Mumbai beat Bengal by 132 runs at the Wankhede Stadium to win their 37th Ranji Title (and 7th in the last 14 seasons). All things considered, Mumbai’s performance was about par – with the India players making all the difference. Apart from a brief period when Ganguly and Tiwari (Dada and chota-Dada if the grapewine is to be believed!) were at the crease. Rohan Gavaskar threatened briefly, but once he left, it was a matter of time. Bengal tried to make a match of it, but after their first innings debacle, it was always going to be too difficult.
What this Ranji Trophy game did show was a glimpse of what the Ranji Trophy can be – if it is expanded and if the Duleep Trophy becomes a viable contest (instead of the knockout farce that it is today). First class cricket will not be played in India until October now. So there is no first class cricket played in India from February to October! The weather definitely does not define this season. With more Ranji matches, you would have more opportunities for India players to participate, and you would have a greater opportunity to sort of up coming talent. Manoj Tiwari and Ranadeb Bose have come to the fore this year. One other important thing that an expanded domestic cricket schedule will do (especially if it is televised), is that it will provide more information to the average Indian about cricket. This will hopefully lead to more informed, and less filmy positions about cricket (Chappell getting assaulted apparently because Orissa wasn’t represented in the Indian side, Kaif’s home being attacked etc etc). If you really think about it, for the profile that cricket has in India, an astonishing little amount of it is actually played in the public eye.
The high profile match has also brought to the fore shortcomings in ground facilities for spectators, which must be embarassing for the MCA, what with the 2011 World Cup Final scheduled to be played at the Wankhede Stadium.
This blog has a superb set of posts on the Ranji Final and Mumbai Cricket. Do have a look at it……
Kartikeyadate's Weblog 
February 6, 2007 at 4:03 am
Thanks much for the referral Kartikeya.. Much appreciated :).
A couple of points on this post –
1. The Super League now has 15 teams leading to lop sided contests. What we need is a smaller pool in the Super League, not bigger. Let the Top 12 teams play each other in 2 pools or the top 8 teams play each other in a round robin format.
2. The hiatus between Feb and Oct is a good thing, if the selectors plan to leverage it. The A team concept can be revived ( and a B team too if needed) and this time gap between seasons can be used to either tour abroad or have home games.
3. I was not too flash about Sachin and Zaheer showing up for the finals. Wasim and Ajit had played in the earlier rounds and so not too much against them, but I would have loved to see the XV who got Mumbai this far to have been pitted against Bengal. Would have been a fair contest and would have given us a better idea of just how good the revamped Mumbai team is.
I thik Mumbai would have done good 🙂
Cheers,
Homer