india b vs india cricket

 

Musheer Khan leads India B's revival with impressive ton

Nineteen-year-old Musheer Khan stole the opening day's honours at Bengaluru as he fought his way towards a resolute century under pressure. Coming in at a time when his team was under pressure against an experienced India A attack in the Duleep Trophy, Musheer ground his way out of a nervy start and dragged his team along single-handedly towards a respectable total, whilst scoring more than half the team's total of 202 by the end of the first day.

The first couple of sessions saw India's pace contenders attract early attention. Under overcast conditions and on a pitch with a green tinge, both Khaleel Ahmed and Akash Deep got some movement that had Yashasvi Jaiswal go threw a few nervy plays and misses. Although, along with Avesh Khan, the pace trio clocked only in the 130kph mark, the discipline in lines made the going tough for the batters. Akash Deep's first spell read 8-3-11-0 while Avesh Khan's read 7-3-10-1.

India B, put in to bat, saw their openers showing some discipline in countering that to last the first 12 overs for just 33 runs. Jaiswal held back his shots unless the bowlers erred, like Khaleel did a couple of times, to go through a patient initial phase. However, his partner and skipper Abhimanyu Easwaran lost his patience when he slashed at a wide one from Avesh Khan to nick behind. This coincided with Khaleel coming back for a more threatening second spell where he had a bit of luck as Jaiswal slapped a widish delivery straight to point. He found the lines from round the wicket to the right-handers useful as he finished with a spell of 5-2-15-1.

The brothers from Mumbai Sarfraz Khan and Musheer Khan were kept quiet even as the former started off with a cut boundary. Through the first 30 overs until the Lunch break, India B had managed only 65 runs for the loss of the openers.

The second session began on a good note for India A with Avesh trapping Sarfaraz LBW with a sharp incoming delivery, bringing in a much anticipated red-ball comeback of Rishabh Pant.

The left-hander, however, came out with an attacking intent that fell flat. He was gifted a full toss first ball and swung and missed straight after. In a scratchy stay that lasted only ten balls, Pant ended up skying a catch while trying to take on a metronomic Akash. The Bengal pacer found his lengths with the older ball, thereby becoming more and more threatening. He had Nitish Reddy dismissed with the ball of the day that seamed after pitching in line to get him for a golden duck. In a spell that read 5-2-6-2 straight after Lunch, Akash also got a foot onto the ball which resulted in Washington Sundar run out for a duck. India B lost their fifth in the session when R Sai Kishore edged Khaleel to slip to 94 for 7.

Their only consolation as the day wore on came in the form of a resolute Musheer Khan. Sarfraz's younger brother had stuck to his guns even when he was tested constantly, including a close LBW shout off Shivam Dube. But he stuck to fighting it out in a half-century that came off 118 balls. He proceeded to farm the strike with Navdeep Saini as the sun began to come down and chose to pick the spin of Kuldeep Yadav as a scoring option. He managed four boundaries off the senior spinner, employing the sweep effectively.

Sticking to a time-tested template, Musheer began to up the ante against a weary bowling attack in the final session with the spinners bearing the brunt of his assault. His confidence in partner Saini staying in grew over a period of time as they put on an impressive unbeaten 108-run stand. His hundred eventually came off 205 balls with scoring getting progressively easier against the older ball. Both spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Tanush Kotian had little purchase off the surface and were put under further pressure by an attacking Musheer, who made the day his own.  India B 202/7 (Musheer Khan 105*; Akash Deep 2-28) vs India A