Today, Sidhu hung his head in embarrassment on way back to the dressing room. Two grave miscalculations by him placed his side in a precarious position against defending champions Karnataka on the opening day of the five-day Ranji Trophy semi-final encounter. He first ran out Sandeep Sharma and then got himself run out. As panic set in the Punjab ranks Dodda Ganesh ripped through by taking six wickets for 37.

Karnataka needed to play out a session to shut all exit doors on Punjab. Instead, their batsmen were tentative and in trouble at 68 for four before Vijay Bhardwaj and Tilak Naidu steadied the innings. They added 116 runs for the fifth wicket and even the dismissal of Bhardwaj towards the fag end of the day, did not deter Karnataka as they finished at 206 for five atclose.

In the process, Bhardwaj surpassed Baroda's Jacob Martin's record of highest individual runs (1037) in a Ranji season when he reached his personal score of 16. With his 67 today, Bhardwaj took his season's tally to 1089 runs from 12 innings.

If Sidhu erred in judgment, his batting mates lacked the guts and commitment to exploit a depleted Karnataka bowling attack. With Anil Kumble, Javagal Srinath, Venkatesh Prasad and Sunil Joshi not around, Karnataka had their trump card in Ganesh.

With a 20-over old ball in his hand, Ganesh's second spell was a reflection of his ability to reverse swing the ball. No Punjab batsman worked him out on a pitch which had low bounce.

SCOREBOARD

PUNJAB (Ist innings): Vikram Rathore b Ganesh 19, Navjot Sidhu run out 26, Sandeep Sharma run out 0, Pankaj Dharmani lbw Ganesh 13, D. Mongia b Katti 7, Amit Sharma b Ganesh 0, H Jugnu b Ganesh 6, Sarandeep b Katti 0, Harbhajan lbw Ganesh 4, Navdeep Singh lbw Ganesh 0, Bhushan not out 0. Extras (b1, lb1,nb13) 15. Total: 90 in 31 overs.

Fall of wickets: 1-44, 2-55, 3-64, 4-77, 5-77, 6-83, 7-84, 8-85, 9-89.

Bowling: D Ganesh 14-3-37-6, M.A. Khan 5-1-23-0, Anand Katti 10-5-20-2, Anand Yalvigi 2-1-8-0.

KARNATAKA (Ist innings): Somasunder c and b Bhushan 16, Arun Kumar c Jugnu b Sandeep 11, Anil Kumar st Jugnu b Harbhajan 9, Vijay Bharadwaj c Harbhajan b Bhushan 67, A Vijay c Bhushan b Sarandeep 9, Thilak Naidu not 70, Soma Shirraguppi not out 7. Extras (nb3, b7, lb7) 17. Total (for 5 in 59 overs) 206.

Fall of wickets: 1-20, 2-36, 3-42, 4-68, 5-186.

Bowling: Bharat Bhushan 13-2-49-2, Sandeep Sharma 15-3-42-1, Harbhajan Singh, 17-2-50-1, Sarandeep Singh 5-0-25-1, Navdeep Singh 9-1-26-0.