Chowgule, after electing to bat, were in all sorts of trouble against Varun's medium-pacers. At one stage, they were 37 for four, the bowler to cause the early dent was left-arm medium-pacer Janak Mistry, who took three wickets, while Umesh Patwal took the other wicket.

The fifth-wicket pair of Anand Mapankar (20) and Dhananjay Patil (37) added an invaluable 56 runs. Both were claimed by Rajesh Shintre, who finished with 3-26. Thereafter, Chowgule were all out for 146. Janak Mistry finished with 4-37, while left-arm spiner Digvijay Singh took 2-37.

Varun also had a poor start, losing two quick wickets before reaching into double figures. However, the third wicket pair of Dharmendra Gupta (38 with 6x4) and RohitRane added 100 runs. Then Rane and Ashok Upadhaya saw the day through. Rane's knock of 102 had a six and 15 fours, while Upadhaya hit eight fours in his 41.

An unbeaten century by veteran Ramesh Wajge (112) and his 164 runs partnership for the fifth wicket with Bharat Karnik (102) helped Mumbai Customs to score 298 against Dena Bank at the Azad Maidan.

A 161-run stand for the second wicket between opener Deepak Thakre (77) and centurion Praful Dhule (103) helped B Arunkumar notch 296 against Bank of India at Matunga.

Sunil Chaturvedi's century (117) and his unbroken 183 runs partnership for the first wicket with Sandeep Kotre (63) helped Union Bank score 183 in reply to Bank of Maharashtra's total of 161.

Brief scores

Group A - Chowgule 145 (Dhananjay Patil 37, Avdhoot Amonkar 30, Abrar Khan 25; Janak Mistry 4-37, Rajesh Shintre 3-26, Digvijay Singh 2-37) vs Varun Shipping 188-3 (Dharmendra Gupta 38, Rohit Rane batting 102, Ashok Upadhaya batting 41).

B Arunkumar 296 (Deepak Thakre 77,Praful Dhule 103, Santosh Jadhav 33 n.o; Alex Menezes 4-55) vs Bank of India

38-1.

Group B - Bank of Maharashtra 151 (Prashant Pandit 33, Santosh Jagtap 33; Rupam Malviya 5-14, Manish Sakhalkar 4-62) vs Union Bank 183-0 (Sunil Chaturvedi batting 117, Sandeep Kotre batting 63)

PSES 332-8 (Sanjay Patil 41, Sushant Manjrekar 65, Prashant Keer 61, Uday Bhogle 45; Sandeep Mahadkar 6-89)

Group C - Mumbai Customs 296 (Bharat Karnik 102, Ramesh Vajge 112 n.o.; Abhijit Tatkar 4-49, Mukund Parmar 3-46) vs Dena Bank

Indian Navy 257-9 (N Singh 30, C D Thomas 38, C V Raghavan 49, Kapil Dev Pandey 36; Shreyas Khanolkar 3-61) vs RCF

Group D - Central Bank 304 (Arvind Ahir 92, Arthur Falcao 36, Alim Shaikh 40, R Khan 45; J Shetty 3-75) vs New India Assurance 32-4.