1943–44 Ranji Trophy

1943–44 Ranji Trophy
	The Ranji Trophy
Administrator(s)	BCCI
Cricket format	First-class
Tournament format(s)	Knockout
Champions	Western India (1st title)
Participants	19
Matches	18
Most runs	Vijay Merchant (Bombay) (553)
Most wickets	Saeed Ahmed (Western India) (28)
	← 1942–43 1944–45 →

The 1943–44 Ranji Trophy was the tenth season of the Ranji Trophy. Western India won their only title defeating Bengal in the final.

This season could be considered as the arbitrary starting point of high scoring in Indian domestic cricket that would last till the end of the decade. In the final of the Bombay Pentangular in early December 1943, Vijay Merchant and Vijay Hazare scored 250* and 309. It was the prelude to Merchant setting a new Ranji and Indian first class record of 359* for Bombay against Maharashtra between 31 December 1943, and 2 January 1944, at the Brabourne Stadium in Bombay.

Highlights

The Bombay-Maharashtra match^[3] set several national records.

Bombay made 735, the highest score in Indian first class cricket bettering 703 by Bengal Cyclone XI in 1942-43.^[4] The previous Ranji record was 675 by Maharashtra v Bombay in 1940-41^[5]
Vijay Merchant's 359* was the highest individual score in India. Vijay Hazare's 316* for Maharashtra v Baroda in 1939-40 was the previous Ranji and first class record.^[6]
Merchant and Rusi Modi's partnership of 371 was a national record for the sixth wicket. As of 2014, it is bettered only by 417 between Wridhiman Saha and Laxmi Ratan Shukla for Bengal v Assam in 2010-11^[7]

Vijay Merchant's season batting average of 276.50 is the highest by any batsman scoring over 500 runs.
Herbert Barritt captained Western India to the title. He was the third Englishman to captain a Ranji winning team, after Bert Wensley of Nawanagar in 1936-37 and Tom Longfield of Bengal in 1938–39.

Zonal Matches

West Zone

Round 1		Round 2		Round 3

10 Dec 1943 – Jamnagar

Nawanagar	221 & 70/5
		28 Dec 1943 – Rajkot
Western India	336 & 116/3d
		Western India	274 & 285
11 Dec 1943 – Karachi
		Sind	178 & 158/6
Sind	175 & 83/1
				15 Jan 1944 – Rajkot
Gujarat	120 & 136
				Western India	363/4
11 Dec 1943 – Bombay
				Bombay	255
Bombay	487
		31 Dec 1943 – Bombay
Baroda	297
		Bombay	735

		Maharashtra	298

East Zone

Round 1		Round 2

18 Dec 1943 – Calcutta

Bengal	249 & 88/8
		7 Jan 1944 – Calcutta
Bihar	159 & 261/7d
		Bengal	387 & 21/0
17 Dec 1943 – Indore
		Holkar	138 & 266
Holkar	222 & 420/7d

United Provinces	116 & 227

North Zone

Round 1		Round 2		Round 3

20 Dec 1943 – Gwalior

Gwalior	92 & 61
		29 Jan 1944 – New Delhi
Delhi	179 & 393
		Delhi	84 & 103

		Southern Punjab	388

				4 Mar 1944 – Patiala

				Southern Punjab	326 & 104/8

				Northern India	329 & 127

South Zone

Round 1		Round 2

31 Dec 1943 – Nagpur

Central Provinces and Berar	166 & 93
		28 Jan 1944 – Secunderabad
Hyderabad	160 & 109
		Hyderabad	183 & 141/2
31 Dec 1943 – Bangalore
		Madras	349 & 191
Mysore	359

Madras	365

Inter-Zonal Knockout matches

Semi-finals		Final

17 Mar 1944 – Rajkot

Western India	254 & 175/3
		7 Apr 1944 – Bombay
Northern India	145 & 283
		Western India	433
19 Feb 1944 – Calcutta
		Bengal	234 & 176
Bengal	235 & 266

Madras	102 & 265

Final

7-10 Apr 1944 (timeless match)
Scorecard

Bengal	v	Western India
234 (130.2 overs) Asoke Chatterjee 68 Shantilal Gandhi 6/50		433 (153.5 overs) G. Kishenchand 111 B.K. Mitra 4/80
176 (79.2 overs) Nirmal Chatterjee 71 Saeed Ahmed 4/23

Western India won by an innings and 23 runs
Brabourne Stadium, Bombay
Umpires: M.G. Bhave and D.K. Naik

Bengal won the toss and elected to bat
The match was played on a neutral ground
The trophy was presented by Sir Homi Mody, the President of the Cricket Club of India

Summary of first ten seasons

Scorecards and averages

CricketArchive

References

^ "Ranji Trophy, 1943/44 / Records / Most runs". Retrieved 23 August 2014.
^ "Ranji Trophy, 1943/44 / Records / Most wickets". Retrieved 23 August 2014.
^ Bombay v Maharashtra, Brabourne Stadium
^ Bijapur Famine XI v Bengal Cyclone XI, 1942-43
^ Maharashtra v Bombay 1940-41
^ Maharashtra v Baroda, 1939-40
^ Bengal v Assam, 2010-11

This article related to an Indian domestic cricket competition is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

[1] "Ranji Trophy, 1943/44 / Records / Most runs". Retrieved 23 August 2014.

[2] "Ranji Trophy, 1943/44 / Records / Most wickets". Retrieved 23 August 2014.

[3] Bombay v Maharashtra, Brabourne Stadium

[4] Bijapur Famine XI v Bengal Cyclone XI, 1942-43

[5] Maharashtra v Bombay 1940-41

[6] Maharashtra v Baroda, 1939-40

[7] Bengal v Assam, 2010-11

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v t e Ranji Trophy
Seasons	1934–35 1935–36 1936–37 1937–38 1938–39 1939–40 1940–41 1941–42 1942–43 1943–44 1944–45 1945–46 1946–47 1947–48 1948–49 1949–50 1950–51 1951–52 1952–53 1953–54 1954–55 1955–56 1956–57 1957–58 1958–59 1959–60 1960–61 1961–62 1962–63 1963–64 1964–65 1965–66 1966–67 1967–68 1968–69 1969–70 1970–71 1971–72 1972–73 1973–74 1974–75 1975–76 1976–77 1977–78 1978–79 1979–80 1980–81 1981–82 1982–83 1983–84 1984–85 1985–86 1986–87 1987–88 1988–89 1989–90 1990–91 1991–92 1992–93 1993–94 1994–95 1995–96 1996–97 1997–98 1998–99 1999–2000 2000–01 2001–02 2002–03 2003–04 2004–05 2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09 2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2012–13 2013–14 2014–15 2015–16 2016–17 2017–18 2018–19 2019–20 2020–21 2021–22 2022–23 2023–24
Current teams	Andhra Arunachal Pradesh Assam Baroda Bengal Bihar Chandigarh Chhattisgarh Delhi Goa Gujarat Haryana Himachal Pradesh Hyderabad Jammu and Kashmir Jharkhand Karnataka Kerala Madhya Pradesh Maharashtra Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Mumbai Nagaland Odisha Pondicherry Punjab Railways Rajasthan Saurashtra Services Sikkim Tamil Nadu Tripura Uttar Pradesh Uttarakhand Vidarbha
Former teams	Army Central Provinces and Berar Eastern Punjab Nawanagar Northern India Northern Punjab North West Frontier Province Patiala Sind Southern Punjab Travancore-Cochin Western India
Records	List of Ranji Trophy records Triple centuries Hat-tricks