The West Zone, with their phenomenal play, win the Duleep Trophy.
The West Zone, with their phenomenal play, win the Duleep Trophy. On the final day of competition, West Zone cruised to an easy victory over South Zone in Coimbatore. Hence, they secured their place as winners of the Duleep Trophy. By the end of the fourth day, West Zone had taken the lead. On the morning of the fifth day, they finished the job by taking the last four wickets.
When South Zone fell to 146/6 while going after 529, the Duleep Trophy winners were already apparent. With the top six players back in the pavilion, it seemed unlikely that R Sai Kishore and T Ravi Teja would be able to bat for most of the day’s overs. However, on Sunday, they did an excellent job by slowing down the West Zone attack for a while. Ravi Teja hit a fifty, but Sai Kishore was content just to bat out time.
At one point, Ravi Teja complained that Yashasvi Jaiswal kept sledging him. As a result, West Zone captain Ajinkya Rahane asked Yashasvi Jaiswal to leave the field. But that didn’t change much on the field because Chintan Gaja ended the frustrating stand. Finally, on that particular day, Shams Mulani took two more wickets, giving him a total of four as South Zone was bowled out for 234 runs.
After giving up a 57-run lead in the first inning, West Zone did a lot to turn things around. The second time they batted, they did a great job and put 585/4 on the board, which pretty much made South Zone give up.
Brief scores
West Zone – 270 (Het Patel 98; R Sai Kishore 5/86) & 585 (Yashasvi Jaiswal 265; R Sai Kishore 2/157)
South Zone – 327 (Baba Indrajith 118; Jaydev Unadkat 4/52) & 234 (Rohan Kunnummal 93; Shams Mulani 4/51)
Result: WZ beat SZ by 294 runs!