Cheteshwar Pujara on Saturday joined a select group of cricketing greats by smashing his 50th first-class century during Saurashtra’s Ranji Trophy group B match against Karnataka at Rajkot.

Pujara warmed up for the upcoming Test series in New Zealand with stylish 162 off 238 balls that was laced with 17 fours and a six. Pujara, joined an elite list of nine Indians led by Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid.

The 31-year-old Pujara, who has 18 Test centuries, is fourth on the list of active players with most first-class centuries behind former England skipper Alastair Cook (65), former South Africa captain Hashim Amla (52) and India’s domestic cricket giant Wasim Jaffer (57).

Among current active Test players, the nearest contender to Pujara is Australia’s Steve Smith, who has 42 first-class centuries while his India team-mates Virat Kohli (34) and Ajinkya Rahane (32) are well behind. Pujara (15, 188 before this match) already has scored more than 15,000 runs in his career, during which he has played 197 matches.

Mulani, Tare rescue Mumbai with fighting knocks

Shams Mulani (87) and Aditya Tare (69*) raised a 155-run partnership with fighting half-centuries to help Mumbai finish the opening day of their match against Tamil Nadu at 284/6 in Mumbai on Saturday.

Electing to bat after winning the toss, the visitors were in a spot of bother as left-arm spinner R Sai Kishore (3/77) and ace off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin (3/58) struck at regular intervals to leave them five-down.

Baba Aparajith led Tamil Nadu as Vijay Shankar was drafted into the India A’ team for the New Zealand tour and left to join the squad. Kishore got into the act first and picked up the first three wickets in the opening session. Ashwin was wicketless till the lunch break but made his presence felt after the break, dismissing debutant Hardik Tamore (21) and Sarfaraz Khan (36).

Khan hit two towering sixes off Kishore but miscued a cut off Ashwin to be caught by Aparajith. Earlier, Mumbai got off to a solid start as Jay Bista made a fluent 41 and put on 50 runs for the opening wicket with debutant Bhupen Lalwani (21). Bista looked good for more before Kishore got one to go in between bat and pad to disturb the stumps.

Kishore got the wickets of Lalwani and Mumbai’s crisis-man Siddhesh Lad (0), caught brilliantly by Aparajith in the slips. Ashwin picked scalped Tamore and Sarfaraz to put more pressure on Mumbai.

Tare, who joined Mulani in the middle started slowly and looked to play himself in. After defying Ashwin, Kishore and the rest of the Tamil Nadu attack for the rest of the middle session, they came into their own in the final session. Mulani displayed a full range of strokes and played a few attractive hooks and pulls as the bowlers ran out of ideas.

However, Ashwin struck against the run of play, dismissing Mulani, caught by Aparajith in the slips off the penultimate ball of the day. Mulani later told reporters that the pitch was on the slower side. “I was a little patient. Just tried to play to my strengths,” he said about his approach today.

Sai Kishore admitted that the team’s bowlers could have bowled more tight lines and lengths in the second and third sessions when Mulani and Tare got going.

Wakhare, Sarvate skittle out Bengal for 170

Off-break bowler Akshay Wakhare and slow left-arm orthodox Aditya Sarvate were deadly on a spinner-friendly track as defending champions Vidarbha bowled out Bengal for a paltry 170 in Nagpur.

At stumps, Vidarbha were 89/3 with skipper Faiz Fazal (51) being dismissed off the final delivery of the day by off-spinner Arnab Nandi. The nature of the pitch is an indicator that the match is likely to end inside three days.

Barring former skipper Manoj Tiwary (48) and the injured Ritwick Roy Chowdhury (27), none of other Bengal players were able to cross 20-run mark.

Wakhare (5/56 in 19 overs) and Sarvate (4/53 in 20 overs) made life miserable on a track where there was turn. Such was there dominance that team’s biggest star Umesh Yadav (1/19) bowled only six overs in two spells.

Tiwary’s brief innings with five boundaries was a lesson on how to counter on a vicious turner. He looked good for a half-century but tried to cut Wakhare against the turn and was bowled in the process.

It was yet another failure for Bengal captain Abhimanyu Easwaran (18), who is apparently slipped down the pecking order as far as being in the national reckoning is concerned. He was caught at forward short leg trying a defensive shot against Wakhare.

Easwaran has done his case no good with KL Rahul and Shubman Gill way ahead of him in contention for the reserve opener’s slot.

Brief Scores:

Mumbai 284/6 (Shams Mulani 87, Aditya Tare 69*, Jay Bista 41; R Ashwin 3/58, R Sai Kishore 3/77) vs Tamil Nadu.

At Rajkot: Saurashtra 296/2 (Cheteshwar Pujara 162*, Sheldon Jackson 99*; J Suchith 2/85) vs Karnataka.

At Kanpur: Uttar Pradesh 295/5 (Mohd. Saif 99*, RK Singh 62, Almas Shaukat 48; Anureet Singh 2/48) vs Baroda.

At Delhi: Madhya Pradesh 124 (Rajat Patidar 38; Himanshu Sangwan 6/33) vs Railways 104/3 (Mrunal Devdhar 43*)

At Nagpur: Bengal 170 (Manoj Tiwary 48, Akshay Wakhare 5/56, Aditya Sarvate 4/53). Vidarbha 89/3 (Faiz Fazal 51, Shreyan Chakraborty 1/20, Arnab Nandi 1/19).

At Ongole: Hyderabad 225 (Jaweed Ali 98, KV Sasikanth 5/60, Yarra Prithvi Raj 3/45). Andhra 13/0.

At Jaipur: Rajasthan 225/4 (Samit Gohel 93, Bharghav Merai 54, Tanvuir ul Haq 2/48) vs Rajasthan.

At Thumba: Kerala 227 (Salman Nizar 91, Robin Uthappa 48, Baltej Singh 3/33, Siddarth Kaul 3/47, Vinay Choudhary 3/37). Punjab 46/2.

More to follow...