Cricket News By TODAYLIVESCORE.INFO - Batters give India A steady start after hard toil. Prithvi Shaw made a quickfire 48.
Prithvi Shaw made a quickfire 48.
Indian bowlers were made to toil hard on the second day of the first unofficial Test as well as South Africa A declared on 509 for 7 in Bloemfontein. After Pieter Malan and Tony de Zorzi made centuries on the opening day, Sinethemba Qeshile and George Linde struck half-centuries with the Indian bowlers struggling to find any help from the surface.
South Africa resumed on 343 for 3 but lost Malan and Smith early in the day. At 350 for 5, India A had a chance to make a strong comeback in the game but Qeshile and Linde made 102 for the sixth wicket to put South Africa A on top again. Navdeep Saini and Arzan Nagwaswalla got two wickets each while Umran Malik got one. Among spinners, only Rahul Chahar picked a wicket but also went on to register a bowling century himself with figures of 28.5-0-125-1.
With a mountain ahead of them, India batters ended the day on 125 for 1 in the 33 overs they batted. Prithvi Shaw, hoping to make a Test comeback, was aggressive and struck nine boundaries to make 48 off 45. Captain Priyank Panchal made an unbeaten 45 off 99 to ensure the hosts were able to pick just one wicket on the day.
India A raced to 80 for 1 in 13.5 overs courtesy Shaw's flurry of boundaries before Abhimanyu Easwaran and Panchal settled in to see the side to stumps. Easwaran's unbeaten 27 had five boundaries as he stitched a 45-run stand with his captain.
Brief scores: South Africa A 509/7 dec (Pieter Malan 163, Tony de Zorzi 117; Navdeep Saini 2-57) lead India A 125/1 (Prithvi Shaw 48) by 384 runs.
