Pacers put Karnataka at the forefront on day 1

Bengaluru: Karnataka ended their opening day by attaining a slight advantage against Rajasthan in their Ranji Trophy quarter-final match played at M.Chinnaswamy Stadium here on Tuesday. 

At stumps Karnataka's score was 12 for no loss, trailing by 212 runs against Rajasthan's total of 224 runs. Rajesh Bishnoi and skipper Mahipal Lomror were the highlights with the bat for visitors. Despite some errors on the field, Manish Pandey might be pleased with the performance as Abhimanyu Mithun and K Gowtham bagged three wickets whereas Vinay and Gopal shared honours with two wickets each.

Even though for short span, Karnataka openers Samarth R and Nischal Dega successfully negotiated the all-round bowling attack of Rajasthan. Both the batsmen were unbeaten at the score of 7 and 5 runs respectively. With pitch displaying dual nature, a tough road ahead in the upcoming day for hosts against the likes of Aniket Chaudhary and Deepak Chahar.

Earlier in the morning, Manish Pandey won the toss and put Rajasthan to bat. The decision made by Karnataka's skipper yielded good dividend in the form of Amit Gautam who was undone by Vinay Kumar within the first hour of play.  Opener Chetan Bisht and Rajasthan's skipper Mahipal Lomror were rebuilding the innings steadily. At the cusp of half-century run stand, their partnership was broken by Shreyas Gopal who rattled Chetan (39,72b) on his first ball of the day. Soon, his brother and team's highest run scorer this season Robin Bist(13 off 18balls) was also dismissed of Vinay Kumar's delivery.  Ashok Meneria also left for the pavilion on duck, becoming Gopal's second scalp at the stroke of lunch.

Ronit More took the wicket of Salman Khan (7off 35balls), denting the hopes of visitors. It would have been two wickets in the same over had BR Sharath hadn't spilled a regulation catch edged from Rajesh Bishnoi's bat who was then batting on zero.  Bishnoi  managed to score 79 runs, comprising of ten fours and two sixes.