South fumble after Vidwath's fifer

South Zone, what with their much-hyped batting line-up, were in a muck of their own doing on the opening day of their four-day Duleep Trophy semifinal against North Zone. And, had it not been for Karnataka pacer Vidwath Kaverappa’s fifer, it would have certainly looked worse.

South, led by Hanuma Vihari, ended the day on a shaky 63 for 4 from 17 testing overs after bowling North out for 198 in 58.3 overs.

Karnataka skipper Mayank Agarwal remained unbeaten on 37 and Tilak Varma, comforted aplenty by lady luck, reached an unbeaten 12 at the M Chinnaswamy stadium on Wednesday.

Also Read | England rest Anderson and Tongue for third Ashes test, Moeen and Wood included

In conditions typical of the city this time of year, South won a good toss and had the bowlers at their disposal to capitalise on the same.

Vidwath, who has had a stellar debut season for Karnataka with 34 first-class wickets in 10 contests, would have been eager to show up at his home ground. He did more than just that.

The nippy 24-year-old finished with figures of 5 for 28 from 17.3 overs to claim his third five-wicket haul in first-class cricket.

“The conditions were perfect,” he said after the day’s play. “In the morning there was no grass, and we were wondering how it was going to play. It was a bit sticky in the beginning because the ball wasn’t going nicely off the wicket. But eventually, we figured out what we needed to do.”

The Kodava lad revealed that he applied more backspin on the ball instead of digging it in, and that did the trick. Just like that, he scalped the wickets of Dhruv Shorey, Ankit Kalsi, Jayant Yadav, Pulkit Narang and Baltej Singh.

Three caught behinds, one leg before wicket and one bowled are a testament to his accuracy on the day.

“I don’t think about much. I focus on the basics,” he said. “When I have any issues with my bowling, I approach my coach Samuel Jayaraj Muthu in the off-season, and we watch videos and always we strip it down to the basics.”

While Kaverappa was building on his reputation, the famed South top-order looked dreadful.

Sai Sudharsan appeared unsure against a Baltej delivery that stopped on him.

R Samarth, another Karnataka product, pointlessly poked at a nothing ball from Baltej and nicked it to Prashant Chopra at second slip.

Vihari got on his toes, aesthetically of course, and clipped Harshit Rana onto the stumps. And Ricky Bhui’s feet were evidently still cold as he was trapped in front of the stumps the very next ball.

It was a 20-odd minutes of amateur batting which resulted in South reduced to 35 for 4, while the sun played peekaboo, much to the annoyance of the light-metre-toting umpires.

Following this melee, Agarwal took control, and Varma remained clueless.

The day had it all.

Brief scores: At M Chinnaswamy stadium: North Zone: 198 all out in 58.3 overs (Prabhsimran Singh 49, Ankit Kumar 33, Nishant Sindhu 27, Harshit Rana 31; Vidwath Kaverappa 5-28, KV Sasikanth 2-52) vs South Zone: 63/4 in 17 overs (Mayank Agarwal 37 n.o.; Baltej Singh 2-21, Harshit Rana 2-19).

At Alur: West Zone: 216/8 in 90 overs (Prithvi Shaw 26, Cheteshwar Pujara 28, Atit Sheth 74, Dharmendrasinh Jadeja 39; Shivam Mavi 4-43) vs Central Zone.