The game was skewed in favor of Kerala’s team by the combination of Aditya Sarwate and Jalaj Saxena, who shared eight wickets between them.
It was set up for an exciting conclusion. With three wickets remaining, Gujarat needed just 28 runs at the beginning of the last day to surpass the opponent’s 457, making the odds stacked against Kerala. In order to win a slim two-run advantage and earn a spot in its first-ever Ranji Trophy final, the visitor had to work hard.The primary threat was anticipated to be Jalaj Saxena, who took four wickets on the penultimate day. Aditya Sarwate, the team’s other professional, however, emerged with the winning hand.It was always going to come down to the first hour of play. Kerala practiced a lot of close-in catching and wicket-keeping before the game. Players wearing helmets hopped from silly point to short leg and vice versa while the spinners meticulously curated the fields.
Siddharth Desai and Jaymeet Patel have already shown their defensive prowess with a strong 72-run partnership. With some tight bowling, the visitor increased the pressure, giving up only five runs in the day’s opening five overs.
When captain Sachin Baby lost a straightforward catch at short cover off Sarwate’s bowling, it appeared as though Kerala had ruined their chance to dismiss the well-set Jaymeet. But the drop didn’t turn out to be expensive. A few balls later, Sarwate beat the batter’s outside edge to pull Jaymeet forward, and Mohammed Azharuddeen displayed excellent awareness to remove the bails while the batter’s foot was still hanging on the crease.Kerala saw an opportunity after the set batter was out. Every time a ball rapped the pad or beat the bat, there was an uproar of appeals. After a change of ends, Sarwate went on, and when Siddharth was dismissed bat-pad to silly point, it appeared as though he had further dashed Gujarat’s aspirations.
After Gujarat’s review, the UltraEdge check revealed that the bat hitting the ground produced the second sound, which caused the Gujarat dugout to clap a few times when the pictures appeared on the large screen. However, the subsequent ball-tracking check showed three reds, putting Kerala within one wicket of victory.
Eleventh Despite having a shattered left hand, Priyajitsinh Jadeja bravely tried to help his team win the game. Nagwaswalla’s astute strike rotation and a few of outside edges from Priyajitsinh brought the home team within two runs of Kerala’s total. Gujarat, who had more points than Kerala during the group stage, would have advanced to the final if the first innings had been drawn. Kerala brought in all of its fielders because they only had one run to spare. Nagwaswalla saw his chance to give the home team the victory by hitting a ball over the infield.To send the Kerala players into a frenzy, the left-arm bowler slog-swept a Sarwate delivery onto the legside, but it bounced off the helmet of short-leg fielder Salman Nizar and then settled securely in Sachin’s hands at slip. In jubilation, Saxena raised Salman’s helmet, the hero of the last dismissal, high in the air.
Kerala only needed to bat out the remaining overs till the inevitable draw to secure its first-ever berth in the final because they were ahead by the slimmest of margins. Saxena maintained composure with a 37-run effort to take the side to 114 for four in 46 overs when the ceremonial handshake came around, but Gujarat’s spinners refused to give up and managed to capture four wickets after lunch to keep themselves in the game.
