Hubli: A journey that began 67 years ago, finally ended in success on Saturday with Jammu and Kashmir becoming Ranji Trophy champions for the first time.
The match between the Paras Dogra-led side and Karnataka ended in a draw at the KSCA Hubli Cricket Ground and J&K was declared the winner based on its massive first innings lead.
The victory was particularly sweet as the J&K players outbatted eight-time champion Karnataka for nearly two and a half days.
Dogra declared the second innings at 342/4, following which the captains of both sides agreed to a draw. The entire Jammu and Kashmir squad stormed onto the field thereafter to kickstart historic title celebrations, as reported by News18.
J&K continued to pile on the runs on Saturday, with opener Qamran Iqbal scoring a century after being included in the playing XI as a last-minute replacement for the injured Shubham Khajuria.
Karnataka was aware of the outcome after the fourth da
y of play and did not use their pace spearheads, Prasidh Krishna and Vijaykumar Vyshak, for even a single over on the fifth morning. Karnataka captain Devdutt Padikkal rotated between Shreyas Gopal, Vidyadhar Patil and Shikhar Shetty, and even turned to part-timers K L Rahul and Karun Nair to go through the motions.
The J&K overnight batters showed little urgency, as they calmly negotiated the opening session without any fuss. Iqbal took 28 deliveries to move from 94 to 100, reaching the milestone with a boundary off spinner Gopal. In between, he successfully overturned a caught-behind decision while on 98 after opting for a review.
The team scored 99 runs in 38 overs without losing a wicket in the first session of the day, taking lunch at 285/4 in 95 overs.
Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah and BCCI president Mithun Manhas watched from the stands as Dogra’s men completed the formalities and etched their names in history.
J&K had won the toss and elected to bat. A century from Shubham Pundir and half-centuries from Shail Lotra, Kanhaiya Wadhawan and Dogra powered them to a formidable 584 all out.
Though Karnataka’s batting line-up boasted the likes of Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Karun Nair, Devdutt Padikkal and Ravichandran Smaran – the season’s highest run-getter, the team crumbled to the brilliance of right-arm pacer Auqib Nabi and were bowled out for 293 in 93.3 overs.
Nabi returned figures of 5 for 54 – his seventh five-wicket haul of the season – which also helped him surpass Uttarakhand’s Mayank Mishra to finish as the season’s highest wicket-taker.