Ranji Trophy 2015-16: Rajasthan comes from behind to win a thriller

Ranji Trophy 2015-16: Rajasthan comes from behind to win a thriller: There have been very few instances of a team coming from behind to win a thriller, in the history of Ranji Trophy. One such situation was witnessed in the final league match between Rajasthan and Odisha played at Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur, between 1st and 3rd December 2015.

Rajasthan, led by Pankaj Singh, won the toss and chose to field. Left-arm medium pacers Aniket Choudhary, with a brilliant spell of 14.2-6-27-6 and the skipper Pankaj Singh, with an analysis of 14-2-53-3, were successful in restricting the visitors to 151 runs in their first innings that lasted 52.2 overs.

However, little did they expect that their own batting would collapse like ‘nine pins’, facing the fury of the Odisha pace duo of Alok Chandra Sahoo (13-2-33-6) and Basant Mohanty (14-9-17-4).

Rajasthan could score only 51 runs in their first innings that lasted a mere 27.2 overs in a little over two hours. Only three batsmen, Manender Singh (10), Vineet Saxena (12), and Tanveer-ul-Haq (10) could reach double digits. This has been the second lowest first innings total in the history of Ranji Trophy.

Taking a crucial lead of 100 runs over their opponents, Odisha could manage to score just 129 runs in their second knock. Only Alok Chandra Sahoo (31) and Ranit Singh (30) could come up with some sensible batting with ‘Extras’ (20) being the third highest contributor.

Once again the pacers, Pankaj Singh (15-5-43-4) and Aniket Choudhary (10-1-31-4) put up a brilliant bowling performance. Faced with a target of 230 runs to win the match, Rajasthan batsmen rose to the occasion. Losing the openers cheaply (7/2), Puneet Yadav (59,125m, 75b, 10 fours), Siddharth Dobal (52, 106m, 52b, 7 fours), Rajat Bhatia (31, 164m, 96b, 4 fours) made amends to their first innings failure and helped their team to ‘cross the line’.

Rajasthan scored 231 for the loss of 6 wickets and went on to register a victory, coming from behind. Two useful partnerships, 77 runs for the third wicket between Tanveer-ul-Haq (who was promoted up the order) and Puneet Yadav, and 76 runs for the sixth wicket between Rajat Bhatia and Siddharth Dobal played a crucial role in the victory.

Aniket Choudhary, who ended the match with an excellent analysis of 24.2-7-58-10 was adjudged the Player of the Match.

Rajasthan picked up 6 points from the win, but that was not enough to secure them a place in the knock-out round since they ended the league stage only with 17 points from 8 games – winning 2, losing 3 and drawing 3 matches. They would be contended with the fact that they ended their Ranji season 2015-16 on a winning note.