da esport bet： The Orissa team gave their state a very happy New Year’s gift by scoring a 129-run victory over Bengal in the East Zone Ranji Trophy tie at the Eden Gardens onSunday
Sakyasen Mittra31-Dec-2000The Orissa team gave their state a very happy New Year’s gift by scoring a 129-run victory over Bengal in the East Zone Ranji Trophy tie at the Eden Gardens onSunday. The emphatic manner in which the cricketers from Utkal dominated thegame was hard to believe. Undoubtedly, the man of the match was the formerIndian seam bowler Debashis Mohanty. He took five wickets in the second inningsto take his match tally to 11, the first time that he had taken 10 or morewickets in a first class game. Incidentally this is the first time that Orissahave managed to defeat Bengal in 43 years of first class cricket.The issue was wide open on Saturday as Sourav Ganguly was still at the crease.But Mohanty had reserved one of the best deliveries for him. The ball that hadthe Indian captain could have done the same to any other batsmen. It pitchedjust outside the off-stump, bounced and moved off the seam late. Gangulydesperately tried to remove himself from the line of the delivery but could onlyglove it to wicket-keeper Gautam Gopal. Earlier, Mohanty had removed nightwatchman Sourashis Lahiri and then had dismissed the Bengal skipper DevangGandhi with successive deliveries. However, Gandhi could have left the ballalone. He tried to play it down and managed only to glove it for the secondcatch of the day to Gautam Gopal.An early lunch for Bengal was on the cards as Rohan Gavaskar was caught andbowled by Ajay Barik who had replaced Mohanty after the latter had bowledunchanged for two hours from the club house end. Gavaskar hit him for two lovelydrives through the covers. However, the moment Barik went round the wicket andaltered the line, Gavaskar was found wanting. He played well across to a balltrying to flick it through mid wicket. The ball caught the leading edge andlobbed back for a simple catch to the bowler. Srikkant Kalyani then was trappedplumb in front by P.Jayachandran as he shuffled too far across the stumps.Bengal finally managed to give some respectability to the score because of aninth wicket stand between Deep Dasgupta and Utpal Chatterjee. The two added 99runs for the ninth wicket taking the score over the 250 mark. However, the jobfor the two became comparatively easy as the Orissa spinners were operating.Both played freely and demonstrated to their predecessors that there was nothingin the pitch. Chatterjee scored 53 with seven boundaries. He was particularlysevere on off spinner S.Satpathy, repeatedly cutting him to the point fence.Dasgupta also looked quite solid in his 39. He was out to a dubious caughtbehind decision. Two balls later the match was over as Jayachandra had uprootedthe stumps of the last batsman Shiv Shankar Paul.Orissa now have 21 points from three matches while Bengal have 13. The latterwill at least need a minimum of five points to have a safe passage into theknockout stage. Assam have 16 points from two matches, while Bihar have eightfrom three.