for a quarterfinal berth in the nine-team Group `B'.

True, this is just the first match but the fact remains that Karnataka will have to do all the running from here on. They next take on a formidable Tamil Nadu in Chennai from Friday.

SCOREBOARD Baroda 1st Innings: 406 Karnataka 1st Innings: 284 Baroda (O/n: 115/4): A. Chauhan c Pandey b Binny 52,I. Pathan b Mithun 38, P. Shah b Appanna 22, K.Panchal c Gautam b Raju 58, Gagandeep Singh lbw Verma 24, B. Bhatt c Uthappa b Verma 4, F. Bhaja (not out) 0. Extras (B-23, LB-4, NB-3) 30 Total (all out, 84.1 overs) 249 FoW: 5-124, 6-124, 7-172, 8-237, 9249.
Bowling: R. Vinay Kumar 10-3-31-1, A. Mithun 17-6-47-2, S. Binny 13-629-2, K.P. Appanna 20-2-64-1, M.Pandey 6-2-18-1, A. Verma 5.1-1-202, S. Raju 13-6-13-1 Karnataka 2nd Innings: K.B. Pawan (not out) 39, R. Uthappa c Devdhar b Y. Pathan 43, G. Satish (not out) 14.
Extras (B-6) 6.
Total (for 1 wkt, 32 overs) 102 FoW: 1-75 Bowling: Gagandeep Singh 6-3-10-0, F. Bhaja 9-0-42-0. B. Bhatt 10-3-29-0, Y. Pathan 7-2-15-1