Much needed win, says skipper Vinay

Karnataka captain R Vinay Kumar was a happy man after the team clinched their first victory of the season.

However, he admitted the team needed to work on their fielding as the knockout stage draws near. On a seamer-friendly pitch, Karnataka were helped by Robin Uthappa’s brisk 160 in the second innings before the bowlers hunted in group to deflate the host in their backyard.

“It was much needed victory, especially the way we came back in the second innings. Definitely we dropped many catches in the innings, but I had a word with Rajasthan captain Ashok Menaria who also said that there was some brightness issue at the slips, something like Sharjah where you have sand –based wickets,”  Vinay told reporters.

Vinay said they were confident of pulling it off despite Pranay Sharma scoring a plucky 114 off 190 balls. “He was playing well but we were aware about his weakness outside the off-stump. We had dropped him so many times but then it happens sometimes.  We need to keep improving. Our goal is to win the Ranji Trophy,” he said.

Karnataka next plays Odisha at Mysore on November 7 and Vinay was looking forward to the return of their key players. ”All of us bowled well, be it me or Arvind or the new boy David (Mathias) despite missing on our two frontline bowlers. Shreyas also did well..Karun Nair will be back from Board’s President XI and Manish Pandey, we are also expecting, will recover by the time we play Odisha. We depend a lot on them,” he said.