Maiden ton in Subbaiah Pillai Trophy by Manohar

Hyderabad: Hyderabad's left hand opening batsman Daniel Manohar's maiden century in the Subbaiah Pillai Trophy marked the highlight of the day's proceedings in the match between hosts Hyderabad and Andhra at the Gymkhana Ground here on Sunday. Hyderabad won easily by seven wickets.

Chasing a moderate target of 220 set by the opposition. Hyderabad opened the innings with recalled India batsman VVS Laxman and southpaw Daniel Manohar. The opening pair put on a century stand, before Laxman was out after scoring a fine 58. Laxman took some time because of the low bounce of the track to make some pleasing strokes on either side of the wicket. He was pretty severe on Madhukar. Laxman scored 20 off the 28 runs conceded by the bowler in his first spell of five overs. KST Sai replaced Madhukar and he too faced the punitive blade of Laxman who struck three lovely drives for boundaries.

At the other end Daniel Manohar kept the tempo going and the two batsmen raised the 50 in the 12th over and 100 in the 21st over. Laxman was the first to reach 50 off 62 balls in 85 minutes and 19 minutes later Manohar reached his 50 off 70 deliveries with the help of five fours to Laxman's seven.

Andhra met with success when left arm bowler Ram Mohan replaced Shahabuddin at 107 in the 22nd over and dismissed Laxman in his second over. Nanda Kishore did not stay long and gave Vatekar a return catch at three with the total 116. Skipper Mohammad Azharuddin joined Manohar and the two added 88 runs for the third wicket in 77 minutes, the later dominating with some powerful strokes. In Vatekar's 8th over Azharuddin straight drove a ball so powerfully that after hitting the boot of the Umpire Ramachandran the ball struck him in the face between the right upper lip and nose. The umpire, for a brief time was replaced by the match referee Pawan Agarwal, while he was given first aid. Ramachandran was back on duty after 20 minutes (3.4 overs).

Azharuddin was out when he was brilliantly held by the bowler Srinivas, who took it on the second attempt. Devishetty Vinay Kumar joined Manohar when he was on 88. A little later, Manohar completed his maiden ton in the 46th over of the innings. He faced 129 balls and hit nine boundaries. Deservingly he hit the winning stroke, a boundary, to see Hyderabad romp to victory.

Andhra, opting to strike first, opened with its wicket-keeper batsman L N Prasad Reddy and skipper Amit Pathak. After the early loss of Pathak, who was brilliantly caught by Azharuddin at gully, Reddy found an ally in V Nagini Kumar and the pair put on a valuable 79 for the second wicket off 121 balls.

Later Reddy and I Srinivas added 72 runs for the fifth wicket off 65 deliveries before the former was caught by Azharuddin off the bowling of Narenderpal Singh for a well made 93. In a stay of three hours, Reddy occupied the crease for the first 46.1 Overs and faced 142 balls in the process. Srinivas contributed 37 and Shahauddin 14 runs to push the Andhra score to 219 for seven in the 50 overs.

In the morning before play began, two minutes silence was observed by both teams to pay their respects to former Test cricketer M L Jaisimha who passed away recently in Hyderabad. Jaisimha was the coach for the Hyderabad team for the past three years.