By Paritosh Pramanik A CRESTFALLEN Vidarbha captain Akshay Wadkar threw his head in disbelief. He knocked his bat onto his helmet and made a long, slow stroll back to the pavilion even as Pondicherry players patted his back. Just one mistake in his 509 minutes stay in the middle while batting proved costly as the skipper missed a well-deserved maiden double century by just two runs on Day Two of their Elite Group A Ranji Trophy match here at VCA’s Jamtha Stadium. The Vidarbha dressing room was ready to celebrate its captain’s landmark innings, the shutterbugs had loaded their mobile cameras zooming in towards Wadkar. But as the Vidarbha captain missed that sweep shot and the ball brushed his pads all went numb seeing the umpire raising his dreaded finger. Their hearts might have missed a beat watching Wadkar controlling his emotions, walking back. Riding on Wadkar’s 198, his career’s best score, and Yash Rathod’s 134, Vidarbha posted a huge 428 from 129.4 overs in their first innings. At stumps, Pondicherry were 107 for 1, still trailing by 321 runs. Debutant Ritesh Gudge completed his half century and was batting strongly on 59 while veteran Nikhil Gangta was unbeaten on 32. Both the batters negotiated Vidarbha seamers and spinners and added unbeaten 92 runs for the second wicket. But the day would be remembered for Wadkar’s gritty knock.

 

Wadkar bossed Pondicherry bowlers. He played a perfect anchor’s role stitching another important partnership of 72 runs for the ninth wicket with Parth Rekhade (20) after posting 245 with Rathod earlier in the innings. In his 363 balls innings, Wadkar showed his aggressive side as well picking 23 boundaries. He once pulled a bouncer from Vijai Raja towards mid-wicket and in the same over cracked a backfoot punch towards square boundary to race to 192. He reached 197 with another four off the same bowler, this time the ball landing in the deep midwicket region. But as luck would have it, the wicketkeeper-batter played an unnecessary sweep shot and missed it completely to be trapped leg before giving Pondicherry’s Sagar Udeshi his fourth wicket of the innings. Wadkar was the last man out as Vidarbha’s innings folded after lunch. Earlier in the morning, Vidarbha lost Rathod, who could add only three runs to his overnight score of 131. Some quick wickets in next few overs halted the hosts’ run flow. Harsh Dubey, Nachiket Bhute could not contribute much from their bats. In the meantime, captain Wadkar completed 150 runs with a boundary behind the stumps. By lunch, Vidarbha had added another 82 runs losing three wickets after resuming at the overnight score of 300-5. Rekhade and Wadkar frustrated Pondicherry bowlers further before the former was caught out on personal score of 20 runs. With tail wagging, Wadkar tried to achieve the double ton but missed the line completely. The dejected long walk back to pavilion would haunt him for some time.