Skipper Perveez Rasool led from the front with a scintillating century as Jammu and Kashmir fought back gallantly to leave their Ranji Trophy quarter-final match against strong contenders Punjab evenly poised here today.
In reply to Punjab's first innings score of 304, Jammu and Kashmir rode on Rasool's gutsy 103 off 137 balls before folding up for 277, conceding a slender first innings lead of 27 runs on the second day.
J&K seamers Umar Nazir and Mohammed Mudhasir then struck two early blows to remove the in-form openers Jiwanjot Singh (8) and Manan Vohra (7) cheaply. At stumps, Punjab were struggling at 15 for two, having an overall lead of 42.
With Ranji quarter-finals being a five-day affair, there is every possibility that this slender first innings lead will be of little consequence as the match is expected to have an outright result with three full days left.
The day belonged to Rasool, who showed that he is ready to go one up on Harbhajan as he hit 11 fours and a lovely six over deep mid-wicket off veteran India off-spinner's bowling.
He completed his fifth first-class century with a couple of boundaries. The ton came off 131 balls.
Rasool had two important partnerships during the course of the Jammu and Kashmir innings.
The first was a 81-run stand with in-form opener Adil Rishi (65) for the fourth wicket after J&K were reduced to 62 for three.
Rishi and Rasool carried the team to 141 before Yuvraj Singh trapped the opener leg before with an arm ball. Rishi hit nine fours and one six in his 108-ball innings. Rishi's total runs this season has gone upto 643 but Rasool today overtook him as he completed 650 runs in the current season.
