Jasprit Bumrah’s magnificent six-wicket haul took Gujarat to only their second Ranji Trophy final in history. At the start of the day’s play in Nagpur, Parthiv Patel’s side had a lot of ground to make up: they had a slender lead to fall back on and Shahbaz Nadeem was running riot with his left-arm spin.

Manpreet Juneja (81) and Chirag Gandhi (51) gave Gujarat a respectable score of 235 to defend. The task became tougher with Rush Kalaria unable to take the field. Bumrah, along with veteran RP Singh, regularly made inroads. Jharkhand’s shot selection was also questionable on occasions. Gujarat romped to a 123-run win, and will make their first final appearance in 66 years.

Over in Rajkit, Tamil Nadu skipper Abhinav Mukund (122), who has had a memorable season, led from the front once again with a fluent hundred. It was the other centurion, Baba Indrajith (138), who provided the fireworks, though. Mumbai bowlers were carted around Rajkot.

It must have taken many by surprise when Mukund made a brave declaration at the tail-end of the day’s play. Mumbai were 5/0 in pursuit of 251.

Bumrah’s finest domestic hour

The story of Gujarat’s season so far has been that so many of their players have come to the party when the side has been in trouble. Priyank Panchal may be a cut above the rest with his run-glut, but Gujarat’s bowlers have taken turns to turn on the style too.

With Kalaria sitting out and having to defend a modest score of 235, Gujarat had their task cut out. Nadeem (5/69) yet again sparkled for Jharkhand and it was largely due to the rearguard efforts of Juneja and Gandhi that Gujarat were in with a chance.

Bumrah had other ideas. The 22-year-old made up for his below-par display in the first innings with regular breakthroughs, never allowing the Jharkhand batsmen to settle down. At 27/4, the the tide had turned firmly in Gujarat’s favour. The finals nails in the coffin of the first-time semi-finalists came when star batsman Ishan Kishan and Kaushal Singh departed.

RP Singh and Bumrah kept coming at the batsmen and skittled Jharkhand out for 111. The left-armer finished with a rich match haul of 9/125. Bumrah finished with figures of 6/29.

Indrajith and Mukund make merry

Rajkot is widely known to have acted as a death knell for many a bowler’s reputation over the years. On the contrary, the runs have not been easy to come by in this encounter.

The Mumbai attack, which impressed in the first innings, were picked apart by a determined Mukund and Indrajith, who stockpiled 185 runs for the second wicket. Their scoring rate, which was a tad in excess of four runs an over, was something the 41-time champions struggled to cope with.

Mukund dropped anchor at one end while Indrajith was free-flowing and slammed a flurry of boundaries. None of the Mumbai bowlers did enough to stem the flow of runs.

Tamil Nadu have challenged the Mumbai batsmen to go after a 251-run target on day five. Mukund’s young pace attack have their sternest test so far.

Brief scores:

  • Tamil Nadu 305 (Baba Indrajith 64, Vijay Shankar 50; Abhishek Nayar 4/66, Shardul Thakur 4/75) and 356/6 declared (Baba Indrajith 138, Abhinav Mukund 122; Balwinder Sandhu 2/67) lead Mumbai 406 (Aditya Tare 83, Suryakumar Yadav 73; Shankar 4/59) & 5/0 by 246 runs.
  • Gujarat 390 (Priyank Panchal 149, Parthiv Patel 62; Ajay Yadav 3/67, Rahul Shukla 3/71) and 252 (Manpreet Juneja 81, Chirag Gandhi 51; Shahbaz Nadeem 5/69) beat Jharkhand 408 (Ishank Jaggi 129, Ishan Kishan 61, RP Singh 6/90) & 111 (Kaushal Singh 24; Jasprit Bumrah 6/29, RP Singh 3/25) by 123 runs.