Rest of India retains Irani Cup

GWALIOR: Rest of India’s bowling unit performed like a well-oiled machine as the team thrashed Madhya Pradesh by 238 runs to retain the prestigious Irani Cup here on Sunday.

Madhya Pradesh was bowled out for 198 in 58.4 overs while chasing a near-impossible 437 for victory as the match ended in the opening session of the fifth day. The Gwalior track offered help to both batters and bowlers – four tons were scored and 40 wickets fell during the match. A case in point was the Madhya Pradesh second innings, where the pacers and spinners shared five wickets each.

Pacers Mukesh Kumar (2/34), Atit Sheth (2/37) and Navdeep Saini (1/34) blew away the top-order while off-spinner Pulkit Narang (2/27) and left-arm spinner Saurabh Kumar (3/60) took advantage of the deteriorating surface to mop up the lower middle-order and tail.

At the start of the day, Madhya Pradesh skipper Himanshu Mantri (51 off 81 balls, 8 fours) got a raw deal from umpire Rohan Pandit, who raised his finger when the batter had not actually nicked one behind the stumps. The ‘host’ lost wickets at regular intervals, with first-innings centurion Yash Dubey (8) cleaned up by a lethal in-cutter from Mukesh.

There was no let-up in the intensity from the Rest of India bowlers and Madhya Pradesh did not even have the remotest chance to make a match of it. For the RoI team, which was made up of mainly India A players, No.3 batter Yashasvi Jaiswal, with 357 runs across two innings (213 and 144), was the showstopper.

“If I would have remained not out [on Day 1], I would have gotten a triple hundred. That would have been better,” Jaiswal said after the match. He praised opener Abhimanyu Easwaran (154), with whom he shared a 300-plus stand in the first innings. “I had an experienced partner in Easwaran and it was amazing to bat alongside him,” Jaiswal added. Another good news overall was Saini bowling 29 overs across two innings at a brisk pace.

BRIEF SCORES: Rest of India 484 & 246 bt Madhya Pradesh 294 & 198 in 58.4 overs (H Mantri 51, H Gawli 48, Saurabh 3/60)