Ranji Trophy: Gautam Gambhir's ton puts Delhi in top

Led by skipper Gautam Gambhir's 153 in the second innings, Delhi are well on the way to their first victory in the Ranji Trophy 2013-14 season against Haryana at the Roshanara Club Ground in New Delhi on Saturday.

Haryana ended the third day at 63/5 chasing 376 in the third round of the tournament after the hosts had declared at 312/5.

Resuming the day at 35 for no loss, opening batsman Unmukt Chand (19), batting with Gambhir, faltered at the start. He was followed by Virender Sehwag (6), who again failed to make an impact.

There on, Gambhir struck an important 80-run third-wicket partnership with veteran Mithun Manhas, who retired hurt batting on 36. Left hander Vaibhav Rawal (7) also perished quickly.

Gambhir then joined hands with all-rounder Rajat Bhatia (56 not out) and put together a partnership of 124-runs before the former India opener was caught in front of the stumps. The left hander's 215-ball innings comprised of 25 boundaries.

Pacer Ashish Hooda and offie Jayant Yadav clinched two wickets each for Haryana while medium pacer Sachin Rana settled for one.

Combined with a first innings lead of 63 runs, Delhi gave a difficult target of 376 for the Haryana batsmen to chase. However, the visitors, who have already won a match in the tournament, faltered after a decent start to their second innings.

Openers Abhimanyu Khod and Nitin Saini took off well scoring 29 each. But a collapse in the Haryana top order led the visitors to lose five wickets within 17 runs. From 44 for no loss, suddenly Haryana were reeling at 61/5 before stumps a few minutes later.

The visitors need a further 313 runs with five wickets remaining to win the match.

Brief Scores:

Group A

In Delhi: Delhi 201 all out and 312 for five declared (Gautam Gambhir 153, Rajat Bhatia 56 not out; Ashish Hooda 2-38) vs. Haryana 138 all out and 63 for five (Nitin Saini 29; Varun Sood 3-3).

In Mohali: Punjab 172 all out and 309 all out (Jiwanjot Singh 51, Uday Kaul 52 not out; Jasprit Bumrah 3-63, Mehul Patel 3-79) vs. Gujarat 127 all out and 33 for three (Sandeep Sharma 2-7).

In Nagpur: Vidarbha 542 all out (Faiz Fazal 147, Shalabh Shrivastava 193; HS Sharath 4-104) vs. Karnataka 25 for no loss.

In Cuttack: Jharkhand 221 all out and 149 for six (Pappu Singh batting 56, Saurabh Tiwary 57; Basant Mohanty 6-63) vs. Odisha 307 all out (Bikas Pati 94, Biplab Samantray 67; Ajay Yadav 5-61).

Group B

In Meerut: Tamil Nadu 297 all out vs. Uttar Pradesh 411 for seven (Mukul Dagar 69, Piyush Chawla batting 114; Aushik Srinivas 3-123).

In Kolkata: Bengal 303 all out and 194 for eight (Anustup Majumdar 69, Wriddhiman Saha 52; Abhishek Bhatt 4-47, Chirag Jani 3-54) vs. Saurashtra 225 all out (Cheteshwar Pujara 102; Ashok Dinda Dinda 4-65, Sourav Sarkar 2-34).

In Jaipur: Railways 283 all out and 96 for four (Nitin Bhille batting 30, H.D. Rawle 22; Deepak Chahar 3-26) vs. Rajasthan 178 all out (Vineet Saxena 73, Dinesh Yagnik 19; Anureet Singh 3-60, Krishnakant Upadhyay 3-67).

In Delhi: Madhya Pradesh 239 all out and 127 for three (Naman Ojha batting 61, Mohnish Mishra 31; Koteswar Rao 2-18) vs. Services 391 all out (Rajat Paliwal 99, Yashpal Singh 142; Jalaj Saxena 4-83, Jatin Saxena 4-47).

Group C

In Dharmasala: Hyderabad 237 all out and 319 for seven (Ravi Teja 73, Syed Quadri not out 77; Akshay Chauhan 5-80, Rishi Dhawan 2-84) vs. Himachal Pradesh 296 all out (Bipul Sharma 91, Rishi Dhawan 47; Alfred Absolem 4-88, Pagadala Naidu 3-68).

In Pune: Maharashtra 635 all out (Harshad Khadiwale 262, Kedhar Jadhav 106; Amit Yadav 7-155) vs. Goa 297 for five (Harshad Gadekar batting 86, Sagun Kamat 83; Shrikant Mundhe 2-68, Domnic Joseph 2-74).

In Anantapur: Jammu and Kashmir 225 all out and 121 all out (Adil Rishi 25, Parvez Rasool 25; Paidikalva Vijaykumar 5-52, Shaik Basha 3-27) vs. Andhra Pradesh 205 all out (Srikar Bharat 39, Kakani Harish not out 30; Ram Dayal 2-46, Mohammed Mudhasir 4-49) and 79 for eight (Marripuri Suresh batting 27; Ram Dayal 3-24, Mohammed Mudhasir 3-10)

In Agartala: Tripura 136 all out and 159 for three (Samrat Singha batting 57, K.B. Pawan 51; Arup Das 2-57) vs. Assam 526 for five declared (Dheeraj Jadhav 194, Tarjinder Singh 99; Manisankar Murasingh 2-107, Rana Dutta 2-91).