Orissa defeat Bengal, qualify for Wills Trophy

Orissa qualified for the Wills Trophy after 16 years, defeating Bengal by eight wickets in their final East Zone Ranji Trophy one day league match at the Eden Gardens today. As a result, Orissa finished with eight points, sufficient for them to make it to the Wills Trophy.

It was a wrong decision by the Bengal think-tank that proved disastrous for the hosts. After winning the toss, Bengal decided to bat on a pitch that had a lot of life in the initial period, an advantage that was used to the hilt by Debashis Mohanty and Ajoy Barik. Bengal lost their first seven wickets within 20 runs and the match was as good as over during the first hour of the game. The decision to bat was all the more surprising because only on Saturday, Bengal skipper Devang Gandhi had said they would like to chase. It was the grave error in reading the pitch that prevented the finalists of 1998 from qualifying this season.

Bengal managed to reach three figures only because of a doughty knock from Wrichik Mazumdar. He scored 37 in 80 balls and with Shiv Sagar Singh added 42 runs for the ninth wicket. Before that, it was simply a tale of going and coming back. The slide started when the Orissa wicket-keeper Gautam Gopal took an excellent catch on the leg side to dismiss makeshift opener Lakshmi Ratan Shukla off the bowling of Barik. Then Mohanty got into the act. With his outswinger working nicely, Mohanty cartwheeled Nikhil Haldipur and Rohan Gavaskar. Barik on the other hand had Gandhi hooking, only to find the fielder at square leg. Bengal had then been reduced to only nine runs for four wickets. Mohanty then once more produced a lovely break back to bowl Deep Dasgupta in his third over. Then in his fifth over he had Utpal Chatterjee playing on and with the fifth delivery of the same over, had Sanjiv Sanyal edging to keeper Gopal. Bengal at this stage, were 20 for seven. Srikkant Kalyani, Mazumdar and Singh managed to take the total to over 100. However, that would not have been possible had not the Orissa team given away 25 extras, 20 of which came from wides and no balls.

When Orissa batted, BBCC Mahapatra was bowled by Shukla trying to pull a ball that kept low. Immediately after lunch, Shukla had Gopal caught at point with a ball that bounced a bit more. However, Sanjay Raul batting with elan on a pitch that had dried up, quietly guided Orissa to victory without a fuss. His driving within the `V' was a treat to watch. He remained unbeaten on 42 with five fours. With Pradip Das, the other opener, Raul added 78 runs to take Orissa to a convincing win.