Captain's knock by Rajiv Nayyar

By slow but methodical batting, Himachal Pradesh played themselves into a position of strength at close of play in the North Zone Ranji Trophy league match against Services at the Palam ground in New Delhi on Monday. In reply to Services' 276, Himachal were 224 for two off 82 overs at stumps.

Services, who resumed at 264 for eight, did not last very long in the morning. Then they had the encouragement of an early wicket when Rahul Panta was bowled by MV Rao without opening his account in the third over. Thereafter Himachal slowly took command. First the other opener Nischal Gaur and skipper Rajeev Nayyar added 126 runs for the second wicket off 40 overs before the former was out for 68. Gaur batted 193 minutes, faced 133 balls and hit seven fours.

Nayyar, who has a penchant for playing long innings and Amit Sharma then consolidated with an unbroken third wicket partnership of 96 runs off 38.5 overs. At close, Nayyar had scored 84 after having batted about 5-1/2 hours. He has so far played 242 balls and hit eleven fours. Amit Sharma was batting with 50 from 119 balls. He hit five fours.