Defending champions Vidarbha Ranji team won their second consecutive Ranji trophy 2018-19 edition by 78 runs from Saurashtra Ranji team on Thursday. Faiz Fazal led Vidarbha ceased Saurashtra at 127 runs in the final of the Ranji Trophy.
The match which was played at the Vidarbha Cricket Association in Nagpur displayed a brilliant performance by both the teams and in the end Vidarbha who have not lost a single game for the last two seasons, took only one session on Day 5 to lift the coveted domestic trophy for the second consecutive time.
Vidarbha’s left-arm orthodox spinner, Aditya Sarwate was named as the Man of the Match. He took 11 wickets but more importantly, he nullified the threat of Cheteshwar Pujara by dismissing him in both the innings at a score of 1 and 0 respectively.
Vidarbha set the 206-run target which proved to be a heck of a target for Saurashtra as they succumbed for just 127 runs. The match started on Sunday, February 3 at Vidarbha Cricket Association. Batting-first Vidarbha scored 312 runs in their first innings. Akshay Karnewar scored unbeaten 73 runs and he was accompanied by the wicketkeeper-batsman Akshay Wadkar who scored 45 runs. Saurashtra captain Jaydev Unadkat took 3-wickets in the first innings.
In response, Saurashtra’s opener Snell Patel displayed a brilliant inning by scoring 102 runs and Jaydev Unadkat’s 46 runs took the team’s total at 307 runs. Aditya Sarwate took 5-wicket haul while Akshay Wakhre took 4 wickets.
In the second innings, it looked difficult to rotate the strike as Saurashtra’s DA Jadeja took 6 wickets which helped them to cease Vidarbha at a below-par score of 200 runs and posted a target of 206 runs. Vidarbha’s Akshay Sarwate scored 49 runs before getting lbw out by Jadeja.
Sarwate who already contributed with the bat in the second innings later stripped down Saurashtra’s batting lineup by taking 6 wickets. Vishvaraj Jadeja scored 52 runs during the chase which was the highest for Saurashtra.
