Stats Analysis

Pujara eyes most runs in an Indian first-class season

Cheteshwar Pujara and Wriddhiman Saha broke a host of records during the course of their successful chase of 379 against Gujarat in the Irani Cup

Bharath Seervi
24-Jan-2017
Pujara and Saha shared the second-highest partnership in Irani Cup history  •  ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Pujara and Saha shared the second-highest partnership in Irani Cup history  •  ESPNcricinfo Ltd

2 Number of successful Irani Cup chases higher than Rest of India's 379 on Tuesday. The two highest chases have also been by Rest of India: 482 for 6 against Mumbai in the previous season and 424 for 5 against Delhi in 1982-83.
15-4 Rest of India's win-loss record in the last 19 editions. The only Ranji champions to beat Rest of India in this period have been Railways (2002-03 and 2005-06) and Karnataka (2013-14 and 2014-15). Overall, this was Rest of India's 27th win. It equalled the total of all Ranji champions. Click here for all the Irani Cup results since 1959-60.
316* Partnership between Cheteshwar Pujara and Wriddhiman Saha - the second-highest for any wicket in the tournament. Ravi Shastri and Pravin Amre's 327-run stand against Bengal in 1990-91 is the highest.
1522 Runs aggregated by Pujara in the ongoing first-class season. This is the second season in which he has made in excess of 1500 runs; he had previously crossed the mark in 2012-13, when his state side Saurashtra qualified for the Ranji Trophy final. Seven other players overall have achieved this mark in India in the past, with the highest being Chandu Borde, who made 1604 runs in 1964-65. Pujara potentially has five Tests (one against Bangladesh and four against Australia) to break the record.
Most runs in an Indian season (1500 or more first-class runs)
Name Matches Inns Runs HS Ave 100 Season
 CG Borde  21  28  1604  168  64.16  6  1964-65
 CA Pujara  13  23  1585  352  93.23  5  2012-13
 FMM Worrell  20  30  1560  127  57.77  4  1950-51
 Hanumant Singh  13  25  1556  213*  74.09  6  1966-67
 W Jaffer  14  24  1549  301  67.34  4  2008-09
 A Sandham  24  27  1540  150  61.60  6  1926-27
 GR Viswanath  17  31  1538  200*  53.03  4  1974-75
 CA Pujara  12 20  1522  256*  89.52  6  2016-17
 SM Gavaskar  20  32  1518  166  50.60  4  1979-80
0 Number of batsmen to have made a double-ton in the fourth innings of the Irani Cup prior to Wriddhiman Saha's 203 not out. The previous highest was Ajinkya Rahane's 191 in 2010-11. This was also Saha's highest first-class score.
51 Wickets for Pankaj Singh this season. He is the fifth player after Shahbaz Nadeem (60 wickets), R Ashwin (55), Kuldeep Yadav (52) and Ravindra Jadeja (50) to take 50 or more wickets. Pankaj's bowling average of 23.31 is the highest among the five.

Bharath Seervi is stats sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo. @SeerviBharath