Sriram stars in Tamil Nadu's confident start

Sridharan Sriram stroked his way to an unbeaten 92 as Tamil Nadu made a confident start, scoring 153 for one wicket off 47 overs at close of play on the first day of their South Zone Ranji Trophy league match against Andhra at the Guru Nanak college ground in Chennai on Wednesday.

Morning showers delayed the start of play but good work by the ground staff saw the game start at 1.15 pm after a delay of 185 minutes. Winning the toss, Tamil Nadu were served well by openers Sriram and Rajat Bhatia (21) who put on 62 runs off 20 overs. Bhatia was then caught by Madhukar at mid off off Ranganath. His fall brought two left handers and India players Sriram and Hemang Badani together and the two proceeded to accelerate the scoring rate. Off 27 overs, the two added 91 runs for the unbroken second wicket when stumps were drawn. Play was extended by 60 minutes and 58 overs were to be bowled on the truncated day. But bad light lopped off 11 overs towards the end.

Sriram was the more aggressive of the two batsmen. He had announced his intentions early when he hit medium pacer Shahbuddin over square leg for a rousing six. His purple patch came when he clouted off spinner H Vatekar for 17 runs off five successive balls (42461). By close, he had faced 154 balls and hit six fours and two sixes. Badani, who was composed during his innings of 33, faced 80 balls and hit two of them to the ropes.