Ranji Trophy Highlights, Delhi vs Railways: Delhi bowl Railways out for 241, Kohli-crazy crowd in Delhi made to wait

Elsewhere, it was a good day for former Indian team stalwarts Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane. Pujara headed into stumps at 95*, and Rahane on 83*. Kohli will be looking to match the efforts of his former teammates.

The focus is on the national capital where Delhi are taking on Railways and playing for the former is an old warhorse. The last time Virat Kohli turned up for a cricket match as a Delhi player, his teammates included Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir among others. The former India captain will be looking to shake off some of the poor form he is going through in red-ball cricket in his first Ranji Trophy match in over a decade.

The seventh and final round of the Ranji Trophy 2024-25 season group stage is set to commence today, with plenty to draw the attention of domestic cricket savants and those looking to follow along with the fortunes of international Indian team stars alike. With 16 matches set to take place across the country across the four groups, there will be no scarcity of action and intrigue, especially as the race for the quarterfinal spots reaches its climax.

There will also be a lot of focus on the performances of India’s stars after a relatively timid showing last time out, with Ravindra Jadeja and Shubman Gill earning some credit with 12 wickets and a century respectively, but Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Rishabh Pant all disappointing with the bat. These stars will expect immediate bounce-back in this round, more and more acclimatised to their return to Ranji cricket, but the main focus will be on Virat Kohli as he boots up for Delhi for the first time since 2012.

Beginning with Group A, Jammu and Kashmir sealed their progression to the quarters with a historic and memorable victory in Mumbai, beating home favourites with a strong performance across the board that pushed them to the top of the group standings. However, Mumbai are still in with a chance following Baroda’s heavy loss to Maharashtra: Mumbai face lowly Meghalaya, who have lost all six of their matches and are likely to be relegated to the Plate division.

Mumbai will expect maximum points, and a strong chance for Rohit and co. to bounce back under captaincy of Ajinkya Rahane. Mumbai, however, will need another helping hand, this time hoping J&K can beat Baroda and lend their star-studded team a favour.

The match of the week comes from Group B, where Vidarbha’s bounce-back win against Rajasthan saw them go comfortably top of the group, leaving two teams to slug it out for second place. Gujarat are in a position of strength, five points ahead of their opponents in the final round, Himachal Pradesh, who suffered a chastening defeat at the hands of Hyderabad. It is a straightforward equation for Himachal: win and they are through. Even if they draw, it won’t be enough, and Gujarat will go through. Set up to be a barnstormer.

Further down the group, one subplot of interest will be the performance of Hyderabad opener Tanmay Agarwal, who is leading the run-scoring charts but under pressure from an in-form player in Madhya Pradesh captain Shubham Sharma. Tanmay sits on 792, with Sharma behind on 713, and this is a race that could get interesting.

In Group D, there are mathematically four teams in the hunt with nobody’s progression guaranteed. However, with Kerala facing bottom-placed Bihar, they will expect to handle their business and progress, leaving the other teams to fight it out. A seven-point win for Karnataka against current first-placed Haryana will be enough to see them through on quotient, but six won’t be enough.

Bolstered by the return of KL Rahul, who will likely open the batting alongside Mayank Agarwal in another powerful opening combination, Karnataka will be hoping that Bihar can pull off an upset against Kerala and make the equation slightly easier. Still, a tough task, and Haryana and Kerala will remain heavy favourites to progress from this group.

Finally, the most tightly packed of all the groups, in Group D. Tamil Nadu sit top with 25 points, but the next five teams are separated by just five points. It is a difficult group to make predictions for: the winner of Railways vs Delhi will need favours from other teams to help them pull through. Chandigarh, meanwhile, face off against Chhattisgarh, and will have a slight one-point advantage ahead of Jadeja and Pujara’s Saurashtra, who have a dogged Assam to contend with. If both teams find themselves frustrated, the door opens for Railways to qualify with a win, although even that might not be enough for Delhi or Jharkhand.

All in all, an enticing and thrilling round of fixtures coming up, that will take shape early and provide the narrative for the rest of the week. 32 teams in the competition, but soon there will only be eight.