From February 26 to March 2, Vidarbha and Kerala will square off in the Ranji Trophy 2024–25 final at Nagpur's Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium (Jamtha). So far, Vidarbha's campaign has been outstanding. They won six of their games, drew one, and lost none, easily winning their group. They set up a match against Mumbai, the team they lost to in the Ranji Trophy final the previous season, after defeating Tamil Nadu by 198 runs in the quarterfinal.
Mumbai's hopes of taking a first-innings lead were thwarted by Vidarbha's outstanding performance in the semi-final, which included Parth Rekhade's three-wicket over in the first innings that included all of India's hitters. From that point on, the visitors had to catch up as Vidarbha won easily by 80 runs.
Kerala, on the other side, won four games, lost none, and drew four, finishing second in their group by a little point. They had thrilling knockout games both times. They won the first innings of their quarterfinal match against Jammu & Kashmir, which was thrillingly secured by a single run.
As the home team got closer to Kerala's first innings total, the slow-burning semi-final matchup with Gujarat became a scorching contest. Kerala appeared to be in trouble as the gap was only two runs and Gujarat had one wicket remaining. But a lucky break resulted in a wicket falling, giving the South Indian state a narrow but significant advantage.
Once more, they prevailed on a lead in the first inning. Vidarbha has participated in three Ranji Trophy finals, whereas Kerala has advanced to their first-ever final. They have won the title twice out of those, both in the past ten years. The two well-established teams are anticipated to engage in a fierce battle in the final.
Possible Playing XIs
Vidarbha: Atharva Taide, Dhruv Shorey, Danish Malewar, Karun Nair, Yash Rathod, Akshay Wadkar (c&w), Harsh Dubey, Darshan Nalkande, Parth Rekhade, Nachiket Bhute, Yash Thakur
Kerala: Akshay Chandran, Rohan Kunnummal, Varun Nayanar, Sachin Baby (c), Jalaj Saxena, Salman Nizar, Mohammed Azharuddeen (wk), Ahammed Imran, Aditya Sarwate, MD Nidheesh, Nedumankuzhy Basil