Andhra make early inroads on truncated day

HYDERABAD: As feared the four-day downpour in the city made an impact on the first day's play as only 82 minutes of play was possible and Hyderabad staggered to 44 for two against Andhra in their opening four-day Ranji Trophy encounter at the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium, here on Sunday.
Much to the disappointment of the holiday crowd, play was not possible in the first two sessions because of the damp outfield.
Even though there was no water-logging there were several areas where the ground was wet and 'dangerous' for the players. It took more than six hours for the ground staff to get the ground into 'playing' condition.
The umpires - Nitin Menon and Paschim Pathak - inspected the ground four times - before play started, at 11 a.m, 1.30 p.m. and 3 p.m. After the fourth inspection, the officials decided to start play an hour after the tea break and extended play till 5.30 p.m. or a minimum of 23 overs. However, after 82 minutes and 20 overs of play the officials were forced to call it a day due to bad light.
Andhra skipper AG Pradeep won the toss and had no hesitation in inviting the hosts to bat first. It was an obvious decision as the visitors, whose strength is their three-man pace attack, wanted to exploit the conditions and put the Hyderabad batting under pressure.
Skipper P Akshath Reddy and DB Ravi Teja opened the innings and the first few overs passed without much ado as the Andhra pacers failed to get the required movement or bounce to trouble the batsmen.
Pacer Shiva Kumar, bowling from the far end, made one to jump up a bit awkwardly and caught Teja off guard whose intended cut, luckily for him, failed to connect. Barring that, the Hyderabad batsmen looked much at ease and it seemed Andhra's gamble may have failed.
But once veteran pacer Shahabuddin switched to the far end, the game sprang to life. The wily old Anantapur paceman started troubling Teja and sowed doubts in the batsman's mind. The strategy paid off as in Shahabuddin's fifth over and the second from the far end, he rapped Teja (11; 30 balls, 1x4) on the pads twice to soften him up and delivered the blow by trapping him leg before off the last ball of the over.
Shiva cleaned up Akshath (17; 50b, 3x4) with the first ball of his second spell - this time from the pavilion end.
At 32 for two, it looked a bit dicey for the hosts but T Suman and GH Vihari ensured no further hiccups. Suman, in particular, looked quite comfortable and was willing to take the attack to the rival camp. He struck two boundaries off off-spinner SM Basha in what turned out to be the last over of the day. Suman used his feet beautifully to come to the pitch of the ball and drove it elegantly to the cover fence. Basha dropped the next ball short and Suman rocked back and pulled it to the mid-wicket fence.
Left-arm seamers - Hyderabad's CV Milind and Andhra's Ch Stephen made their debut in the game. Milind is the 250th player to don the Hyderabad cap.
Scoreboard
Hyderabad (1st Innings): P Akshath Reddy b Shiva Kumar 17, DB Ravi Teja lbw Shahabuddin 11, T Suman (batting) 12, GH Vihari (batting 3); Extras: (LB1) 1.
Total: (for 2 wickets, 20 overs) 44.
Fall of wickets: 1-24, 2-32.
Bowling: K Shahabuddin 7-2-12-1, D Shiva Kumar 5-1-9-1, Ch Stephen 4-1-12-0, G Shankara Rao 2-0-2-0, SM Basha 2-1-8-0.