Sachin Tendulkar hammered 199 and added 225 runs for the third wicket with Vinod Kambli (105 not out) as West Zone went on a run spree on the opening day of their Duleep Trophy match against East Zone at the Nehru stadium in Pune on Thursday. Riding on the form shown by the gifted duo, West Zone rattled up 384 for four wickets off 90 overs at close of play.

It was a good toss that Tendulkar won but Wasim Jaffer was perhaps a trifle unfortunate to be out to the first ball of the match, edging Debasish Mohanty to Deep Dasgupta. The home team suffered another early blow when the other opening bowler J Zaman had Nayan Mongia caught by Sukhbinder Singh for seven runs.

Tendulkar joined Hrishikesh Kanitkar at this stage and at once there was a change in the tempo of the match. The hunter suddenly became the hunted. Even as Kanitkar held on firmly, Tendulkar blazed away with thrilling strokes. The third wicket partnership added 127 runs off 25.2 overs before Kanitkar was leg before to Sukhbinder Singh. For his 42, the former Indian player batted almost three hours, content to play second fiddle to Tendulkar. He faced 121 balls and hit eight fours.

Kambli replaced Kanitkar at the crease and thanks to some splendid batting by him and Tendulkar, West Zone quickly went into a position of ascendency. Tendulkar and Kambli did pretty much what they liked with the bowling. East Zone captain Shiv Sundar Das tried seven bowlers in all but the runs kept coming at a fast clip. Tendulkar took only 39 balls to reach his first 50, in which there were eleven fours. His second fifty came off 73 balls with nine hits to the boundary. In the third 50, which came off 52 balls, there were five fours and two sixes. Just when a double century beckoned, Tendulkar was caught by substitute M Gupta off Sanjay Raul. Tendulkar batted five fours, faced 214 balls and hit 20 fours and four sixes. He had come in during the 12th over and was out to the last ball of the 79th over.

Joined by Jacob Martin, Kambli reached his hundred. By close he had faced 151 balls and hit 12 fours and three sixes. Martin who made a sedate start (two off 36 balls) was with him at stumps.

© CricInfo