Mohali: Punjab fast-bowlers made a good start against Tamilnadu by picking three early wickets on the first day of the Ranji Trophy encounter at home in Mohali.
For Punjab, medium pacer Baltej Singh shined with two wickets with the wickets of Narayan Jagadeesan and Baba Indrajith. Winning the toss and opting to field first Punjab, Punjab made five changes. One notable inclusion was the return of Under-19 star Shubman Gill.
Tamilnadu too made two changes by including pacer K Vignesh and the experienced Vijay Shankar, who is returning from the India A tour to New Zealand, in the place of opener Kaushik Gandhi and Rahil Shah. Narayan Jagadeesan opened the batting along with Abhinav Mukund.
In the 10th over, the first wicket fell for Tamilnadu with Mukund getting out at 17 to Manpreet Gony. In the 15th over, Tamilnadu dealt a double blow with back to back wickets.
First, it was N Jagadeesan who was dismissed lbw for 19 off Baltej Singh. Within a space of two deliveries TN lost its in-form skipper, Baba Indrajith for a nought in a Baltej delivery that rattled his stumps.
Experienced Dinesh Karthik then joined Baba Aparajith, who is struggling for form this season. The pair put alongside a 41 run partnership and took the team from 31/3 to 72/3 at the stroke of lunch.