By Our Reporter
Shillong, Jan 11: Manipur are just 17 runs away from victory after completely dominating the second day of their Ranji Trophy plate group match against Meghalaya at the MCA Ground here on Wednesday.
Only the fading light and the ticking clock prevented the visitors from winning the game on the second day itself.
Resuming their first innings on 81/4, Manipur were eventually out for 220 and then rolled Meghalaya over for 91, leaving them just 29 to win. At stumps, they were 12/1 and they will, barring a miracle, celebrate victory on Thursday.
Earlier, Akash Choudhary (2/40) claimed the first of his two wickets early in the morning session but Rex Rajkumar (27) and overnight batter Ronald Longjam added 54 for the fifth wicket.
Ronald (43) missed out on a half-century by being run out by Choudhary and the tail wagged long enough to get Manipur past 200.
Rajesh Bishnoi (5/63) claimed his fourth five-wicket haul in this season’s Ranji Trophy.
Meghalaya’s other wicket-taker was Abhishek Kumar, who bagged one wicket at the start yesterday and another towards the end of the innings today to finish with figures of 2/54.
Though they faced a 63-run deficit going into their second innings, Meghalaya had overcome such a hurdle on three separate occasions to win this season but the momentum was firmly with Manipur, who came out rearing to go with ball in hand.
In contrast to Manipur, Meghalaya’s tail could not wag all that much and Bishnoi was left stranded on 27 not out, with Tarique Siddique (14) the only other batter to reach double figures.