At the end of the 4th day of Ranji final, Mumbai team is richer by 367 runs to their already formidable cricket score of 402, thus tightening their grip further on the tile. The next day will see UP chasing an impossible target of 525 - the highest chase in Ranji history so far. Resuming from 130 for no loss and Jaffer and Samant going great gun, Mumbai went up to make 367 with Samant and Rohit hitting their hundreds. (Samant 113 and Rohit 108). In true Mumbai spirit, the pair carried on without declaring even if they amassed cricket scores big enough to make the opponents go crazy.

The UP bowlers were good at their efforts, but that could not stop the Mumbai on the fourth day from cruising to a point from where they literally batted out their opponents. These two centuries were definitely the high points of the 4th day. With his majestic 108, Rohit joined the league of only the sixth batsman who could hit two centuries in a Ranji Trophy final. Even if it took him wait through 27 balls to get his first run, he looked confident and sure of himself throughout his classy innings. Chawla’s googlies were answered with straight drives and confident pulls.

At one point of time, the UP bowlers did make the matters difficult for the Mumbai batsmen. Starting with a commanding 130 for 0, at one point of time Mumbai scoreboard blinked a poor 241 for 6. Throughout the morning the Kumar duo - Bhuvneshwar and Praveen went on giving Mumbai batsmen some tough time. Rahane’s lbw did create some uneasiness for Mumbai. Only Samant remained unfazed and with a brilliant display of a slew of late-cuts he eventually bagged his century. And that is despite an aggressive field setting.

However, Tendulkar came as a big disappointment for the Mumbai team. If the first innings was wasted on a duck, the second innings fetched him just 4 as 7th batsman. Sachin ’s exit did spark off hope in UP camp, but Rohit’s strokeplays tackled well the commanding jobs delivered by medium-pacer Parvinder Singh and Piyush Chawla. It was Sairaj Bahutule and Dhawal Kulkarni who failed to give any significant trouble to the opponents.

At the end of the day, Mumbai took the game to a towering height with an enormous target of 525. It’ll be interesting to watch how UP fairs at their 2nd innings.

Don’t forget to join Cicket360.com tomorrow for the Final Match Coverage. 

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3.25 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."

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