RANJI TROPHY
Follow UsHello, Ranji Trophy, it’s been a while!
The Indian Premier League 2022 mega auction has hogged all the limelight over the last two-three weeks, and quite a few domestic players managed to strike gold in the auction. However, there were many who went unsold, while the rest of them didn’t even make it to the final auction list. There would have been disappointments but those players would be delighted with the fact that the Ranji Trophy is set to return after a year’s gap. The last edition of India's premier first-class competition was cancelled due to Covid, hurting the financial health of the domestic players, especially those who do not have IPL contracts.
The 38-team red-ball tournament will be conducted in two phases, with the IPL in between. The first phase will start on February 17 and end on March 15, consisting of group-stage encounters and one pre-quarter-final. The forthcoming edition of the IPL will reportedly get underway from March 27, and once the T20 league is over, the knockout phase of the 2021-22 Ranji Trophy will begin on May 30 and run up to June 26. The teams have been divided into nine groups (eight Elite and one Plate) and each of them will play three matches in the league stage. The Elite groups consist of four teams each, while the Plate group will have six teams, but will still play only three games in their group.
Amongst the eight Elite-Group toppers, the seven with best points will automatically qualify for the quarter-finals, while the remaining Elite-group topper will take on the Plate-group topper in a pre-quarter-final for that last spot in the quarter-finals. The venues for the pre-quarter-final and the knockouts are yet to be decided but all the Plate-group encounters will be played in Kolkata. Meanwhile, the Elite matches will be held in Rajkot, Cuttack, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Thiruvananthapuram, Thumba, Delhi, Rohtak, Gurugram, Sultanpur and Guwahati. The teams will also be allowed to make a like-for-like replacement if a player tests positive for Covid or shows symptoms - subject to match referee's approval.
The players won’t get the same number of matches they generally get in a Ranji Trophy season and will have to be at their best from the word go. This tournament will serve as a perfect platform for all those young players who are looking to impress the selectors, but at the same time, senior players like Ajinkya Rahane, Cheteshwar Pujara, Hanuma Vihari, Mayank Agarwal, Umesh Yadav, and a few others will also be eager to prove their worth to the Indian team management. Here, we look at players who are likely to grab eyeballs during the tournament.
Ajinkya Rahane
"Right now, I am just focussing on the Ranji Trophy and want to give my best for the Mumbai team. I am confident that I will be back in the Indian team," Rahane recently told the Times of India. The 33-year-old middle-order batter knows that he is going through a lean patch, having scored just 819 in his last 35 innings at a mediocre average of 24.09. Rahane has managed only four 50-plus scores since 2020 and has also lost the vice-captaincy to Rohit Sharma.
There have been reports regarding how the team management is planning to move on from Rahane and the senior batter will have to amass tons of runs in the first phase of the competition if he wants to continue to be part of the Indian Test set-up. The two-match Test series against Sri Lanka will get underway from March 4 and even if the BCCI announces the squad 10 days prior to the series, Rahane will get only one Ranji game to push his case forward.
Cheteshwar Pujara
It’s fitting that Rahane’s Mumbai will start their Ranji Trophy campaign against Pujara’s Saurashtra, considering both these senior batters will be fighting for survival. With eight half-centuries in his last 20 Tests, Pujara has surely been more consistent than Rahane but still averages only 26.3 in this period.
The No. 3 batter hasn’t scored a century since January 2019 but played a couple of match-defining knocks during the tour of Australia and England. Amongst the No.3 batters in Test cricket, Pujara (26.76) has the lowest average since 2021 (minimum 10 innings). For now, Pujara is most likely to feature in the Sri Lanka series but the 34-year-old will have to start getting those big runs if he wants to stay in the mix.
Hanuma Vihari
It’s not easy being Hanuma Vihari. In his 13 Test long career, he has played just one game at home, with his trusted tag of being an ‘away’ specialist. The 28-year old is a solid defensive player, who brings in technical solidity and a sense of calm which is a prerequisite in Test cricket, especially as the conditions and flow of the game keep changing. Vihari, who averages over 55 in first-class cricket, has done almost everything the team has asked of him.
The right-handed batter opened the innings in one of the four Tests in Australia in 2018 and then also helped India pull off a miraculous draw in Sydney during the 2020-21 tour. Vihari has done well in the limited opportunities he has received so far despite playing in difficult conditions. The team management wants stroke-makers like Shreyas Iyer, Shubman Gill and Suryakumar Yadav in the middle-order but it would be difficult for them to leave out Vihari, who could even fit at that No. 3 spot if Pujara keeps failing. For now, all Vihari could do is keep plundering runs for his state, which he has been doing for many years.
Mayank Agarwal and Prithvi Shaw
Rohit and KL Rahul have rightly become India’s first-choice openers, especially after what they did in England. Rohit didn’t travel to South Africa because of an injury but was impressive in the two Tests he played in Australia. Meanwhile, Rahul didn’t get a chance in Australia but looked solid in England and South Africa, smashing two centuries and as many fifties. Now, who are India’s back-up openers? Priyank Panchal and Abhimanyu Easwaran have been around for a while now, while Gill is likely to be slotted in the middle-order in the long run. Hence, the race is now between Agarwal and Shaw.
Agarwal is a different beast at home but averages just over 25 in overseas Tests. He got his chance in South Africa but couldn’t capitalise despite starting the tour with a superb fifty. Meanwhile, Shaw is way behind Agarwal on the waiting list but will always be in the reckoning because of how destructive he can be at the top. The 22-year-old, who has featured in five Tests, is set to captain Mumbai and would be itching to get back in the Indian set-up. Both Agarwal and Shaw have been ruthless in the domestic circuit and could once stamp their authority in the Ranji Trophy.
S Sreesanth
The 39-year-old paceman’s international career is over but it would be interesting to see him return to red-ball cricket after close to 10 years. Sreesanth, who played 27 Tests for India, even registered for the IPL auction but his name didn’t even come up in the accelerated phase. The right-arm seamer last played a first-class game for Kerala in 2012 but did feature in the Vijay Hazare Trophy and Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy in 2021, picking up 17 wickets in 11 matches. This has nothing to do with the national team but Sreesanth’s re-emergence in red-ball cricket could be extremely fun to watch.
Under-19 lads
The Boys in Blue were always the red-hot favourites to win the 2022 Under-19 World Cup and they did that in some style, staying unbeaten throughout the tournament. The focus will now shift to how they graduate to the next level. The captain of the World Cup-winning side, Yash Dhull has already given himself a period of 18 months to try to make it to the senior side but the road ahead will only get tougher and tougher for him and other members of the side.
Dhull is a part of Delhi's squad, while left-handed opener Harnoor Singh and fast-bowling allrounder Raj Angad Bawa will play for Chandigarh. Left-arm seamer Ravi Kumar has managed to break into the Bengal side, while wicketkeeper-batter Dinesh Bana and spin-bowling allrounder Nishant Sindhu will feature for Haryana. Meanwhile, Maharashtra have included spin-bowling allrounders Vicky Ostwal and Kaushal Tambe in their set-up. Maharashtra's fast-bowling allrounder Rajvardhan Hangargekar too was selected but won't be participating in the league phase due to the illness of his mother. This year’s Ranji Trophy won’t define their careers but every single one of them would be eager to showcase their skills at the senior level.
