Dhawan five-for helps HP gain lead

Himachal Pradesh allrounder Rishi Dhawan's terrific season continued as he captured five wickets to demolish Assam for 81, before his unbeaten 36 helped stretch the lead past 100. It was Dhawan's fourth five-wicket haul of the Ranji season, taking his tally to a tournament-high 34, well ahead of Madhya Pradesh allrounder Jalaj Saxena who has 21. Dhawan also has 289 runs at 57.80, which has been instrumental in taking Himachal to the top of the Group C table.

The Assam innings lasted only 32.5 overs as they failed to recover from Dhawan's early strikes. None of the batsmen made it past 17, and the final five wickets went down for 16 runs. Himachal had a stutter of their own when they lost three wickets for two runs to slide to 119 for 4, before Dhawan put on an unbroken 80-run stand with Nikhil Gangta.

Ian Dev Singh's 98 led a strong Jammu & Kashmir showing on the first day as they finished on 312 for 4. Kerala won the toss and put J&K in, with the openers putting on 27. Once Adil Rishi fell for 10, Bandeep Singh, coming in at No. 3, joined forces with ID Singh as the pair put on 123 runs for the second wicket. ID Singh fell just two runs short of a century when he was caught by Rohan Prem off the bowling of Chovvakkaran Shahid. Parvez Rasool, the J&K captain, joined Bandeep Singh, but it wasn't for a long stint as Bandeep was dismissed one run short of a half-century. Both Manzoor Dar and Hardeep Singh added unbeaten fifties as J&K finished the day in a healthy position.

Eight wickets fell in the space of 55 runs as Goa limped to 231 for 8, after the openers had put on 176 for the first wicket. Amogh Desai and Swapnil Asnodkar didn't give any quarter to Tripura's bowlers for the first 65 overs of the day. This changed in the 66th when Asnodkar was caught by Manisankar Murasingh off the bowling of Rana Dutta for 75. Wickets began to tumble thereafter as, aside from Desai, only Keenan Vaz and Saurabh Bandekar crossed into double figures as the rest of the line-up folded without much resistance. Desai reached a third first-class century, before being bowled by Murasingh shortly after on 102. Dutta and Sanjay Majumder were the pick of the bowlers with 4 for 52 and 3 for 51 respectively.

Andhra's young openers Srikar Bharat and Prasanth Kumar scored contrasting 80s to give their side a solid platform against Maharashtra. Bharat struck 11 fours and two sixes as he rattled along to 82 off 113 balls, dominating a 122-run opening stand, before being bowled by quick bowler Domnic Joseph. Prasanth took his time to build his innings, but he too fell short of a century, caught behind for 86. Two of Andhra's most experienced batsmen, Amol Muzumdar and B Sumanth, were in the middle at stumps, with the home side looking to cash in on the strong start to the innings.