Iyer, Lad lift Mumbai to 327

A brisk 90 from Shreyas Iyer and complementing fifties from captain Aditya Tare (68) and Siddhesh Lad (57*) led Mumbai to a strong 327 for 7 on the first day of the semi-final against Madhya Pradesh in Cuttack.

Medium-pacer Chandrakant Sakure took 4 for 102, accounting for Mumbai's top three but the side recovered through a string of fifty-plus stands to pull Mumbai out of trouble.

MP won the toss and Sakure got a breakthrough with Akhil Herwadkar's wicket in the 11th over, but Mumbai still forged on through an 88-run second-wicket partnership between Iyer and Bhavin Thakkar. The side suffered a wobble when Thakkar and Suryakumar Yadav were dismissed in successive overs with the score at 112 for 3 but recovered as Iyer added 57 runs with Aditya Tare.

Iyer fell 10 runs short of his fourth hundred of this Ranji Trophy season, his 103-ball stay at the crease yielding 13 fours and a six. It was his ninth fifty-plus score in this season, a tally second only to Vijay Bharadwaj [1998-99] and Abhishek Nayar's [2012-13] 11 in a season. A 65-run partnership for the fifth wicket between Tare and Lad, followed by a breezy 75-run partnership between Lad and Abhishek Nayar kept Mumbai in control.

After Tare's dismissal for 68, Nayar and Lad lifted the tempo of the innings, the former scoring a 48-ball 43 that included seven fours. His partnership with Lad progressed at a rate of 5.17 and took the side past the 300-run mark. Lad saw Mumbai through to close of play with an unbeaten 57 off 115 with 11 fours.