A double century by opener Barrington Rowland (210) and a century by Sunil Joshi (110) helped Karnataka amass 475 runs in the first innings against Assam in the Ranji Trophy Elite Group 'B' league at Bangalore on Saturday.
Karnataka have established a first innings lead of 266 runs as against 209 scored by Assam, but the hosts still have a herculean task to perform -- to achieve their target of an outright win to sail into the semi-final.
With a day left and Assam having nine wickets in hand, Karnataka face an uphill task.
Rowland who remained unbeaten on 111 yesterday managed to add 89 runs more to the side's score. Joshi's impressive eighth-wicket pairing with D Ganesh (55) also made useful contributions.
Rowland's knock was embellished with 26 boundaries and came off 434 balls while Joshi hit 13 boundaries and two sixes in his innings.
For the visitors, Arien Konwar picked five wickets, including that of Joshi's, conceeding 150 runs.
Assam began their second innings on a disastrous note losing Sajjad Hussain (2). Kiran Powar (22) who joined the other opener Parag Das (23) then played cautiously.
Assam were 52 for one when stumps were drawn for the day.
Scoreboard:
Karnataka 1st Innings: (Overnight 211/6)
J Arun Kumar lbw Dutta 2
Barrington M Rowland c S Das b Goswami 210
Sudhindra P Shinde c Zakaria Zuffri b Parag Das 16
Deepak Chougule c Das b Talukdar 5
R Vijay Bharadwaj c Hussain b Konwar 8
V S Tilak Naidu lbw Konwar 44
Stuart Binny c Utpal Medhi (sub) b Konwar 0
Sunil B Joshi c Goswami b Konwar 110
D Ganesh c Goswami b Konwar 55
Udit B Patel lbw Goswami 9
N C Aiyappa batting 2
Extras (b-7, lb-6, wd-1) 14
Total (all out in 144.5 overs) 475
Fall of wickets:1/2, 2/43, 3/49, 4/62, 5/184, 6/184, 7/370, 8/451, 9/467
Bowling: Gautam D Dutta 16-3-55-1; Dhiraj Goswami 16.5-4-72-2; Parag Das 22-13-30-1; Arien Konwar 46-4-150-5; S V Saravanan 4-1-15-0; Mrigen Talukdar 17-5-64-1; Kiran R Powar 23-4-76-0.
Assam II innings:
Sajjad Hussain c Barrington b Joshi 2
Parag K Das not out 23
Kiran R Powar not out 22
Extras (B-4, LB-1) 5
Total (for 1 wkt in 23 overs) 52
Fall of wicket: 1/9
Bowling: D Ganesh 2-0-6-0; N C Aiyappa 1-0-1-0; Sunil B Joshi 10-4-15-1; Udit B Patel 10-1-25-0.
