Y Venugopal Rao cracked an unbeaten century but Andhra Pradesh were in a precarious position against hosts Madhya Pradesh on the opening day of the four-day Ranji Trophy Elite Group A match played at Usharaje stadium in Indore on Sunday.

Andhra were 266 for the loss of six wickets when the stumps were drawn for the day with Venugopal Rao remaining unbeaten on 112 runs, which included 20 fours.

Electing to bat, Andhra received an early jolt when it lost its opener L N Prasad Reddy in the third over of the day with the scoreboard reading just six runs.

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But Amit Pathak (38, 4x7) and M Suresh (10) provided the needed stability to the visitors and took the score to 36 before Devendra Bundela trapped Suresh leg before.

Venugopal Rao then took charge of the batting and was involved in three useful partnerships for his team. First, he added 53 runs for the fourth wicket with skipper MSK Prasad and then added 69 and 32 runs for the sixth and seventh wicket with RV Ch Prasad and K Shabuddin respectively.

For MP, Pitre took two wickets while Narendra Hirwani, Sanjay Pandey, Devendra Bundela and Abbas Ali chipped in with one wicket each.

Scorecard:

Andhra Pradesh Ist Innings:
L N Prasad Reddy c Yengde b Pandey 2
Amit Pathak c Hirwani b Pitre 38
M Suresh lbw Bundela 10
Y Venugopal Rao not out 112
M S K Prasad b Pitre 20
Y Ganeshwar Rao lbw Hirwani 19
R V Ch Prasad c Bundela b Ali 25
K Shahabuddin not out 32
Extras: (nb 5, lb 1, b 2) 8
Total: (For six wickets in 90 overs) 266
Fall of wickets: 1-6, 2-36, 3-67, 4-120, 5-147, 6-197.
Bowling: Sanjay Pandey 18-5-46-1, Shantanu Pitre 17-4-51-2, Devendra Bundela 5-1-18-1, Yogesh Golwalkar 21-7-67-0, Narendra Hirwani 24-5-66-1, Abbas Ali 5-1-15-1.