Upbeat Tamil Nadu eyes quarters berth in Ranji

Saurashtra collected three points from its drawn-game against Mumbai and is sitting at the second place in the combined A and B Group standings with 28 points.

A win will boost it more before playing the quarter-final. Only five teams from combined A and B will make thequarter-finals.

Tamil Nadu, which has 19 points, is in contention mathematically. It will need to beat Saurashtra with a bonus point and then hope that Karnataka, UP and Punjab lose their respective games. This way it will be on 26 and could be the fifth team to make the cut.

If TN doesn’t win with a bonus point, it can still qualify if Karnataka, Punjab and UP lose their matches, as then the quotient will come into picture. TN right now has a higher quotient.

Bowling has not been an issue for Saurashtra as its spinners led by Dharmendrasinh Jadeja and pacers led by Jaydev Unadkat have done a decent job.

Jadeja has so far taken 20 wickets. But he needs support from others and so does Unadkat.

It is its batting which needs to come good, especially the top-order. The host is too dependent on Arpit Vasavada or Sheldon Jackson and the likes of Harvik Deai, Snell Patel need to score big. Tamil Nadu has a tough task at hand considering that the track at SCA Stadium could aide spinners from the third day.