Rishabh Pant put the disappointment of his first-innings failure behind to signal his Test readiness with a 34-ball half-century for India B in the Duleep Trophy first-round match against India A in Bengaluru on Saturday.
He smashed 9 fours and 2 sixes before being dismissed for 61 off 47 balls by Tanush Kotian.
In the first innings, Pant was dismissed by paceman Akash Deep for just seven runs off a brilliant catch by India A skipper Shubman Gill.
India B bowlers, led by three wickets each by pacers Mukesh Kumar and Navdeep Saini, dismissed India A for 231 on Saturday to take a 90-run lead in the first innings.
However, the India B top-order collapsed in the second innings, as the scoreboard read 22 for 3. It included a duck by their centurion from the first innings, Musheer Khan.
That brought Pant and Sarfaraz Khan together, and the latter dominated their quickfire 72-run stand for the fourth wicket, at which point Sarfaraz fell to Avesh Khan for a 36-ball 46.
Pant, who is making a comeback to red-ball cricket since his horrific car accident in December 2022, took over from thereon and added 46 runs with Nitish Reddy.
At the time of publishing this report, India B were 146 for 5, leading India A by 236 runs.
