DEC 30: Chasing a target of 389 for an outright victory, hosts Bengal were struggling at 71-3 at close on the third day of their Ranji Trophy match against Orissa at the Eden Gardens here on Saturday.Speedster Debashish Mohanty, who captured six wickets inthe first innings, again did the damage by evicting opener Amitava Banerjee (15) and Wrichik Majumdar (4) after the Orissa tailenders took advantage of some wayward bowling to take their second innings total to 249 on a good batting track.
Earlier, resuming at their overnight score of 82 forseven, Orissa rode on P Jaychandra's composed 54 and some defiant knocks by tailenders Jagannath Das (44) and Ajay Barik (50 n.o.) to wriggle out of trouble before being all out for 249 in 100.4 overs.
Brief scores: Orissa 256 & 249 (P Jaychandra 54, Ajay Barik 50 n.o.; Sourav Ganguly 3-71, Utpal Chatterjee 3-57) vs Bengal 117 & 71-3 (A Bose 32)
Vidharba follow-on
NAGPUR: Vidarbha following on were 109-3 in their second knock against Uttar Pradesh at the end of third day's play in their central zone Ranji Trophy fixtures at VCA grounds here on Saturday.
The home side overnight 46-1 began disasterously losing wickets at regular intervals and were struggling 112-4 wickets at lunch.
Openers Amit deshpande (39), Dheeraj Sharma (30), Harshal Shitoot (26), Rahul Jadhav (27) all fell away after reasonable start.
Brief scores:Uttar Pradesh 605-8 decl vs Vidarbha206 (Amit Deshpande 39; Ashu Sharma 3-51) & 109-3
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