COIMBATORE: It was always going to be the deciding contest. It's between two of the best batters against spin against the best spinner in the tournament. West Zone's Sarfaraz Khan and Shreyas Iyer versus Sai Kishore of South Zone. That Basil Thampi and VC Stephen had run through the West Zone’s top-order (16/3) on Day one of the Duleep Trophy final at Sri Ramakrishna Arts and Science College Ground, Coimbatore, had set up the contest nicely.
Even as Sai Kishore was introduced in the eleventh over, Hanuma Vihari operated pacers from the other end, attacking Shreyas with hard-length. Shreyas took to the age-old phrase — attack is the best form of defence — and pounced on anything that wasn’t a short-pitched delivery. There were on-the-raise drives, lofts, flicks to break the shackles. At the other end, Sarfaraz was holding forte, not playing away from the body.
The real challenge was how the duo dealt with Sai Kishore. The left-arm spinner was just coming off a 10-wicket haul in the semifinal. But for Shreyas, facing spin was an opportunity to attack. He has dominated spinners all through his first-class career — the strike rate of 80.27 is testament to it. He welcomed Sai Kishore with an inside-out loft over cover for a six. Slowly, they were rebuilding.
The field was spread out on the off-side for Shreyas and kept inside for Sarfaraz as Sai Kishore varied his lines and lengths. He bowled a bit back of length on middle-stump, forcing Shreyas to go on back foot. Dot balls started piling up and the left-arm spinner eventually won the contest, deceiving Shreyas (37) with his pace. A miscued loft over cover and Indrajith completed the rest as the celebrations broke.
Immediately, Vihari had five catching fielders around for Het Patel and Sarfaraz as Sai Kishore continued yet another marathon spell. For Sarfaraz, he was a lot quicker, not letting him get under or go on the back foot. At one point, the Mumbaikar launched a counterattack, hitting off-spinner K Gowtham for back-to-back boundaries. He tried the same against Sai Kishore, pulling out the sweep shot. But off the very next delivery, a slightly shorter length from the spinner meant, it took the top-edge and, once again, Indrajith did the rest at short fine-leg.
Speaking about the contest and his variation in lengths to the two batters, Sai Kishore said, “I think that is the beauty of the sport, it’ll be the same ball that you are bowling but there are finer nuances that you have to just change for each batter.”From there on, West Zone slumped to 167/8 before Patel, along with Jaydev Unadkat rescued them to 250/8. The Gujarat wicketkeeper-batter was unbeaten on 96 at the end of day’s play on Wednesday.
While Patel almost single-handedly put West Zone back in control in the last session, the cat and mouse game between the two Mumbai batters and the TN spinner was the contest of the day. And before signing off, Sai Kishore assured that there is more to come on Day two, this time, against the star with the bat — Het Patel.
Brief scores: West Zone 250/8 in 90 overs (Het Patel 96 batting; Sai Kishore 3/80) vs South Zone.