JOIN USA collective effort from bowlers saw Karnataka dominate the opening day’s play of their Ranji Trophy Group ‘A’ game against Gujarat here at the Lalbhai Contractor stadium on Friday.
R Vinay Kumar (2/33), Prateek Jain (2/28), Ronit More (2/63), K Gowtham (2/58) and Shreyas Gopal (2/21) bagged two wickets each as the eight-time champions bundled out the hosts for a modest 216 in 69.4 overs. In response, Karnataka lost their key man Mayank Agarwal (25) cheaply and were 45/2 at stumps.
After their 87-run defeat to Saurashtra, Karnataka made as many as five changes. K Gowtham and Mayank Agarwal came in for J Suchith and Karun Nair. Left-arm seamer Prateek Jain replaced the injured Abhimanyu Mithun while Sharath Srinivas replaced wicketkeeper B R Sharath. Ronit More came in for Pavan Deshpande.
Electing to bat, Gujarat never looked in control as they lost wickets at regular intervals. It was skipper Priyank Panchal (74, 135b) who showed determination on a challenging pitch with a fine knock.
The right-handed opener slammed eight fours. But the classy batsman lacked support as the Gujarat batting line up produced an ordinary performance.
Karnataka, at one stage, looked like bundling out their opponents for well under 200 but a 41-run stand between Piyush Chawla (34) and Mehul B Patel (31) guided Gujarat to a respectable total.