Meerut: It's common knowledge to crouch to the ground during a gun attack as possible targets become smaller to the attackers. It's uncommon though when you witness a similar sight during a Ranji game. Howbeit, the attackers were a swarm of bees.
The incident happened during a Ranji match between Odisha and Uttar Pradesh, which was halted for a few minutes as the bees invaded the ground. While players were busy jostling, competing, and assiduously extracting runs, a swarm of bees started hovering over their heads propelling them to lie down to the ground to escape a possible sting. The umpires too buried their heads face down with hands over their heads as a shield.
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The episode had the crowd stutter, others tittered as it came as comic relief to most witnessing the match under the scorching sun emitting unbearable temperature. Not to the players as they continued the proceedings after the brief halt.
About the match, Uttar Pradesh has scored 257/4 in 68 overs against Odisha in the Elite Group A match. Suryakant Pradhan was the pick of the bowler from Odisha side picking up 3 wickets in 16 overs after Odisha were all out in the first innings scoring 226-10. With a century by Shantanu Mishra (109 runs), Odisha could only find a silver lining in what was a dismal performance. Priyam Garg (122) scored a century for UP, was run out later.
Teams:
Uttar Pradesh (Playing XI): Dhruv Jurel(w), Priyam Garg, Akshdeep Nath, Rinku Singh, Sameer Choudhary, Samarth Singh, Karan Sharma(c), Kunal Yadav, Saurabh Kumar, Shivam Mavi, Karthikeya Jaiswal
Odisha (Playing XI): Anurag Sarangi, Shantanu Mishra, Subhranshu Senapati(c), Kartik Biswal, Govinda Poddar, Prayash Singh, Rajesh Dhuper(w), Abhishek Raut, Jayanta Behera, Sunil Roul, Suryakant Pradhan
