Vinay Kumar took 6 for 34, including a hat-trick, to blow Mumbai away for 173 on the opening day of the Ranji Trophy quarter-final in Nagpur. Invigorated by their captain's display, Karnataka's batsmen responded with a strong start to end the day on 115 for 1 and put them within striking distance of the first-innings lead.
In the morning, with the game only a few minutes old, Vinay set a few
records tumbling. He dismissed in-form opener Prithvi Shaw off the last ball of the first over, after the batsman tried to punch one off the backfoot and away from his body. The ball shaped away enough to catch the outside edge for Karun Nair to snaffle the chance at first slip. Nair teamed up with Vinay again in the first ball of the third over when Jay Bista attempted a similar shot to Shaw's. This time Nair plucked a one-handed catch to leave Mumbai 7 for 2. Vinay completed the second hat-trick of his career after fast bowler Akash Parkar, promoted to the top of the order, was trapped in front to an inswinger. Vinay became the sixth bowler, and the first captain, to take a hat-trick in the knockouts of the Ranji Trophy.
Karnataka's seamers continued to bore into Mumbai's batting order. Vinay struck again to have Siddhesh Lad caught behind before S Aravind and Abhimanyu Mithun took over to send back vice-captain Suryakumar Yadav and captain Aditya Tare cheaply. Mumbai were 49 for 6 and slipped to 95 for 8 as Vinay broke Akhil Herwadkar's resistance (32 off 75 balls).
Vinay went on to have Karsh Kothari caught behind for Gautam's third catch and Mumbai, at 103 for 9, were in danger of embarrassing themselves before Dhawal Kulkarni bailed them out with a 132-ball 75, including nine fours and two sixes. Kulkarni effectively played lone ranger in his 70-run last wicket stand with Shivam Malhotra, who resisted 41 balls for seven runs, before Aravind removed him. In reply, Karnataka's openers R Samarth (40) and Mayank Agarwal (62*) put on 83 before the former was cleaned up by seamer Shivam Dubey.