Laxman and Kanwaljeet stars of the Ranji season

lucknow: mumbai were the most determined and focussed of the teams on the domestic front and not surprisingly regained the ranji trophy after a gap of two years. not having made it even to the super league from west zone last season did rankle them no ends. they were thus out to put the record straight this year. of course, they required the intervention of the genius called sachin tendulkar to help them fulfil that goal.but if there were an award for the team of the season, it would undoubtedly go to hyderabad. they were twice down and out and on both occasions scored superb come-from-behind wins to keep up their challenge right up to the final. they were on verge of elimination in their last super league match against baroda. but their bowlers helped them pull of a brilliant victory, which set up an enthralling quarter-final against uttar pradesh in kanpur. they were against the ropes on the first four days, but again the spinning duo of kanwaljit singh and venkatpathy raju helped them eke out another come-from-behind victory. from then on they were virtually unstoppable, what with venkata sai laxman on fire and the spin twins spitting venom. what probably cost them the title was laxman's run out in the first innings of the final. while these two teams showed their eagerness and determination to excel in domestic cricket, karnataka, on the contrary, seemed well contented with being the national champions the last two seasons. they took their semi-final against hyderabad rather casually, even allowing their two stars rahul dravid and anil kumble to give the match a "go-by" in order to play in english's domestic cricket. their act is akin to a husband refusing to go on a vacation with his own family in order top proceed on one with some other family. not an eyebrow was raised by the cricket board officials when the two bypassed the match. it remains to be seen if they, along with saurav ganguly, will make themselves available for the asia cup scheduled to be held in dhaka may-end. if not, it will then be interesting to know what the reaction of the bcci will be. back on the domestic front, two players were in the limelight more than any for their record performance this season. laxman, broke all batting records in the national championship, by posting 1415 runs, surpassing the earlier highest of 1280 by vijay bharadwaj of karnataka last season. sridharan sriram also crossed the 1000-mark (1,075) to become only the eighth batsman to do so in ranji trophy (see list below). laxman also became the only batsman with two triple centuries in ranji trophy and only the third in over 100-year history of indian first class cricket to get two 300s during career. vijay s hazare had 300s in ranji as well as bombay pentagular, while the late raman lamba had a triple century each in ranji and duleep trophy (the only one in the championship). laxman also is the first to score more than five centuries in a ranji season. from rusi mody in 1944 to brijesh patel to woorkeri raman to sachin tendulkar and m v sridhar and sriram this year have all had five in a season. but laxman surpassed them all by a long way getting eight. he collected over 800 runs in the three knockout matches, an amazing feat. he has set a benchmark for the future batsmen to surpass in the national championship and it is not going to be easy, especially as the bcci is contemplating to revert to the old format of zonal league-cum-knockout, knocking of the super league for good. another benchmark which has remained firm for over 25 years is bishen bedi's haul of 64 wickets in a season. two have come very close but have not able to surpass it. dodda ganesh last year picked up 62 victims and so did kanwaljeet singh this season. but the legendary left-arm spinner's record has survived since 1974. kanwaljeet had 51 wickets last season, for an amazing tally of 113 in the last two. he went past the 300-wicket mark in the match against up, the only hyderabadi to do so. he is the only bowler who has crossed 50 wickets in ranji season twice. narendra hirwani also joined the 300-club with his first wicket this season. he had just 13 for the season as madhya pradesh, last year's finalists could not even make it to super league this time. they all are well behind rajinder goel's monumental 640 wickets, which will stand for a long, long time to come. amarjeet singh kaypee continue to head the all-time run-getters. he has taken his tally to 7633 from 108 matches with 28 centuries. he is followed by ajay sharma with 7421 from 87 matches and he is the highest century-maker with 32, the next best being kaypee's 28 and brijesh patel's 26. ashok malhotra has 7126 runs and patel 7126. these are the only four with over 7,000 runs in the national championship. mohammed azharuddin who made a comeback to test cricket this season, has crossed 15,000 first class runs and has 53 career centuries, third best behind sunil gavaskar's 81 and dilip vengsarkar's 56. but he is well short of gavaskar's record of over 25,000 first class runs. the following is the list of batsmen who have scored over 1000 runs in a ranji season: 1415 - vvs laxman (hyderabad) 1999-00. 1280 - v bhardwaj (karnataka) 1998-99. 1075 - s sriran (tamil nadu) 1999-00. 1037 - jj martin (baroda) 1998-99. 1034 - r lamba (delhi) 1997-98. 1033 - a sharma (delhi) 1997-98. 1018 - w v raman (tamil nadu) 1987-88. 1008 - r s modi (mumbai) 1943-44. the following is the list of bowlers who have taken 50 wickets in a ranji trophy season: 64 - b s bedi (delhi) 1974. 62 - k singh (hyderabad) 2000. 62 - d ganesh (karnataka) 1999. 58 - s venkatraghvan (tamil nadu) 1972. 55 - b s chandrasekhar (karnataka) 1973. 55 - r chauhan (madhya pradesh) 1997. 53 - b vij (punjab) 1997. 52 - s joshi (karnataka) 1996 52 - v raju (hyderabad) 2000. 52 - u chatterjee (bengal) 2000. 52 - r s hans (uttar pradesh) 1977. 51 - k singh (hyderabad) 1999. 50 - a kapoor (tamil nadu 2000. 50 - r b desai (mumbai) 1958.