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On Sunday, September 22, Shreyas Iyer-led India D steamrolled India B to register their first win of the tournament at the Rural Development Trust Stadium B in Anantapur. Ricky Bhui was declared the Player of the Match for scoring a valuable 56 in the first innings and an unbeaten 124-ball 119 in the second innings. With this win, India D jumped to third place with solitary win and two losses and six points to their name in the domestic cricket tournament, Duleep Trophy 2024.
After winning the toss, the India B captain, Abhimanyu Easwaran, decided to put India D into batting first. On the back of fifty-plus scores from the India D top order consisting of Devdutt Padikkal (50), Srikar Bharat (52) and Ricky Bhui (56) and a century from wicketkeeper-batter Sanju Samson (106), the side posted 349 runs. For the bowling side, Navdeep Saini stood out, scalping five wickets while Rahul Chahar claimed three wickets and Mukesh Kumar finished with a wicket.
Arshdeep Singh claims six wickets; Aditya Thakare picks four in India D’s victory
In response, the first innings of India B was below par to say the least as they were bundled out of 282 runs with Saurabh Kumar picking five wickets, whereas Arshdeep Singh and Aditya Thakare picked three and two wickets respectively, despite captain Abhimanyu Easwaran’s 116 and a crucial knock of 86 from Washington Sundar. With a first innings lead of 67 runs, India D ran riot with the bat in hand with Ricky Bhui notching up a hundred, while the captain Shreyas Iyer got fifty.
India D added 305 runs to their lead, to set up a massive 372-run target for India B to chase down in the final innings of the Duleep Trophy 2024 match. The India B captain could not carry forward the momentum from their first innings as he departed at the score of 19. Apart from Nitish Reddy’s unbeaten 40-run knock, none of the India B batters stood up in the run-chase, eventually bundling out at the score of 115 in 22.2 overs.
India D’s Arshdeep Singh and Aditya Thakare run riot with the ball as they together took 10 wickets and led the side to a comprehensive victory by 257 runs.
