Rajesh Dhar
JAMMU, Oct 23: Unpredictable Jammu and Kashmir will lock horns with strong and well-knit Gujarat in the Ranji Trophy Group-B four day match at Surat in Gujarat from tomorrow.
Gujarat being the defending Ranji Trophy champion, have a galaxy of good performers in their kitty, while on the other hand, whimsical Jammu and Kashmir possesses some champion players, who can help their team to beat the best on their day.
Jammu and Kashmir in their two outings this season, earned valuable 3 points against formidable Rajasthan, besides suffering a thrashing by an innings and 212 runs against clinical Saurashtra, who were having the services of Test cricketers Ravindra Jadeja, Cheteshwar Pujara and Robin Uthapa and not to talk of explosive batsman Sheldon Jackson, while on the other hand, Gujarat played against Kerala and defeated them out-rightly by 4 wickets.
On the bowling front, Gujarat will be relying on spinners Piyush Chawla and Sidharth Desai, besides medium pacers Mehul Patel and Chintan Gaja, on the other hand, Jammu and Kashmir will heavily rely on speedster Mohammad Mudhasir and spinning trio of off-spinner Parvez Rasool, left-arm spinner Amir Aziz and right-arm leg-spinner Manik Gupta, if at all, he gets the nod of the team management.
Though, in the batting department, J&K have a reliable, young and promising opening pair of Shubham Khajuria and Ahmad Omar Banday in their kitty, to be followed by a strong middle-order in the form of Ian Dev Singh, skipper Parvez Rasool, Punit Bisht, Pranav Gupta and Bandeep Singh, yet they will still rely on their batting mainstays in Ian and Rasool to deliver, in order to create ripples in the rival camp. However, Gujarat have a strong batting line-up in openers Samit Gohel and Priyank Panchal, with skipper Parthiv Patel and Manpreet Juneja in the middle-order.
Though, one gets a feeling that Gujarat will certainly enjoy a slight edge over Jammu and Kashmir, yet J&K have a bunch of talented players, who are a class act when on song. Moreover, Jammu and Kashmir will have the confidence of registering an out-right victory over Goa at this ground last season.
Cricket, being the game of glorious uncertainties, so predicting anything will be like flogging a dead-horse. No-doubt, it will be a testing time for J&K team and if they hold their nerves in the crunch situations, they can make a match of it.
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