Mumbai march into 47th Ranji Trophy final, to face Madhya Pradesh

Bengaluru: Domestic giants Mumbai completed the formality of qualifying for the Ranji Trophy final by virtue of first innings lead on the final day of their lastfour match against Uttar Pradesh, here on Saturday. The 41-time champions, Mumbai thoroughly dominated from the first ball of the game, which ended in a draw, at the Just Cricket Academy ground.

Mumbai had posted 393 in their first innings and then bundled out Uttar Pradesh for a meagre 180, to gain a massive first-innings lead. When play ended on the fourth day on Friday, Mumbai had piled up a mammoth 449 for 4 in their second essay, courtesy of hundreds by Yashasvi Jaiswal and Armaan Jaffer. At stumps of Day 4, Mumbai took an overall lead of 662 runs, making it amply clear that there was only one result possible from the match.

On Saturday, play began after lunch due to wet outfield and overnight batters Sarfaraz Khan and Shams Mulani continued to torment the UP bowlers. Both Sarfaraz (59 not out) and Mulani (51 not out) completed their half-centuries, after which both the captains decided to shake hands. Mumbai posted 533 for 4 in their second essay. Sarfaraz hit one boundary and three sixes, while Mulani hammered six fours.

Mumbai will meet Madhya Pradesh in the final, which will be played at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium from June 22. The final will be a battle between two former Mumbai players Amol Mazumdar and Chandrakant Pandit, who are coaches of Mumbai and MP respectively.

Brief scores: Madhya Pradesh 341 (Himanshu Mantri 165, Akshat Raghuwanshi 63; Mukesh Kumar 4-66) & 281 (Aditya Shrivastava 82, Rajat Patidar 79; Shahbaz Ahmed 5-79) beat Bengal 273 (Shahbaz Ahmed 116, Manoj Tiwary 102; Puneet Datey 3-48) & 175 (Abhimanyu Easwaran 78; Kumar Kartikeya 5-67, Gaurav Yadav 3-19) by 174 runs.