Indian domestic cricket/ players

[Atithee]

Rishabh Pant is in a hospital after a serious car accident. He is in a stable condition but hurt. Praying for a full and a speedy recovery.

[PKBasu]

This year, the Elite group has been expanded by including the likes of Nagaland and Pondicherry, who are struggling to be competitive. In the third round of Ranji matches, Rajasthan beat Pondicherry by an innings and 101 runs within 2 days, and Bengal beat Nagaland by an innings and 161 runs with a day to spare (and in fact lost just 4 wickets in their only innings, with Easwaran making 170, Gharami 101, Tiwary 51*, Shahbaz 75*).

But there have also been some very exciting, hard-fought matches -- most notably between recent stalwarts Saurashtra (who are missing Pujara and Unadkat) and the always-strong Mumbai. Saurashtra took a 59 run first innings lead despite 95 from Suryakumar and 75 from Sarfaraz. Then the Mumbai bowlers struck back to bowl Saurashtra out for 220 (Mulani 6/56 and 10 in the match) but Mumbai will start the final morning on 218/8 (despite Shaw making 68), still needing 62 to win. Mulani is 30* and is the key man still standing.

In the Assam-Hyderabad match, the latter took a 3-run first innings lead (208 vs 205), Assam responded with 252, and Hyderabad are 228/9, still needing 22 to win with just one wicket in hand. Maharashtra conceded a first innings lead of 11 (200 vs 211) to Andhra, then made 250 in the second innings, setting Andhra 240 to win. Andhra are 100/4 in the chase, with skipper Vihari 36* (after making 49 in the first essay).

Sorry about the typo (caught wittily by Atithee and prasen9). It should have been Saurashtra. Mulani fell for 34 early on the final morning, and Saurashtra have comfortably won that match by 48 runs.

Assam beat Hyderabad by 18 runs, picking up the final wicket early on the final morning.

[PKBasu]

Sad and worrying news about Rishabh Pant. Apparently he was driving at 5:30am perhaps on a hilly road and nodded off at the wheel. The car caught fire, and the accident seems very serious, although he has suffered no fractures. I'm particularly worried about the report above saying that he has been moved to a hospital in Delhi -- as he had originally been taken to the Max hospital in Dehradun. Get well soon Rishabh!

[Atithee]

^^I am from the local area and Max in Dehradun and AIIMS in Rishikesh are the best local hospitals but they aren’t as good. Moving Pant to Delhi is the right move. The car was so badly damaged and burned inside. It’s a miracle Pant survived without any fracture or other major injuries. God was certainly watching over him.

[PKBasu]

There were a couple of upsets in this round of Ranji matches. J&K beat Vidarbha (recent Ranji champions), while Uttarakhand beat Himachal to keep their winning streak alive. Uttarakhand's star was Deepak Dhapola (8/35 and 2/72), who played the key role in bowling Himachal out for 49 in the first innings, exploiting the swing-friendly conditions on the first morning in Dharamsala (HP's home ground). Dhapola is 32, and only made his first-class debut in 2018. He would probably never have played first-class cricket had it not been for the expansion of the Ranji trophy to the Plate group, where he got his initial pile of wickets. But he is now doing well in the Elite division too, and his good work is keeping Uttarakhand competitive.

Vidharbha took an 81-run first innings lead over J&K, but were bowled out for 101 in the second innings, chasing 141 for an outright victory. Slow left arm orthodox bowler Abid Mushtaq took 8/18 in the second innings.

[PKBasu]

Prithvi Shaw made 379 for Mumbai vs Assam (eventually falling to Riyan Parag Das just before lunch on the second day). That's the second highest score in Ranji history. Shaw had actually been in very poor form in the Ranji season until this match, making a total of 160 runs in 7 innings (avg 22.85). But this innings takes his average for the season to 67.38. He will begin to be noticed again.

[prasen9]

Give him a good run in T20Is where he should fit the best. Or maybe we can gamble and throw him in as an opener against Australia in tests again! On Indian grounds, he can perhaps be a handful. I do not have very much faith in Gill and Rahul in the long run.

[rajitghosh]

Jadeja has been asked to play a Ranji match to prove his fitness. He is leading Saurashtra against a pretty decent TN team. Unadkat and Pujara have been rested so he is the captain. He picked up 1 wicket in 24 wickets- that of Baba Indrajith.

[PKBasu]

Jadeja took 7 wickets in the second innings to lead Saurashtra back into the match against Tamil Nadu, dismissing the latter for 133. Saurashtra need another 262 runs on the final day to win the match.

[PKBasu]

Going into the final day of the pool stage in the Ranji trophy, 3 teams have comfortably won their pools -- Karnataka (C), holders Madhya Pradesh (D) and Bengal (A). The other qualifiers from Pool A will likely be Uttarakhand, while Punjab will qualify from Pool D. In Pool C, Jharkhand currently seem likeliest to qualify, as Kerala (who conceded a large first innings lead to Pondicherry) need a miracle on the final day, while Rajasthan need to score more than 100 runs against Services on the final day (with just 3 wickets in hand) to win outright and overtake Jharkhand. In Pool B, there is a tough fight underway among Saurashtra, Maharashtra, Mumbai and Andhra for the two spots. Saurashtra will top the pool if they win outright tomorrow, but could be eliminated if they lose outright (Saurashtra are on 26 points, the same as Andhra, who have finished their last game; Saurashtra's quotient is better, but could worsen if they lose to TN). Maharashtra and Mumbai are playing, with 25 and 23 points. In their match, the first innings was tied (both teams made 384), so it is Advantage Maharashtra. If both teams share just 1 point each (for no first innings lead), Maharashtra will probably finish just ahead of Andhra on quotient, and qualify. I would expect Saurashtra to win tomorrow if Jadeja finds form with the bat.

Nagaland are certain to be demoted to the Plate division, with Hyderabad likeliest to join them. In the Plate this year, Meghalaya finished well on top but lost to the 4th placed Bihar in the semifinal, while Manipur also qualified for the final, beating Mizoram. So Bihar and Manipur will be promoted to the Elite division next year.

[PKBasu]

Ranji quarterfinal line-up (all 5-day matches to start on 31st January):
Bengal vs Jharkhand
Saurashtra vs Punjab
Karnataka vs Uttarakhand
Madhya Pradesh vs Andhra

(Maharashtra had a better quotient than Andhra, but the latter made it through, perhaps because something else was used as tiebreaker before the quotient...; 3 teams finished with the same points in that Group -- Saurashtra topping the group on quotient).

[suresh]

Interesting. No Mumbai, Delhi,TN, Hyderabad!

[PKBasu]

Suresh, Hyderabad not only failed to make the QF, they finished dead last in the Elite division with just 1 point (1 less than Nagaland's 2) and have been demoted to the Plate division (of just 6 teams) next year. Mumbai and Maharashtra narrowly missed making it, while TN were unlucky to be in the same group with those two, as well as Saurashtra, while Andhra managed to squeeze into second place in the group (edging Maharashtra, who had the same points and a better quotient, but perhaps Andhra finished ahead because they beat Maharashtra in the bilateral match -- not really sure).

[PKBasu]

Bengal beat Jharkhand by 9 wickets, Karnataka beat Uttarakhand by an innings, and holders Madhya Pradesh beat Andhra by 5 wickets to make the Ranji semifinal. Bengal played Madhya Pradesh in the SF last year as well (and Bengal beat Jharkhand in last year's QF too!). Let's see who wins the repeat SF this year!

For Karnataka, a debutant opening bowler (Venkatesh) shone with 5-for in the first innings, while Shreyas Gopal top-scored (150+) and took 3/26 in the second innings (not having bowled in the first!). I saw Uttarakhand's 32 year old Dhapola (who had destroyed Himachal in Dehradun with 8/35, having made his FC debut only 5 years ago) bowl to the Karnataka openers: he was quite dangerous, moving the ball late both ways, but Mayank Agarwal (83) and Samarth (82) countered him by playing him cautiously and late (with little backlift), putting on 159 for the first wicket. For Bengal, Anustup Majumdar (38 years old) has been the key batsman this season, but Abhimanyu Easwaran has performed whenever he is available (as he did in this match). Akash Deep was MoM but Akash Ghatak (a 26 year old playing only his second first class match) took 1/15 and 3/21 in the two innings.

The MP vs Andhra match was interesting, with Andhra taking a big 151 run first innings lead (after 149 from Ricky Bhui, now the Andhra 'keeper although he was a batting allrounder who bowled leg-spin as an India under-19 player 8-10 years ago). But Madhya Pradesh fought back by dismissing Andhra for 93, with Avesh Khan taking 4 wickets. (Khan had 1 for 100+ in the first innings, but he injured Andhra skipper Vihari in that innings). In the second innings, Vihari came into bat at #11 with a fractured right thumb, and chose to bat left-handed, making 15 runs: heroic stuff). Yash Dubey (58) and Rajat Patidar (55) helped MP chase down the 245 run target with 5 wickets and a day to spare. Patidar has had a solid season, making 508 runs at 50.8 apiece. His career average is 46, slightly better than Suryakumar in FC cricket.

Saurashtra vs Punjab has gone into the fifth day. Punjab scored 431 in response to Saurashtra's first innings of 303. In the absence of Unadkat (who is on the India bench), the Punjab openers Prabhsimran Singh and Naman Dhir put on a 212 run opening stand. But Saurashtra made 379 in the second innings, with skipper Vasavada and Chirag Jani making 77 each, and Prerak Mankad 88. Punjab are 52/2, chasing 252 to win, having lost both openers in the second innings. The winner will play Karnataka in the SF.

[prasen9]

Saurashtra won despite conceding a 130 run or so lead. The last innings batting seemed too much for Punjab!