Vijay Hazare Trophy – Sheldon Jackson and Chirag Jani play starring roles as Saurashtra beat Maharashtra

Saurashtra 249 for 5 (Jackson 133*, Desai 50, Jani 30*, Ostwal 2-20, Choudhary 2-38) beat Maharashtra 248 for 9 (Gaikwad 108, Kazi 37, Shaikh 31*, Jani 3-43) by five wickets

Satyajeet Bachhav’s third over truly got the best out of Jackson, who charged down to hit the left-arm spinner straight over his head on successive balls before a misfield at sweeper cover got him another boundary. He brought up his half-century off 66 balls and Desai followed him by getting there in 61 balls.

But with Jackson getting to a 116-ball century and stitching a 36-ball 42 run partnership for the fourth wicket with Vasavada, Saurashtra managed to keep their noses in front.

Ostwal sent back Vasavada for his second wicket, and Bachhav got rid of Prerak Mankad immediately after, and when Jani joined Jackson in the middle, Saurashtra were still 57 adrift. But the pair put the pressure back on Maharashtra and knocked off the runs needed with 21 balls to spare. Fittingly, it was Jackson who hit a six and a four to finish the job.

In nippy conditions in the morning, Jaydev Unadkat and Kushang Patel kept the Maharashtra openers quiet – Gaikwad and Pavan Shah couldn’t find the boundaries but also found strike-rotation difficult. It led to Pavan attempting a risky single after flicking Unadkat to midwicket to be run-out courtesy a direct hit from Jani.

The battle of the morning was between Unadkat and Gaikwad, both experienced players fighting inch for inch with neither giving any. After a four-over spell, Unadkat changed ends and thought he had Gaikwad caught behind, but the umpire was unmoved. He gave away just one run in the two overs after changing ends and after his first two spells, his figures read 6-1-5-0. That also involved a mean bouncer that hit Bachhav on the helmet.

Gaikwad, meanwhile, struggled to get going as Maharashtra crawled to 18 for 1 at the ten-over mark. He was on 10 off 45 balls before he hit is first four – a sweep over backward square-leg off Dharmendrasinh Jadeja. A couple of overs later, he pulled fast bowler Kushang over square leg.

He took on Jadeja in the process, hitting the left-arm spinner on the off side repeatedly. He scored his third century a row with back-to-back sixes off Jani before a run-out brought a tame end to his knock. Maharashtra couldn’t accelerate much after that, and Jani’s hat-trick – Saurabh Nawale, Hangargekar and Ostwal his victims – in the penultimate over made them stop well short of a par score.

The win enhanced Unadkat’s credentials as captain; he had led Saurashtra to their first Ranji Trophy title in 2019-2020. He also finished at the top of the wicket-taking charts in the Vijay Hazare Trophy with 19 strikes to his name.