Gujarat's Saurav Chauhan recorded an enviable historic feat in the ongoing Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy while playing against Arunachal Pradesh at the JSCA Oval Ground on Monday, October 16.
Saurav recorded the highest strike rate (338.88) by a player to have faced more than 10 deliveries during his innings in the tournament. He surpassed Manjeet Singh of Rajasthan who previously held the record.
Manjeet had scored a quick-fire 37* off just 11 balls, including three fours and four sixes against Uttar Pradesh. His knock had come at a scintillating strike rate of 336.36 and stood tall till Monday before Saurav annihilated Arunachal's bowling attack.
Saurav, a middle-order batter made his intentions clear from ball one and was able to get under the skin of the Arunachal bowlers. He played a total of 18 balls and scored 61 runs, including five fours and six sixes. His strike rate of 338.88 helped Gujarat make light work of Arunachal's total of 126 runs.
Gujarat took just 7.4 overs to scale the target and won the game by six wickets to spare. No. 3 batter Umang Kumar also dazzled with the bat and scored a brisk 37 off just 13 balls with the help of four fours and three sixes at a praiseworthy strike rate of 284.61.
Earlier in the day, Arunachal's skipper Neelam Obi won the toss and elected to bat first on a wicket that looked extremely good for batting. They needed to post an imposing total on the board to stand a chance against the tall batting order of Gujarat but failed to do so.
Neelam was the highest run-getter for his team but didn't get enough assistance from the other batters which resulted in Arunachal getting restricted to 126 for the loss of eight wickets in 20 overs.
Leg spinner Ravi Bishnoi was the pick of the Gujarat bowlers with two scalps in his four overs and conceded just 15 runs at an economy rate of 3.75. Chintan Gaja and Arzan Nagwaswalla also bagged two scalps each.
