Ranji Trophy 2017-18, Final, Day 1: Dhruv Shorey makes up for Gautam Gambhir's failure
The highly anticipated Ranji Trophy final between Delhi and Vidarbha began today at the Holkar Stadium in Indore.
After winning the toss and electing to bowl first, Vidarbha debutant Aditya Thakare removed Kunal Chandela early in the innings. Shortly after that, Akshay Wakhare got the prized wicket of Gautam Gambhir.
Delhi looked in deep trouble at one point in time but were revived by Dhurv Shorey's heroics, who scored a magnificent century.
He put on a 105-run partnership for the fifth wicket along with Himmat Singh, who scored a quickfire half-century. Earlier in the innings, Rishabh Pant got off to a good start but was unable to convert it into a big score as he was dismissed by semifinal hero Rajneesh Gurbani while looking to slash a delivery outside off-stump.
Gurbani picked up the wicket of Himmat as well, just when he was looking extremely dangerous. Thakare too picked up two wickets while Wakhare ended with one.
Delhi ended the day with 271 runs on the board for the loss of six wickets. With not much batting left in their line-up, Shorey and Vikas Mishra will look to put on another 100-150 runs and make it extremely hard for Vidarbha to achieve a first innings lead.
Vidarbha, on the other hand, will look to bowl Delhi out as soon as possible and hope to get the vital first-innings lead. The first-time finalists did not miss the presence of experienced campaigner Umesh Yadav as the other bowlers were able to get the job done.
Yadav is on his way to South Africa along with Ishant Sharma, who will be missed by Delhi.
With the pitch offering a lot to both the batsmen and the bowlers, we could expect the match to have a result, rather than see one of the sides lift the trophy due to a first-innings lead.
With this match, Rishabh Pant becomes the youngest (20 years, 86 days) to captain a team in the Ranji Trophy final as he overtook Sachin Tendulkar, who was 21 years and 337 days when he captained Mumbai in the 1994/95 final against Punjab.