MUMBAI:
Shreyas Iyer
was greeted with a barrage of short stuff by the Andhra bowlers, but he didn’t flinch and calmly thwarted them away, even stroking multiple pulls to the boundary.
Once settled and looking forward to putting behind the low scores in South Africa Test series and omission from the T20I squad against Afghanistan, it seemed like he had sedated the opponents and was due a big one.
But against the run of play, he was back in the pavilion.
It was the second last over before tea, Iyer, seeing a rare pitched up delivery, poked at it and ended up edging it to the keeper
Uppara Girinath
off right-arm pacer
K Nithish Kumar Reddy
, who came round the wicket to create an angle.
Iyer got out for 48 from as many balls with seven fours. Mumbai entered the post tea season at 205-5 but more importantly, like Iyer, most of those dismissed, threw away the good start they got. At stumps, Mumbai had reached 281-6 in 88 overs with Shams Mulani (30 batting, 77b; 2x4) and Tanush Kotian (31 batting, 76b; 4x4) once again, like they have done in the past seasons, resurrecting Mumbai’s innings with their unbeaten 57-run association for the seventh wicket.
Iyer, who batted at No. 5, came to the crease in the post-lunch session and barring a couple of nervy moments, looked in control of his innings.
At one point, Andhra had put six fielders on the leg side to trap Iyer with their round the wicket short deliveries, but he didn’t fall into the trap.
Andhra had a spread-out field on the off side as well, including a third man and deep point, in anticipation that he can be trapped while playing uppishly in that region, but Iyer avoided that too.
Reddy, who took 3-44 to finish as Andhra’s most successful bowler, said after the day’s play that their plan was to “play on Mumbai batters’ patience” and it worked for them.
“We planned bouncers to Shreyas but as it wasn’t working, we reverted to the normal plan,” he said.
What may have hastened their decision to revert to bowling up to Iyer was him hitting three fours in the 54th over off Penmetsa Raju (0-76). The revised plan worked.
Mumbai opener Bhupen Lalwani (61, 119b; 10x4) scored his second half-century of the season. He would have been disappointed at not building on the start and getting a ton. Skipper
Ajinkya Rahane
, who got out for a duck, would also be disappointed.
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