Prithvi Shaw’s first outing for his new Ranji team, Maharashtra, started on a disastrous note as he was sent back to the pavilion without opening his account. Maharashtra, who are the defending champions, are currently playing last year's runner-up Kerala in their opening match of the Ranji Trophy 2025-26 campaign. Shaw, who transferred to Maharashtra from Mumbai ahead of the season, recently impressed with a century in a warm-up game against his former team.
Both teams are playing the match at the Greenfield Stadium in Thiruvananthapuram, with Maharashtra at one point of time finding themselves in deep trouble after 4 wickets for 5 runs within just four overs against Kerala . All the runs came through extras as all four batsmen, including skipper Ankit Bawne, failed to open their account.
Maharashtra in huge trouble against Kerala
With Sanju Samson playing the first match after winning the Asia Cup recently, Kerala skipper and wicketkeeper Mohammed Azharuddeen opted to bowl first. The home team struck early as their in-form seam bowler MD Nidheesh trapped Shaw in front of the wicket with a well-directed inswinging delivery . His early exit saw Maharashtra losing wickets in cluster.
The carnage continued immediately as Nidheesh dismissed Siddhesh Veer off the very next ball for a golden duck. Following that, Kerala introduced Nedumankuzhy Basil into the attack, who maintained the pressure by clean bowling Arshin Kulkarni with his first delivery, caught spectacularly by Rohan Kunnummal in the slips.
Maharashtra’s captain Ankeet Bawana also fell cheaply to Basil’s bowling, leaving the visitors struggling at 5 runs for 4 wickets with none of their batsmen able to open their account. The team faced the prospect of equaling a rare and unwanted Ranji Trophy record of seven ducks in a single innings, a feat last seen in 2016-17.
At the time of writing Ruturaj Gaikwad was batting on 19runs, while experienced Jalaj Saxena was batting at 22 runs.
