While Saurashtra were still in the middle of their Ranji Trophy final against Bengal in early March 2020, the world was changing in a way no one could have imagined. As Cheteshwar Pujara was shutting the gates, grinding his way to a 237-ball 66, WHO was finally declaring the spread of Covid-19 a “pandemic.” The Indian government was shutting the country’s borders. The BCCI was postponing the season's IPL. In different states at different rates, schools, colleges, malls, theatres, gyms, movie halls and swimming pools were being closed down.
The Saurashtra cricket team after winning the Ranji Trophy. (Saurashtra/Twitter)
On March 13, when Saurashtra was creating history with their first ever Ranji title, India’s unprecedented lockdown was still a week away. The last day’s proceedings on home turf in Rajkot were in fact played behind closed doors, with only the players’ families as witness.
Since that win, everything has changed. One thing that hasn’t is that Saurashtra’s long wait to defend their maiden title has gotten longer. Following the latest surge in Covid cases, the BCCI has postponed the start of Ranji Trophy 2022 until further notice. The pandemic had wiped out any possibility of having Ranji action last year. Earlier, the virus had also put paid to the winners’ hopes of taking on the Rest of India in Irani Trophy.
“Dear red ball, please give me one more chance…I’ll make you proud, promise!” Saurashtra captain Jaydev Unadkat put out an emotional tweet on Wednesday. Unadkat was speaking for every domestic cricketer whose name is overlooked in the moneyed IPL auction room and for whom the lack of Ranji matches means another year without cricket.
“It was hard to digest that there would possibly be one more year without red-ball cricket,” said Unadkat. “I am still coming to terms with it. There is some hope though that if things get better, the BCCI will do their best to host it.”
Unadkat is an IPL regular. But he has a burning ambition to make an India comeback in Test cricket.
“Yes, we have white-ball cricket happening. But, both demand different skills. Lot of us are losing two prime years of our careers. There is lesser talent coming from Ranji trophy. Players in form could lose it,” he said. “But then, there are people who have lost their jobs. This is what Covid has done to us.”
Unadkat had a breakthrough Ranji season in 2019-20, picking up 67 wickets, the most ever by a seamer. With the bat, Sheldon Jackson and Arpit Vasavada—with 809 and 763 season runs respectively—averaged above 50. In a normal world, being leading architects of Ranji success, they would have been rewarded with opportunities against visiting teams to stake claim for the national side.
“That hurt the most. That we lost the momentum,” said Vasavada, who had scored centuries in both the semi-finals and the finals of Ranji. “We could not play Irani and get other opportunities. All the players were in great form.”
For some the pandemic resulted in far worse consequences. Young left-arm pacer Chetan Sakariya lost his father to the disease. Though there was no link to Covid-19, Saurashtra’s promising opener Avi Barot died of a cardiac arrest last October, aged just 29.
“It became extremely difficult at the start of the season after we lost Avi,” said Unadkat. “There were times when players were lost during practice sessions. We actually had to talk about it and get it out of the system. We all felt very emotional.”
While there was no red ball action, the board found a way to conduct domestic white-ball cricket in the past two years. This year, Saurashtra lifted their game to finish semi-finalists in the Vijay Hazare One-Day competition. The responsibility of keeping team spirits high in the team bubble fell on the captain, for there were no swanky team rooms or support groups like in the IPL. Unadkat would make it a point that the team dined together and conducted team bonding activities.
“Once there is cricket, you forget about other things,” said Vasavada. “Like, during the winning Ranji season, I was happy that I was able to get my game where I wanted by scoring a hundred in the final, having been dismissed for 50’s in past two Ranji finals. After that, I focused all my energy on improving my white-ball game. Just when we began developing mental structures for long form cricket again, we have this news. Of course, no one is to blame for this.”
Jackson, who has been prolific in the middle order for two successive seasons, too is frustrated with the lack of match time but is still glad to be home.
"We were to play practice matches on Thursday. But when I came back home (Bhavnagar) from Rajkot, my mother said she was glad that I came back,” Jackson said. “She is much happier to see me at home than go out and play in the prevailing situation. It is better safe than sorry."
Rasesh Mandani loves a straight drive. He has been covering cricket, the governance and business side of sport for close to two decades. He writes and video blogs for HT.
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