WHAT could have been a better occasion than the 100th First-Class match to score a century! Ganesh Satish, Vidarbha’s only professional cricketer, hammered a huge unbeaten century in his 100th First-Class match to help former two-time Ranji Trophy champions recover from a shaky start and end Day One at a comfortable position. Maharashtra pacer Mukesh Choudhary had put Vidarbha on the back foot sending back both the openers —captain Faiz Fazal (14) and R Sanjay (3) as early as seventh over of the game. But Satish (114*), along with Atharva Taide (68), first did the repair job and then, as the game progressed, strengthened Vidarbha’s position to end the day at 270 for 3.

The day at Gurugram in Rohtak belonged to Satish who was playing his milestone match. The 33-year-old right-handed batter dropped his anchor and played sensibly, picking runs from all parts of the field. Satish and Taide added 177 runs for the third wicket during which the former also completed his 17th First-Class century which was also 10th for Vidarbha in Ranji Trophy. He has also scored six centuries for Karnataka and one for Vidarbha in Irani Trophy while playing against Rest of India. Satish used all his experience and picked runs from all the bowlers. He did not let Choudhary get under his skin and hit four sweetly-timed boundaries from 54 deliveries he faced and collected 27 runs. He had same treatment for Pradeep Dadhe from whose bowling he picked 30 runs with four boundaries. Satyajeet Bachhav, who had taken 11 wickets in Maharashtra’s win over Assam, was in for some special treatment from Satish as the batter collected maximum of his runs from the spinner’s bowling hitting four boundaries and a six. Taide, on the other hand, targeted only Dadhe as the 29 runs he picked from the bowler had six boundaries.

Both the batters were in total control and were close to taking their total past 200 when Taide lost concentration and got stumped off Bachhav in the 63rd over of the day. By the time Taide got out, Vidarbha were back on their feet after the early morning setback. Last match’s centurion Akshay Wadkar joined Satish in the middle with around 25 overs still to be bowled and the wicketkeeper-batsman continued from where he left collecting 35 runs with six boundaries. He looked quite comfortable batting against left-arm orthodox Bachhav picking three boundaries while two came from 19-year-old spinner Vicky Ostwal’s bowling. Satish and Wadkar have already added 75 runs for the fourth wicket and both will look to consolidating it on the morrow.

Earlier in the morning, R Sanjay, who had hit 94 against Uttar Pradesh fell prey to Choudhary’s seam bowling as he nicked one back to give wicketkeeper Vishant More an easy catch in the 5th over. Two overs later, Fazal, who had slammed 192 in the opener, too, could not keep his bat away from a swinging delivery as he too was caught by More. But Satish and Taide made sure there were no more casualties and bailed out Vidarbha. With seven wickets still in hand, Vidarbha are in a strong position to post a huge first innings total and put Maharashtra under pressure. Vidarbha left out Umesh Yadav from the playing XI as he was expected to join the Indian team for the Sri Lanka series.

Article Courtesy : The Hitavada