Ludhiana take 44-run first innings lead against Mansa

Sports Correspondent

Ludhiana, May 3

Fine batting display by Ludhiana top order batsmen enabled their side take a crucial 44-run lead in the first innings on the second day against Mansa in the final of the Inter-District (U-23) Cricket Tournament being organised by the Punjab Cricket Association at IS Bindra Stadium, Mohali, on Tuesday.

Mansa resumed at overnight score of 350 for nine and added nine more runs as their first innings culminated at 359 runs 97.4 overs.

Ludhiana commenced their innings on a solid note with Tikshan Tangri and Jaish Jain giving a flying start. They lost first wicket at 86 when Jaish was dismissed leg before wicket. He contributed 60 runs off 42 balls with the help of six boundaries and four sixes.

Tikshan was joined by skipper Nehal Wadhera and the duo took the score to 126 runs when the latter was clean bowled on his individual score of 27 runs. Bhavish Sethi was the next man in and he, along with Tikshan, played some attractive shots before Tangri lost his wicket with the score board reading 237 for 3.

Tikshan missed his century by just two runs. His innings of 98 runs off 138 balls was laced with 16 hits over the fence. Bhavish left at the total of 321 in which he contributed 73 runs.

With Ludhiana, needing just 39 runs to overhaul Mansa’s first innings total, Vaibhav Kalra played an invaluable innings of 56 runs, besides Sanyam Gambhir, Aradhya Shukla and Sanyam Gill who too chipped in with useful contribution of 24*, 23 and 17 runs, respectively, to steer their team (403 all out in 82.5 overs) surpass opponents’ first innings total of 359 runs.

For Mansa, Randeep Singh captured four wickets for 145 runs, Shubham Singla secured two wickets for 105 runs and Deepak Kumar took one wicket for 17 runs.

At the draw of stumps, Mansa, in their second innings, were 10 for no loss after eight overs. Divyansh Garg and Som Nath were batting on five runs each.