Shreyas Iyer smashed a 139-ball 178 on the opening day of a Ranji Trophy match for Mumbai against Baroda on Friday as Hardik Pandya made a comeback to competitive cricket.
Iyer’s marauding innings was filled with 11 sixes and 17 fours at the Wankhede Stadium, as he decimated the Baroda bowling lineup. At the time of writing, Mumbai were 340/3 after the 60th over, going at nearly 5.6 runs an over.
Pandya removed the Mumbai openers Aditya Tare and Vikrant Auti but bowled just 12 overs for 60 runs.
Captain Siddhesh Lad (also scoring a century) and Iyer then joined hands to put Baroda attack to the sword. Their partnership was worth 183 runs before Iyer was dismissed by Yusuf Pathan.
A depleted Mumbai side got a shot in the arm with the inclusion of Shreyas Iyer after his stint with the India A squad in New Zealand. He returned only on Thursday.
The 41-time champions are without several top players, including those who are doing national duty in Australia, and are fielding a totally inexperienced team in their second home game. Mumbai are lying a lowly 16th out of 18 teams with just five points from the first four games in the combined Groups (A and B) table.
The hosts thus needed nothing less than an outright win over Baroda, and that too with a bonus point to boot, to keep alive their hopes of entering the quarter finals by finishing in the top five of the combined (Groups A and B) table and they made a strong start in that aspect.
Baroda, on the other hand, are sitting pretty in fifth place with 13 points from five games. The were also been boosted by the availability of all rounder Pandya who has recovered from the lower back injury that he sustained in the Asia Cup in September.
(Details to follow)