The champions' curse, and a bowling free-for-all

The champions' curse
The last three seasons haven't been great for defending champions. Railways started the trend in their title defence in 2005-06 by getting relegated. Uttar Pradesh and Mumbai, the subsequent champions just avoided relegations in the next two seasons. It seemed things would be different for Delhi, who seemed to have the quality to sustain their form over two seasons. But three matches into their title defence, they seem to be conforming to the curse.

There hasn't been a five-for from their side so far, nor a century. They haven't remotely looked like 20 wickets in a match, their batsmen have lacked the steel that took them to the championship last season, and it shows in the five points they have got from three matches. To make matters worse for them, Ashish Nehra is back on the injured list, and Rajat Bhatia will miss the next match because of his wedding. In a group of eight, they are languishing at No. 6, and will only take heart from the new rule that means three teams from each group advance to the knockout stages, as opposed to two.

UP - Kaif and PK = disaster
UP's success over the last few seasons had tended to coincide with Mohammad Kaif and Praveen Kumar's presence. This season has been no different. In the first match, Kaif scored 144 and in partnership with Tanmay Srivastava took UP past Andhra's total of 349, getting them three points. In the second, Praveen took five wickets to restrict Baroda to 235, and scored a breezy fifty to take them to a first-innings after they were floundering at 210 for 7. Set 264 on the last day, UP struggled again, and were down at 97 for 6 with more than 30 overs to play out. Step forward Kaif, and Amir Khan, who batted out the rest of the time to secure three points.

On the morning of their third match, against Tamil Nadu, an unwell Kaif and an injured Praveen pulled out. What followed was hardly a surprise: they batted for 100 overs in their two innings. Tamil Nadu were required to bat only once, and they feasted for 153.1 overs. Dinesh Karthik scored a double-century, S Badrinath 123, and L Balaji took nine wickets to complete a dominating win that took TN to top of the table.

UP's batting has relied too much on Kaif, and despite the emergence of Tanmay Srivastava who is their leading run-scorer this season, there is not much else in the batting department of the team that was a finalist last year. Apart from the two, nobody has yet managed an aggregate of 100 runs in three matches.

The Irfan Pathan department
Irfan Pathan, playing in the Ranji Trophy after an axe from the Indian team, has been in the news constantly - for all the wrong reasons, though. While last week it was for anargument he had with some fans in Vadodara, this week he was booked for throwing the ball dangerously at the batsman. Sanjay Bangar was ,as usual, frustrating the hell out of the bowlers, as Baroda pressed for an outright win, when Irfan fielded a ball in his follow-through, and flung it back towards Bangar's head. Bangar ducked, but the match referee didn't. Sunil Chaturvedi, the former UP wicketkeeper, found Irfan guilty of violating Law 2.7 of BCCI's domestic cricket rules, and fined him his entire match fee.

Elsewhere, Irfan celebrated his brother Yusuf's success while playing for India. When Yusuf was smiting England in Indore, Irfan was relaxing in the Karnail Singh Stadium dressing room. Even as Connor Williams and Azhar Bilakhia scored centuries, Irfan was following Yusuf's exploits - without a TV. "In the last over, he was severe on Steven Harmison," he told the Times of India, "He smacked a length ball for six over long-on and on the very next he heaved it for six again over deep-square-leg. Wow! It's an amazing feeling to have your brother scoring a fifty. With me not having to bat or ball today, I followed every bit of his innings." Irfan also wished he had Yusuf's talent.

A bowling free-for-all
In the Punjab-Saurashtra game, Cheteshwar Pujara and Sunny Sohal continued churning out runs. Sohal scored his third century in three matches, while Pujara followed up his triple-century with a 182-ball 189. Pankaj Dharmani and Shitanshu Kotak made moves toward reaching 7000 and 6000 Ranji runs respectively. And when - in response to Punjab's 482 - Saurashtra smashed the bowlers around, Dharmani gave every member of the team a bowl. Uday Kaul, the wicketkeeper, was the 11th bowler tried; Sohal kept when he bowled.

Shane Warne's boys' corner
Finally a failure for Swapnil Asnodkar, who scored 1 and 21 in Goa's 161-run victory over Jharkhand. Ravindra Jadeja took 5 for 106, and scored 56, as Saurashtra secured three points against Punjab. Siddharth Trivedi took 4 for 44 and 3 for 60, but Gujarat fell just short of an outright win after they made Hyderabad follow on. Mahesh Rawat, the Railways wicketkeeper, scored 67 and 57 not out against Baroda, the second-innings effort helping Railways hold on for a draw and one point with that.

The story of Ajay Ratra's life
"Batting at No. 8 for Haryana, I scored 115 [he scored 114 in that match] against Punjab," Mahesh Rawat told the Indian Express of how he got into the Haryana team as a replacement to Ajay Ratra. "After that he [Ajay Ratra] didn't play first-class cricket for two years. He's my neighbour. We keep meeting. But that's the way cricket is. It's tough."

In 2002, Ratra became the youngest wicketkeeper to score a Test century, when he scored 115 not out in Antigua. Three Tests later he injured himself, his replacement Parthiv Patel helped India save the Trent Bridge Test, and Ratra never played a Test again.

Quotehanger
"I think I'm in one of my finest rhythms ever. You learn a lot bowling on the domestic pitches as they are different everywhere."
Irfan Pathan enjoys bowling in domestic cricket.