A season for Karnataka's batsmen and seamers

Stats highlights from the 2013-14 season of the Ranji Trophy, which Karnataka won to notch their seventh win in the tournament

S Rajesh

03-Feb-2014

Abhimanyu Mithun celebrates the wicket of Mohammad Kaif, Central Zone v South Zone, Duleep Trophy semi-final, Chennai, 1st day, October 10, 2013

Only Mumbai (or Bombay) have won the Ranji Trophy more times than Karnataka. They have 40 titles, and four runner-up finishes. Karnataka are in joint second place with Delhi, who've also won seven times. Before their victory this season, they'd last won in 1998-99 and in 1997-98. Their other title triumphs came in 1973-74, 1977-78, 1982-83 and 1995-96. (Click here for the full list of Ranji winners and runners-up.)

Karnataka were the only team to win seven matches this season - they won seven and drew four. Coming into the final, Maharashtra hadn't lost a match either, but defeat in the final meant they ended with a 6-1 record. Apart from Karnataka, the only team which didn't lose a single match this season was Hyderabad - they played eight games, won one, and drew the other seven.

Among the eight teams which reached the quarter-finals, Maharashtra had the best batting average by far, but their bowling average was the poorest. They were the only team to average more than 40 with the bat - their average of 47.29 was well clear of Karnataka's 39.09, though Karnataka completely outbatted them in the final. In the 11 matches Maharashtra played, seven times they scored more than 400, compared to five in 11 games by Karnataka. With the ball, though, Maharashtra conceded 30.63 per wicket, compared to 27.82 for Karnataka. Among the top eight teams, only Railways had a better bowling average.

Karnataka, though, were the team with the most centuries this season: they managed 15, two more than Maharashtra, while Saurashtra and Hyderabad had ten each. Three Karnataka batsmen - KL Rahul, Karun Nair and Manish Pandey - scored three hundreds each. Among their bowlers, Abhimanyu Mithun led the way with 41 wickets at 24, while Vinay Kumar took 29 at 24.68. For Maharashtra Kedar Jadhav scored six hundreds and was the overall leading run-scorer in the tournament with 1223 runs at 87.35, while Harshad Khadiwale was the third-highest run-getter with 1004, next only to Jadhav and Rahul. None of the others touched 1000 for the season.

How the top 8 teams fared in Ranji Trophy 2013-14
Team	Matches	W/ L	Bat ave	Bowl ave	100s/ 50s	5WI/ 10WM
Karnataka	11	7/ 0	39.09	27.82	15/ 20	7/ 1
Maharashtra	11	6/ 1	47.29	30.63	13/ 26	4/ 3
Punjab	10	5/ 2	30.05	28.03	8/ 19	7/ 0
Bengal	9	3/ 1	27.76	28.74	6/ 16	3/ 2
J&K	9	4/ 3	29.44	29.97	4/ 22	8/ 0
Mumbai	9	4/ 2	29.80	27.87	8/ 14	5/ 2
Railways	9	3/ 1	30.64	26.91	7/ 19	7/ 1
Uttar Pradesh	9	2/ 2	32.77	30.03	7/ 16	5/ 0

Among the bowlers, Himachal Pradesh's seamer Rishi Dhawan was the leading wicket-taker with 49 in eight matches at an average of 20.30. He was one of four bowlers who took 40 more wickets this season; the others were Anureet Singh (44 at 17.56), Abhimanyu Mithun (41 at 24) and Ashok Dinda (40 at 25.97). (Click here for the leading wicket-takers this season.) Dhawan took six five-fors this season, more than any other bowler.

Dhawan also scored 435 runs in the season to go with his 49 wickets, averaging 39.54 with the bat and 20.30 with the ball. He was one of four allrounders to score 400-plus runs and take 25 or more wickets in the season. The others were Parvez Rasool of Jammu & Kashmir (663 runs and 27 wickets), Jalaj Saxena of Madhya Pradesh (545 runs and 35 wickets) and Syed Mohammad (420 runs and 26 wickets).

The top four wicket-takers in the tournament were all seamers. The highest wicket-taker among spinners was Vishal Dabholkar, the left-arm spinner from Mumbai, who took 39 wickets at 26.76. Overall in the tournament, the quicker bowlers took the honours, averaging 29.33, compared to 33.02 by the spinners. Of the 21 bowlers who took 30 or more wickets, 15 were seam bowlers. Apart from Dabholkar, the other spinners who took 30 or more wickets were Amit Yadav (37 at 20.51), Jalaj Saxena (35 at 19.68), Akshay Darekar (33 at 32.21), Rakesh Dhurv (33 at 25.36) and Shadab Jakati (30 at 33.83). The seamers for Karnataka took more wickets than those of any other team - 126 at 23.76. Maharashtra were next in terms of wickets - 121 at 27.49.

Abhimanyu Mithun Kedar Jadhav KL Rahul India Maharashtra vs Karnataka Ranji Trophy Indian Domestic Season

S Rajesh is stats editor of ESPNcricinfo. Follow him on Twitter