Defending champions Mumbai stamped their authority over the Ranji Trophy match against Uttar Pradesh on the opening day restricting the hosts to 169 for seven at the K D Singh Babu stadium in Lucknow on Sunday.

Robin Morris, Swapnil Hazare and Onkar Khanvelkar scalped two wickets each even as Gyanendra Pandey fought a lone battle for the home side with an unbeaten half century in the Elite Group 'A' match.

At stumps, Pandey was batting on 57 with Praveen Gupta on seven.

Electing to bat after winning the toss, Uttar Pradesh got off to a poor start losing three wickets for 36 runs. But a 41-run fourth wicket partnership between Suresh Raina (43) and Rizwan Shamshad took the score to 77 before the latter was dismissed.

Pandey, who came to the wicket at the fall of Shamshad, batted sensibly to accumulate some valuable runs.

First he had a useful seventh wicket partnership of 33 runs with Prashant Malviya (17) and then added 34 runs with Praveen Gupta for the unfinished eighth wicket.

Uttar Pradesh first innings:

 R Prakash b  Morris               1
 J Yadav  lbw Hazare               4
 S Shukla lbw Morris              15
 S Raina c Zafar b Onkar          43
 R Shamshad c Samant b Hazare     14
 G Pandey batting                 57
 N Chopra b Bahutule               1
 P Malviya c Samant b Onkar       17
 P Gupta batting                   7
 Extras (B-2, LB-1, NB-4, WB-3)    10
 Total (for 7 wkts, 90 overs)    169
 
FOW: 1-1, 2-9, 3-36, 4-77, 5-90, 6-102, 7-135
 
Bowling:
 
Swapnil Hazare 20-5-56-2,
Robin Morris 13-4-37-2,
Nilesh Kulkarni 25-9-27-0,
S Bahutule 18-9-32-1,
O Khanvilkar 14-6-14-2.