2016–17 Irani Cup
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| Rest of India won by 6 wickets | |||||||
| Date | 20 January 2017 – 24 January 2017 | ||||||
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| Venue | Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai | ||||||
| Player of the Match | Wriddhiman Saha (ROI) | ||||||
| Umpires | Abhijit Deshmukh and Virender Sharma | ||||||
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The 2016–17 Irani Cup was the 55th season of the Irani Cup, a first-class cricket competition in India. It was played as a one-off match from 20 January to 24 January 2017 between Gujarat (the winners of 2016–17 Ranji Trophy) and the Rest of India team.Cheteshwar Pujara was captain of the Rest of India team. The match was held at Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai.
Preview: Gujarat are the 2016–17 Ranji Trophy, their first title in the history of the tournament and it was second appearance in the finals previous one being 65 years ago. Rest of India has top performing players from remaining 27 teams of India with few of whom have played for the national side. Spectators even watch this match as a match between Parthiv Patel and Wriddhiman Saha for the wicket-keeper spot in the Indian team. Wriddhiman Saha was the first choice wicket keeper for India, but was out of team due to the strain in the left thigh during the second Test against England. Patel was called to keep wicket in the third test. With Saha still recovering, Parthiv held down his spot for the next two Tests as well. Overall the match turns up to be an audition for all players for the upcoming five test matches.
Day 1: Gujarat 300 for 8 (Gandhi 136*, Juneja 47, Kaul 4-73) v Rest of India
Gujarat won the toss and elected to bat. But Gujarat saw a collapse in the top order as Pankaj Singh and Siddarth Kaul packed off the top three run getters of 2016–17 Ranji Trophy in the first session. Pankaj hassled Samit Gohel in the first over of the match with a scrambled sequence of inswingers and outswingers. Priyank Panchal, the highest run-scorer in the Ranji Trophy, and Dhruv Raval (39) restored calm with some positive strokes during the course of their 55-run partnership. It took a fine delivery from Pankaj to dislodge Panchal - the ball pitched on middle and off and seamed away and the outside edge was caught by Karun Nair at first slip. In the penultimate over before lunch, Parthiv attempted to punch Kaul off the back foot, but the ball was closer to his body than he anticipated and the resultant inside-edge found the stumps. In the first over of the second session, Raval, who had played a few attacking shots in the morning, dangled his bat at an away-going delivery from Kaul and was caught behind. Things looked dire for Gujarat at 82 for 4, but Juneja and Gandhi stood strong to post a partnership. The run-rate, too, trickled past three as they completed their 50-run partnership in 67 balls. But Gujarat lost momentum once again, as Pujara introduced part-time offspinner Akhil Herwadkar to bowl the last over before tea, and he struck with his second delivery. Juneja went back to a short ball and punched uppishly off the backfoot but picked out Pujara at short cover. Rest of India made a few fielding lapses in the final session, as Kaul and Karun dropped straightforward chances offered by Karan Patel and Mohit Thadani respectively. Kaul, who hurt his ring finger on his right hand while attempting the catch and went off the field, returned to make amends by dismissing Thadani. Gandhi eventually got to his hundred off 125 balls in the company of the tail. An over earlier, though, Chintan Gaja was caught off a deflection off the keeper's pads and held by Manoj Tiwary at first slip, but umpire Virender Sharma turned it down. Pankaj returned to have Gaja trapped in front.
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