da bwin： Veteran left-arm spinner Utpal Chatterjee’s best limited overs bowlingperformance helped Bengal to overcome Bihar in the penultimateencounter of the East Zone One-Day Ranji Trophy tournament at the EdenGardens today
Sakyasen Mittra09-Dec-2000Veteran left-arm spinner Utpal Chatterjee’s best limited overs bowlingperformance helped Bengal to overcome Bihar in the penultimateencounter of the East Zone One-Day Ranji Trophy tournament at the EdenGardens today. Chasing a paltry total of 114, Bengal suffered a scarebefore getting home by five wickets. Chatterjee had figures of fivewickets for four runs in 5.2 overs. Bengal will now meet Orissa intheir final group league match tomorrow. That game will decide theteam to qualify for the Wills Trophy.On a pitch that was uneven and had variable bounce, Bihar won the tossand decided to bat. Initially, they were rocked by Lakshmi RatanShukla’s spell who sent back three batsmen with only nine runs on theboard. The Bihar side was rescued to an extent by Kunjan Sharan andRajiv Ranjan, who added 71 runs for the fifth wicket.However, Chaterjee changed the complexion of the game with a superbbowling display. Introduced in the 29th over, Chatterjee had Sharanbowled with one that came in with the arm. The rest of the batsmenthen failed to cope with him on a pitch where the ball bounced andkept low. From 110 for four, Bihar lost their remaining six wickets in45 balls for the addition of only four runs.The match seemed as good as over at this stage. But Bengal too wererocked initially by a controlled spell of medium pace bowling by MohirDiwakar and Dhiraj Kumar. They bowled their full quota of 20 overs andhad Bengal on the mat by dismissing four of their leading batsmen withonly 52 runs on the board. Of the four however, Devang Gandhi andSrikkant Kalyani could have avoided playing the shots that broughttheir dimissals. Both Diwakar and Kumar bowled with a lot of fire.Bengal managed to recover through Rohan Gavaskar and Deep Dasgupta.Gavaskar only scored 23, but saw out the remainder of the overs thatDiwakar and Kumar had. A lovely straight drive off Rana Choudhury wasthe shot of the match. However, he fell trying to flick Angushaman Rajover square leg, Nikhilesh Ranjan judging the catch to a nicety on the30-yard circle. The Bihar bowlers also made Bengal’s cause easier bygiving away 34 extras. Of these, 25 came from no balls and wide balls.The Bengal selectors have decided to replace opener Arijit Bose withleg-spinner Wrichik Mazumdar in their match against Orissa tomorrow.Lakshmi Ratan Shukla will open the innings. Skipper Devang Gandhi saidthat he to introduce more variety in the attack, Mazumdar has beenincluded.