2017 Vijay Hazare Trophy: Team of the Tournament
The 2017 Vijay Hazare Trophy came to an end with Tamil Nadu beating Bengal by 37 runs to win the tournament for a record fifth time. Dinesh Karthik’s 112 put TN in a strong position before the bowlers did the job for Vijay Shankar.
The last four weeks saw some enthralling performances with Indian internationals including the likes of MS Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir and Shikhar Dhawan taking part in the tournament.
There were a lot of promising performances throughout the tournament with some players sending out a message to the selectors with their performances. Let us take a look at the team of the tournament featuring the best performers.
Openers
There were quite a few openers in the fray to open the innings in the Vijay Hazare Trophy’s Team of the Tournament. Bengal openers Shreevats Goswami and Abhimanyu Easwaran, Maharashtra’s Ruturaj Gaikwad, Odisha’s Govinda Poddar, Baroda’s Kedar Devdhar were all in contention.
Out of these names, Easwaran and Gaikwad made it to the team. Easwaran was in fine form for Bengal and gave his team a good start throughout the tournament. He scored 472 runs at an average of 59 and is the second highest run scorer only behind Dinesh Karthik.
His 101 in the semi-finals against Jharkhand set the tone for Bengal to put on a huge total on the board and eventually beat them by 41 runs.
On the other hand, Gaikwad ended the tournament as the third best batsman. He was an important member of the Maharashtra outfit in the tournament and gave them a flying start on many occasions. He averaged 64 and scored his 444 runs at a rate of 93 runs every 100 balls.