Tasmania evens contest at MCG

Victoria has squandered an excellent start to finish on 6/250 at stumps on the opening day of its Pura Cup clash against Tasmania here at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

After cruising at 1/137 at one stage, Victoria lost three wickets in the space of twelve overs late in the day to allow the Tigers back into the game.

The main destroyer for the visitors was former Bushranger David Saker (3/70), who transferred to Tasmania earlier this year. Saker got his new team off to a dream start, trapping opener Jason Arnberger for a first-ball duck in the opening over of the match.

Given that Arnberger batted through the entire first day in the corresponding match between these two teams here last year, the Tigers would have breathed a sigh of relief to see the twenty-eight year old return to the pavilion. However one return they would rather forget was that of Matthew Elliott's, to first class cricket. Elliott, who shared in that first-day marathon with his opening partner last season, tried to emulate some of that effort today, scoring a classy seventy-nine.

Playing his first Pura Cup match of the season, Elliott was in fine form, racing to twenty-three off just twenty-two deliveries in the opening hour. Elliott's previous first-class innings had been a whopping 177 in August, for English county team Glamorgan, and it seemed the left-hander was destined for another big innings today, after a four month injury-induced break.

Unfortunately for Victoria, he failed to bring up his thirty-third first-class century. However, his knock of seventy-nine - confident and entertaining - is surely a sign of things to come. The twenty-nine year old drove and pulled with sweet timing, punishing loose bowling and striking eleven boundaries in his stay of three and a half hours.

He was amply supported by Matthew Mott (78) at the other end, as the pair amassed a 135-run partnership for the second wicket. It was eventually broken when Elliott fell to medium pacer Shaun Young (1/21), edging a catch to Jamie Cox at second slip.

Mott, however, continued his typically patient knock, notching up his fourteenth first class fifty with a boundary off Ben Targett (0/47). He was dismissed later in the session, edging Scott Kremerskothen (1/25) to Michael Di Venuto in the slips in a similar fashion to Elliott.

The next three batsmen then came and went without making much impact on the game, with Brad Hodge's wicket the most prized by the visitors. Saker ended the Bushranger's dream run of three consecutive centuries from the previous three Pura matches when he had Hodge trapped in front for thirty.

Clinton Peake (9) then became Saker's next victim, playing across to an inswinger which cleaned him up.

Having made thirty-nine runs at an average of just over five and a half in the domestic compeition so far this summer, Darren Berry came out next, looking keen to get some runs on the board in this his one hundredth match in domestic competition. Berry struck five boundaries in his innings of twenty-nine, including consecutive ones off Targett. However, the Victorian vice-captain failed to hang around for more than thirty-three minutes, being bowled by Damien Wright (1/52) just two overs before stumps.

So Victoria resumes tomorrow with Ian Harvey (10*) and captain Paul Reiffel (0*) at the crease, and the match very much in the balance.