Vidyut Sivaramakrishnan cracks 115 at No 11
It is not often that a No 11 batsman gets a hundred in first class cricket
Santhosh S
12-Mar-2001
It is not often that a No 11 batsman gets a hundred in first class cricket.
And in 67 years of the Ranji Trophy competition, no player going in last
had reached the three figure mark - until Sunday. The record score had been
held by S Mubarak Ali who scored 90 for Nawanagar against Bengal way back
in 1936-37. In the process, he and Yadvendrasinhji added 138 runs, a record
in the national competition that stood for 47 years. On Sunday, at the
picturesque IIT-Chemplast ground in Chennai, Vidyut Sivaramakrishnan
created Ranji history by scoring 115 in the Ranji Trophy pre quarterfinal
against Delhi.
At the fall of the ninth wicket, Vidyut, the junior India left-arm
spinner, walked out to join the young MR Shrinivas. Delhi captain Vijay
Dahiya persisted with spin to get the last wicket. What followed was
history. The left handed Vidyut made 115 off just 122 balls, striking 17
boundaries and three huge sixes out of the ground. In one over from
Virendra Shewag, he smashed three fours and a six, as the Delhi players
hung their heads in disbelief. By the time the fast bowlers were called in
to the attack, Vidyut was in full flow, pulling and hooking the short
stuff bowled at him. He got to his hundred with a hook shot to long leg,
where Amit Suman dropped the easy catch to give away two runs.
While Vidyut had his moment of glory, the unsung hero at the other end was
Shrinivas who played with a lot of responsibility to make an unbeaten 42
off 141 balls with four strokes past the ropes. It was his assuring knock
that helped Vidyut to go on the rampage. By the time, the reliable Delhi
seamer, Robin Singh Jr, bowled Vidyut, the two batsmen had added 158 runs
for the last wicket to take Tamil Nadu to an imposing 592 runs. The only
higher last wicket stand in the national competition is 233 between Ajay
Sharma and Maninder Singh for Delhi against Bombay in 1991-92.
List of Centuries by No. 11 batsmen
106* TJ Hastings Victoria v South Australia Melbourne 1902-1903
112* A Fielder Kent v Worcestershire Stourbridge 1909
126 WC Smith MCC v Barbados Bridgetown 1912-1913
101 AER Gilligan Cambridge Univ v Sussex Hove 1919
100* Ahsan-ul-Haq Muslims v Sikhs Lahore 1923-1924
121 SN Banerjee India v Surrey The Oval 1946
163 TPB Smith Essex v Derbyshire Chesterfield 1947
109* Maqsood Kundi Muslim Com Bank v Nat Bank Karachi 1981-1982
115* GB Stevenson Yorkshire v Warwickshire Birmingham 1982
115 S Vidyut Tamil Nadu v Delhi Chennai 2000-2001