Choudhary had also claimed six wickets against Andhra Pradesh in Punjab’s last encounter, but termed Wednesday’s effort as his best. (File)
Left-arm spinner Vinay Choudhary’s six-wicket haul put hosts Punjab in control of their crucial Ranji Trophy group league game against Bengal on Wednesday.
The 26-year-old from Amritsar helped bundle the visitors for 138 on the first day and at stumps, Punjab were 93/3 at the Dhruv Pandove Stadium.
Choudhary, who came into the attack after early inroads were made with medium pacer Baltej Singh removing openers Koushik Ghosh and Abhimanyu Easwaran and fellow spinner Krishan Alang getting Abhishek Raman, troubled the Bengal batsmen with his accuracy.
Veteran Manoj Tiwary and Arnab Nandi tried to fashion a recovery but Choudhary first broke the 28-run fourth-wicket partnership before returning after lunch to take three wickets in an over to reduce Bengal to 104 for 7. Tiwary was the lone ranger for Bengal with an unbeaten 70.
Choudhary had also claimed six wickets against Andhra Pradesh in Punjab’s last encounter, but termed Wednesday’s effort as his best.
“We knew that the wicket would be less helpful and that’s why I would say that this six-wicket haul is better than the one in the last match. The wicket was offering bounce for the pacers and occasional turn for spinners. So my aim was to use the crease and bowl at my spots with accuracy. The first two wickets I got came when the batsmen were trying to sweep and I varied my pace and bowling position.”
Choudhary made his First-Class debut against Karnataka in 2013 at the age of 20. But the next few years would see him playing only 15 matches with Harbhajan Singh being the first choice spinner with tweakers like Sarabjeet Ladda, Varun Khanna and Mayank Markande playing as frontline spinners in recent years.
Between his occasional call-ups for the Punjab team, which also saw him claiming eight wickets against a strong Delhi line-up in the Ranji Trophy in 2018, Choudhary would spend time bowling at nets at Gandhi Ground, Amritsar.
This season too, he had only played in two matches as compared to leg-spinner Markande’s seven but the left-arm spinner took nine wickets in the match against Andhra.
“Spending time under Harbhajan paaji helped me learn a lot and when I was away from the team, I would be bowling a lot in the nets. I would watch videos of Maninder Singh and Bishan Singh Bedi sir. When I did not play in the earlier matches this season, I bowled the same number of overs as I would be in a match in nets with the team. Today when Manoj bhai was stepping out against me, our bowling coach Devender Arora told me to focus on my plan and to bowl as consistently as I do in the nets,” shared Choudhary.
With the team placed at fourth spot in Elite Group A with 24 points, the hosts need at least three points from the match to keep their hopes alive for a spot in the knockouts.
“Vinay’s biggest strength has been his accuracy and he does not give loose balls easily. On this type of wicket, where there is bounce and occasional turn, bowling at the same spot again and again helped him. The pitch is playing well as we saw medium pacers getting good bounce and we were bit unlucky that we lost the third wicket after a good partnership,” said Punjab coach Puneet Bali.
Punjab were reduced to 45 for 2 in 18 overs before Mandeep Singh and Rohan Marwaha took the total to 93 before medium pacer Akashdeep, the only pacer in the Bengal team with coach Arun Lal opting for four spinners, removed Marwaha.
“We would aim to restrict them to possibly a first-innings lead of 50-60 runs, which does not matter much knowing that Punjab will bat last on this pitch. We included a fourth spinner as an all-rounder and our spinners can play a role in the fourth innings,” shared Lal.
Brief Scores: Bengal 138 all out in 49 overs (Manoj Tiwary 73; Vinay Choudhary 6/54, Baltej Singh 3/16) vs Punjab 98 for 3 in 38.2 overs (Rohan Marwaha 48, Mandeep Singh 29 batting; Shahbaz 2/28).