The availability of Pacer Mukesh Kumar gave Bengal a boost on the eve of their Ranji Trophy quarter-final match against Jharkhand here at Eden Gardens.
Mukesh, who was sacked by the Indian side ahead of his T20I decider against New Zealand, will once again form his trio of strong and proven pace with Ishanporel and Akash his deep in the knockout competition starting Tuesday.
Ahmed’s return to his all-rounder Shabazz also strengthened his squad at home.
Bengal won the Co. C. Nayudu Trophy in recent years. The hosts are prolific goalscorer Abhimanyu, who could use Kaji as his partner in the opening of Easwaran. Another prominent goalscorer for Bengal, Anusthup Majumdar, is keen to make a difference after being ‘unscathed’ against Odisha with a thumb injury.
Sudip Gharami and captain Manoj Tiwary will be another reliable hand in the batting department.
Group A leaders Bengal will forget their only loss to Orissa and will rely on a positive result to start over with a jharkhand match.
The full-strength Bengal will gain further confidence from the fact that he overpowered Jharkhand in the final match against 773, who were declared 7 in last season’s quarter-finals.
“We were well prepared. Now it’s a matter of running them in the field. All departments are on track and we are confident,” he said.
Even without Ishan Kishan, the presence of experienced fighters like Saurabh Tiwary and Shahbaz Nadeem will benefit Jharkhand, who finished second in Group C even after losing to Karnataka in their final group game. Talented players such as Virat Singh, Kumar Kushagra and Anukul Roy are assets to the team.
“I’ve played well this season and I want to keep doing that. Our last game against Bengal was tough and we lost. The time will come for our revenge,” said Virat.
The teams (from):
Bengal: Manoj Tiwary (captain), Abhimanyu Eswaran, Anustup Majumdar, Sudip Gharami, Suvankar Bal, Shahbaz Ahmed, Abishek Porel (wk), Ishan Porel, Mukesh Kumar, Akash Deep, Kazi Junaid Saifi, Pradipta Pramanik, Geet Puri, Pritam Chakraborty, Sumanta Gupta, Ankit Mishra, Akash Ghatak and Durgesh Dubey.
Jharkhand: Kumar Deobrat, Aryaman Sen, Kumar Suraj, Saurabh Tiwary, Virat Singh (captain), Kumar Kushagra (wk), Anukul Roy, Shahbaz Nadeem (vice-captain), Ashish Kumar, Vikash Singh, Vinayak Vikram, Pankaj Kumar, Supriyo Chakraborty, Monu Kumar Singh and Rahul Shukla.