The curtains came down on the 2017-18 season of the Ranji Trophy on Monday evening, with underdogs Vidarbha clinching their maiden title in the national championship. In the title clash played in Indore, Vidarbha – led ably by Faiz Fazal and coached by Chandrakant Pandit – dominated the contest and defeated seven-time champions and favourites Delhi by nine wickets.
The Ranji Trophy is the feeder to the national team; it is in this competition that players showcase their talent and show the stuff they’re are made of. It is in the Ranji Trophy that players audition with the hope of getting selected for higher honours; some players get picked to play in the zonal and representative sides – such as India A, Board President’s XI, etc, while some get called up to play for the country directly.
The Ranji Trophy puts players through the grind and prepares them for sterner challenges.
Here’s looking back at some of the players who shone brightly and caught the attention during the Ranji Trophy season that came to an end.
Karnataka’s Mayank Agarwal had an outstanding run with the bat and topped the run-scoring charts with an aggregate of 1160 runs. The 26-year-old started the season poorly, scoring 31 in the season-opener against Assam, and bagged a pair in the following match against Hyderabad. Then came the phenomenal turnaround – from being in a vulnerable position and almost losing his place in the side, he amassed 1033 runs in seven innings in the month of November alone. His series of scores in the month of November read 304*, 176, 23, 90, 133*, 173 & 134.
To put Mayank’s performance in context, while he scored 1033 runs in the month of November alone, the second-highest season aggregate was Faiz Fazal’s 912 runs!
A lot of the credit for Vidarbha’s success should go to their two openers – Faiz Fazal and Sanjay Ramaswamy – who finished second and third respectively in the run-scorer’s charts. Fazal’s aggregate of 912 runs is the best-ever season aggregate for a Vidarbha batsman. The Vidarbha openers were involved in big partnerships on three occasions, and provided their team solid starts.
Punjab’s Anmolpreet Singh, who is rated very highly by those who have seen him bat, and Andhra’s Hanuma Vihari rounded off the top five in the run-scorer’s list.
Jalaj Saxena – the professional signed up by Kerala – topped the wicket-taker’s list with 44 wickets from seven matches. It was the first time in the history of the Ranji Trophy that a bowler from Kerala topped the season-ending wicket-taker’s list.
Rajneesh Gurbani – who turned in match-winning (and Man-of-the-Match winning) performances for Vidarbha in the quarter-final, semi-final and final finished second in the list with a tally of 39 wickets; the telling number from Gurbani’s season has to be that he collected 27 wickets in the three knockout matches. Ashok Dinda was impressive yet again, topping Bengal’s wicket-taking charts for the fifth season running. Among others who featured in the top ten, the Delhi pacer Navdeep Saini, and off-spinners K Gowtham and Akshay Wakhare were impressive.
The Ranji Trophy also affords players discarded from the national side an opportunity to remind the national selectors of what they are capable of. It is the platform players use to force their way back to the national team. However, in this season that came to an end, several cricketers who are still in contention for a recall to the Indian team, were disappointing. Here’s looking at some of the familiar names – among the batsmen – who had a forgettable season.
Delhi made it to the finals of the Ranji Trophy, but they had two promising batsmen who did not live up to the billing. Unmukt Chand – Delhi captain not too long ago – was expected to make a strong case for a place in the Indian team. However, he managed only 128 runs in six innings and eventually lost out on a place in the Delhi team too. Delhi’s current captain Rishabh Pant too had an ordinary season; After collecting 972 runs in the previous season and forcing his way into the Indian team, Pant’s graph took a nosedive and he could only score 315 runs and one half-century in nine innings.
Suresh Raina, who was at one point in time considered the fittest cricketer and the best fielder in the Indian team, has been in the news for the wrong reasons in recent times; It was reported that he didn’t pass the Indian team’s fitness parameters and was therefore not considered for selection. Now, though he has supposedly cleared the yo-yo test, his batting has fallen apart. In five matches (and nine innings) for Uttar Pradesh, the southpaw managed to score a total of 105 runs at an average of 11.67 – with a highest score of 33!
Aditya Tare, the Mumbai captain, and Abhinav Mukund (who was India’s reserve opening batsman not too long ago) too had poor seasons with the bat. While Tare averaged 23.70 after 11 innings, the Tamil Nadu captain Mukund averaged 30.87 from nine innings.
Some of the India discards and India hopefuls too had a disappointing season with the ball; Varun Aaron – among the quickest bowlers in India at one point in time, collected only 15 wickets in five matches, while the likes of Pankaj Singh, Barinder Sran and Amit Mishra couldn’t cause too much damage with the ball.
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