Duleep Trophy final: Shami, Mukesh lead East Zone's charge, restrict South to 242/6

CHENNAI: Veteran pacer Mohammad Shami’s decisive blows while operating in short spells helped East Zone close in on the Duleep Trophy title, reducing South Zone to 242 for six on the third day of the final here on Tuesday.

Skipper Tilak Varma (56, 133b) and CV Milind (0) were batting at stumps after Shreyas Gopal (26) got out in the closing minutes of the day. South still trail by 466 runs and overhauling East’s humongous 708 is nearly impossible from this point.

Shami’s three spells on the day were — 3-2-1-0, 4-1-10-1 and 4-1-6-1 — for an overall 11-4-17-2 and the short bursts were, perhaps, prompted by the humid Chennai conditions.

While the numbers do not look intimidating, they offered ample evidence of Shami’s control over his craft and the ability to crank up when it mattered.

When the South Zone bowlers struggled for impact in the first two days on a docile pitch, Shami bowled a lovely stump-to-stump line, bringing back the memories of some of his remarkable Test match spells.

The right-arm pacer was incredibly persistent with his lengths, seldom giving any room for batters to play their shots.

Shaik Rasheed (29) and Devdutt Padikkal (62) were involved in a 56-run stand for the third wicket, looking good for something bigger.

But Shami intervened at that juncture, trapping Rasheed in front of the wicket with a peach which came in that little bit to avoid the forward prod of the batter.

The 36-year-old was summoned 20 overs later by Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, who wore the captain’s band for a while in the absence of Ishan Kishan, and made an immediate impact.

The pacer jettisoned Ravichandran Smaran, whose partnership with South skipper Tilak had swollen to 45 by then.

The set up was impeccable. Shami started with a fuller delivery on the stumps and then followed it up with two deliveries that came in to the left-hander.

The fourth one moved away from Smaran, who feathered it to stumper Kumar Kushagra, who nudged Sooryavanshi into taking the DRS and the TV umpire upheld the appeal for a caught behind.

Before that Padikkal looked set for another big knock while tackling East bowlers with characteristic solidity.

Fresh from his fruitful tour to Sri Lanka, the Karnataka batter cruised to a fifty in 65 balls, reaching the little landmark with a drilled four through third man off pacer Mukesh Kumar.

But the Bengal pacer had his revenge very soon. Mukesh bowled one on the pads of Padikkal, knowing the left-hander’s penchant to play the pick-up flick.

He indeed played that shot but did not time it that well, only to give substitute DP Das an easy catch in the deep.

The dismissal meant that South Zone could only make 61 runs in the middle session, losing three wickets.

It was a kind of trend in South Zone innings — a partnership getting terminated before reaching its full bloom.

After the early departure of vice-captain Ricky Bhui, who edged Mukesh to Kushagra, Narayan Jagadeesan (32) helped Devdutt milk 60 runs for the second wicket despite the pitch showing increasing signs of weariness.

Jagadeesan was fluent, getting some silken boundaries off the spinners but that eagerness to drive doomed his stay.

Part-time spinner Shikhar Mohan, who was pressed into action early because of a finger injury to Anukul Roy, pitched one probably on the sixth stump.

Jagadeesan saw an opportunity to peel off another boundary but his uppish slap ended in the hands of Abhimanyu Easwaran in the covers.

Tilak, who brought his third successive 50-plus score in this competition in 143 balls, and Shreyas, the last recognised South batting pair, survived 26.4 overs in the last couple of hours of the day, adding 66 runs but that is only a temporary consolation.

South still have a massive task at hand to even avoid the follow-on mark.