Ranji Trophy: Bad light costs TN yet again; Sai rues conceding late runs

When Tamil Nadu started chasing a total of 145 in the fourth innings against hosts Delhi and it needed to achieve that in a maximum of 17 overs, the hearts of the people present at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Feroz Shah Kotla, started racing. The visitors, thanks to a quickfire start by their openers reached 30 in the first three overs and then 54/3 in the first six overs. 91 runs were needed from 66 balls.

With the Bazball in trend and Tamil Nadu team being one of the great exponents of white ball cricket, the chance of a thrilling win for the visitors was very likely. Fans feared yet another bad outing for the home team. It was then that the sun saved the day for Delhi as the match was halted after six overs and then eventually stopped due to bad light.

It was deja vu for the team from down south as this was the second match out of three where bad light stopped play and thwarted chances of a win for them. Earlier, in a match against Hyderabad, Tamil Nadu needed 144 in 11 overs on the last day and they reached 108/1 in seven overs. Bad light stopped play as Baba Inderjith-led side needed only 36 runs from the last four overs.

Ravi Sai Kishore, who was one of the chief architects of what could have been a great win for the 2014-15 Ranji Trophy runners-up, said that they missed out on a win by giving away too many runs in the third innings.

“We gave too many runs in the middle. We could have contained the Delhi batters when they were five for 209,” Sai told the Business Standard after the match. Delhi resumed their second innings from an overnight score of 27/1 and courtesy of dogged innings from Dhruv Shorey (70) and veteran Vaibhav Rawal (95*), reached 262 even as Washington Sundar (4/43) and Sai Kishore (2/53) made scoring difficult on a turning fourth-day pitch of Kotla.

Talking about the decision of the umpires to halt the match due to bad light, Sai Kishore, who took the wickets of Delhi skipper Yash Dhull and Himmat Singh said, “We gave our best. The umpires had to make the call because of the benchmark set on day one and on all days the match wasn’t played much beyond 16:30 hrs. So, we can’t blame it on the light. We needed to contain Delhi a bit earlier.”

Tamil Nadu, who have not reached a Ranji Trophy final since 2014-15, have not had an outright win so far this season and lie in sixth place on the points table of Elite Group B. Only the top two teams from each group move to the quarterfinals. The next assignment of the side is against Mumbai, who are the table toppers.

“We are excited for the next game and having given our best in this one, we are confident of playing a great game again,” said Sai, who has so far taken 16 wickets and is the joint leading wicket-taker for his side.

For Delhi, it was yet another game that they would like to forget and move on from. In the three matches that the seven times Ranji Trophy champions have played this year, they have not been able to even take first innings lead in any of them. This was their first home game and even in this match, they could earn only a single point. They next play Saurashtara away at Rajkot.

Brief Scores:

Delhi 1st Innings- 303 (Dhruv Shorey- 67, L Vignesh 4-50)

Tamil Nadu 1st Innings- 427-8 Declared (Pradosh Paul- 124, Harshit Rana 3-121)

Delhi 2nd Innings- 262 (Vaibhav Rawal- 95*, Washington Sundar 4-43)

Tamil Nadu 2nd Innings- 54/3 ( B Sai Sudahrsan-24, Kuldip Yadav 2-27)