In-form opener Abhinav Mukund struck a solid 96 as Tamil Nadu set a 308-run victory target for Himachal Pradesh on the penultimate day of their four-day Ranji Trophy Super League match in Chennai on Tuesday.
In reply, Himachal Pradesh were five without loss in their second essay with Munish Gupta (4) and Sandeep Sharma (0) at the crease at close of play.
Resuming at their overnight score of 19 for one, Tamil Nadu declared their second innings at 296 for six in 91 overs for an overall lead of 307.
In the morning, Tamil Nadu lost Gopinath (2) early before captain Badrinath and Mukund resurrected the innings.
However, Badrinath also went after being adjudged leg before to Sarandeep Singh for 36. The two added 54 in 15 overs for the third wicket. Tamil Nadu then lost another dependable bat Vasudevadas with the team score at 112 for four.
Mukund and Srinivasan seemed to be heading towards a solid partnership but the latter was out for 34, after the duo had added 72 runs for the fifth wicket.
Yet another good stand of Mukund and S Sureshkumar helped Tamil Nadu to a safer position and their partnership yielded 96 runs for the sixth wicket in 23.4 overs before Mukund missed his deserving century, what would have been his third of the season.
Going forward to drive medium pacer Thakur, he only managed an edge which was taken by wicket keeper Bisla. Mukund made 96 of 258 balls and hit six fours.
For the visitors, Sarandeep Singh (3/78) was the main wicket-taker.
Scorecard:
Tamil Nadu (1st innings): 234
Himachal Pradesh (1st innings): 223
Tamil Nadu (2nd innings, overnight 19/1):
A Mukund c Bisla b Thakur 96
M Vijay c Bisla b S Singh 9
H Gopinath c Bisla b Malik 2
S Badrinath lbw b S Singh 36
K Vasudevadas c Dogra b S Singh 12
R Srinivasan c Dogra b Bhatia 34
S Kumar not out 66
R Ramkumar not out 9
Extras: (b 19, lb 11, nb 2) 32
Total: (6 wickets decl. in 91 overs) 296
Fall of wickets: 1-17, 2-32, 3-86, 4-112, 5-184, 6-280
Bowling: A Thakur 18-4-49-1, V Malik 11-2-45-1, V Bhatia 23-4-54-1, S Singh 27-3-78-3, S Sharma 4-1-14-0, J Mehta 8-1-26-0
Himachal Pradesh (2nd innings):
M Gupta not out 4
S Sharma not out 0
Extras: (lb 1) 1
Total: (for no loss in 1.3 overs) 5
Bowling: V Mahesh 1-1-0-0, P Amarnath 0.3-0-4-0