Vidarbha 379 and 249 for 4 (Nair 132*, Malewar 73) lead Kerala 342 (Child 98, Sarwate 79, Nalkande 3-52, Rekhade 3-65, Dubey 3-88) by 286 runs
Two seasons on, Nair is on the forefront of Vidarbha’s cost to a 3rd Ranji Trophy title, having batted all day to assemble an unbeaten 132, his twenty third first-class century and fourth first-class century of the season. It helped stretch Vidarbha’s result in 286 at stumps, however crucially they nonetheless have six wickets remaining. If Nair does carry the trophy, it will be his third – his first two had been with Karnataka in his first two seasons, 2013-14 and 2014-15.
Malewar and Nair placed on 182 for the third wicket – Malewar making 73 to go together with his excellent 153 within the first innings – to defuse any pressure there might need been within the Vidarbha camp after they misplaced Parth Rekhade and Dhruv Shorey inside the primary three overs. Rekhade was bowled by way of the gate by Jalaj Saxena’s in-drift, and Shorey was out to Mohammed Azharuddeen’s brilliance as he dived full stretch to pluck a wholesome edge in entrance of first slip to present MD Nidheesh an early wicket.
Kerala may have had a 3rd in a short time, however Malewar was aided by luck when DRS deemed a not-out lbw determination off Saxena to be umpire’s name. It was the beginning of a irritating few hours for Kerala, the place they dropped a sitter of a big-match participant, two of their frontline seamers – Nidheesh and N Basil – acquired warnings twice for working onto the hazard space of the pitch after which noticed two wholesome nicks off Saxena, their most prolific and in-form spinner, undergo a vacant slip cordon when the necessity of the hour was to assault, not defend. All these components mixed to present Vidarbha the push they wanted.
Within the seventh over of the day, Malewar survived once more, this time overturning an lbw name on DRS after being given out to Nidheesh, with replays exhibiting the ball swung in late and would have missed leg stump. Issues had been taking place rapidly, and Kerala ought to have remained on the offensive. They did not and paid the value.
Nair was ok to select gaps by way of the quilt as Kerala left the off facet open to have him drive in opposition to the flip. His potential to combine that up by taking part in an outstanding reverse sweep all alongside the bottom made him a troublesome prospect to bowl at. Malewar’s temperament stood out as he absorbed the stress from Saxena and performed largely inside himself till he obtained to his half-century after which stepped out to play a wonderful drive over mid-off.
Because the partnership grew, Kerala resorted to a leg-stump line briefly to attempt to unsettle the batters. However given Vidarbha had been sitting fairly with a lead, realisation dawned for Kerala that they wanted to be slightly extra on the offensive, by which era the pair had already placed on 100 runs.
Nair survived on 65 when a vanguard off Saxena did not carry to the bowler, and he responded by offsetting any stress by taking part in the reverse sweep. En route, he went previous the 800-run mark for the season and charged into the 80s by hitting Aditya Sarwate for 2 back-to-back sixes – one over long-on and long-off. As he introduced up his century, Nair dropped his bat, eliminated his gloves and confirmed two palms in the direction of the dressing room – a symbolic gesture to sign his 9 lots of throughout the season – earlier than taking guard and persevering with to blunt the bowling.
Then a pointy tuner from Sarwate spun again in to entice him lbw, a call that Kerala obtained overturned of their favour by way of the DRS. However moments like these had been far and few amid a largely irritating day for Kerala, whose hopes of a maiden title appear all however gone, with them needing a miracle to make a match of this on the ultimate day.
Shashank Kishore is a senior correspondent at ESPNcricinfo
