Vidarbha Vs Tamil Nadu, Ranji Trophy Quarterfinal Day 2: Aditya Thakare Puts TN On Ropes

Pacer Aditya Thakare's four-wicket burst had Tamil Nadu hanging on the ropes at 159 for six after the second day of their Ranji Trophy quarterfinal match in Nagpur on Sunday. (More Cricket News)

Tamil Nadu have a long batting line-up but⛎ none of their top order b𝕴atters showed gumption to fight out on a rather tricky surface.

The pr♎omising 18-year-old C Andre Siddharth, nephew of former Tamil Nadu batter Sridharan Sharath, played a lone hand with an impress🐎ive 65 off 89 balls (10x4, 2x6) but he did not have any support from the other end.

It was a 𒐪major reason behind Tamil Nadu still trailing by a considerable 194 runs after allowiꦛng Vidarbha to post 353 in their first innings.

TN's batting, much against what they did in the league stages, was 𝄹in shambles this day as star batters like Narayan Jagadeesan (22), Vijay Shankar (22) and B Sai Sudharsan (7) all failed to chip in with anything substantial.

Sudharsan will be particularly disappointed as this was his first outing sin༺ce playing against Australia A for India A in Nov🌜ember, 2024.

Since then, the left-handed batter was recuperating from a sports hernia ��surgery that he underw🧔ent in London in December last year.

At one stage, TN were 38 for four but Shankar and Siddharth added 9💦5 runs to give them some hope, but the former edge🅰d Thakare to stumper Akshay Wadkar.

Now, TN will hope that veterans Pradosh 💫Ranjan Paul (18 batting) and skipper R Sai Kishore (6 batting) will bail them out on Day 3.

The Tamil N▨adu batters can take a leaf out of the fight shown by Vidarbha batters, led by Karun Nair, who extended his overnight 100 t﷽o 122.

But the real star in their batting was Harsh Dubey (69, 132 balls, 9x4) who batted in thꦺe comཧpany of tail lenders to take Vidarbha, overnight 264 for six, to a 350-plus total.

Brief scores: Vidarbha: 353 all out in 121.1 overs (Karun Nair 122, Harsh Dubey 69, Danish Malewar 79; Sonu Yadav 3/91, Vijay Shankar 3/75) vs Tamil Nadu: 159/6 in ✤46 overs (C Andre Siddharth 65; Aditya Thakare 4/18).