Maharashtra seam bowler Iqbal Siddiqui was in devasating form on theopening day of their West Zone Ranji Trophy league match againstSaurashtra at the Deccan Gymkhana ground in Pune on Monday

28-Dec-1999Maharashtra seam bowler Iqbal Siddiqui was in devasating form on theopening day of their West Zone Ranji Trophy league match againstSaurashtra at the Deccan Gymkhana ground in Pune on Monday. He tookeight wickets for 72 as Saurashtra were restricted to 217 in theirfirst innings. Maharashtra were 46 for one at close of play.SB Nair took the first wicket when he dismissed SS Tanna for two. Butthereafter it was Siddiqui all the way. He took the remaining eightwickets that fell to bowlers for HJ Parsana retired hurt when he was58. In the process, Siddiqui became the highest wicket taker forMaharashtra. He now has 156 wickets from 38 matches and went ahead ofPandurang Salgaonkar who had 155 wickets in 48 games.Parsana’s 58 was the highest score. He batted 90 minutes, faced 68balls and hit eleven fours and a six. Skipper SH Kotak (36), PJBhatt(46) and tailender YU Bambhaniya (25) came up with valuablecontributions. But Siddiqui took the day’s honours with his finalfigures of 24.1-8-72-8.Maharashtra openers SS Bhave and DS Jadhav put on 46 runs when shortlybefore stumps, Bhave was out for 30.