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Ranji Trophy: Prateek Jain, from a bread-winner to match-winner

On his part, Prateek has toiled hard to make his mark as a left-arm pacer. He has had a fairly decent stint with the Bijapur Bulls franchise at the Karnataka Premier League. However, breaking into Karnataka's heavy-duty first-class team proved to be an arduous task. 

 Ranji Trophy, Ranji Trophy 2020, Prateek Jain, Prateek Jain bowling, Prateek Jain karnataka, railways vs karnataka, cricket news Left-arm seamer Prateek Jain has been Karnataka’s find of the season.

Last month, Prateek Jain visited his hometown in Sagar, Madhya Pradesh to be with his ailing father Arvind Kumar, who was bedridden since 2018 after suffering a haemorrhage. Consequently, Arvind had to wind up his modest fabrics business. The family had to endure pretty harrowing times, and since then, they have been banking on Prateek’s exploits on the cricket field to get them out of the financial doldrums.

On his part, Prateek has toiled hard to make his mark as a left-arm pacer. He has had a fairly decent stint with the Bijapur Bulls franchise at the Karnataka Premier League. However, breaking into Karnataka’s heavy-duty first-class team proved to be an arduous task. It was during his most recent trip back home, when he was informed that he would be making his much-awaited Ranji Trophy comeback during the Karnataka vs Himachal Pradesh league encounter at Mysore. He impressed with figures of 3/54, and has not looked back since. Prateek had made his first-class debut last year during the match against Gujarat, before getting relegated to the sidelines.

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“He has been performing reasonably well in the Karnataka Premier League, but I think ever since he made his Ranji Trophy debut last year, it has only fuelled his confidence. He knows what a big deal it is to be playing for Karnataka,” Liyan Khan, his friend and team-mate with the Bijapur Bulls told The Indian Express.

Not surprisingly, Prateek has been putting his best foot forward in every opportunity that has come his way. Against Railways, his fifth first-class match, the 25-year-old orchestrated his intrinsic value. As the Karnail Singh Stadium toggled between long periods of gloom with intermittent sunshine, Prateek’s four-wicket haul was the highlight in an otherwise dour opening day’s play. He finished with figures of 4/14 in 13 marathon overs that comprised of 7 maidens, as Railways slumped to 98/6 from 49 overs.

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Prateek took a liking to the freshly laid out track that hardly offered any bounce. First up, he trapped Railways opener Mrunal Devdhar, before cleaning up Saurabh Singh, comeback man Mahesh Rawat and young wicket-keeper batsman Dinesh Mor in a splendid burst in the afternoon session. The Railways batsmen’s diffident approach hardly helped matters. They also didn’t seem to learn from the errors committed in their previous home encounter against Madhya Pradesh, where they were guilty of perpetually playing on the back foot.

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On such tracks, it’s imperative that a batsman takes a positive step forward and play on the front foot. Or else, as Prateek’s victims found out today, they would always be in danger of either getting trapped lbw or out bowled. The indifferent bounce notwithstanding, Prateek insisted that this pitch would aid Karnataka’s stroke-players in the coming three days. “If you see, this wicket is not all that conducive for pace bowling. I was just disciplined and bowled consistent lines, and benefited from the low bounce,” he explained.

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With 16 scalps in Ranji Trophy so far, Prateek is fulfilling a childhood ambition. One he has been nursing since 2010, ever since he along with a group of friends from his hometown landed up in Bangalore to play in a local tournament. Over the last decade, most of his friends, have quit cricket and moved on to other professions, but Prateek has remained steadfast and systematically made the seamless progression through age-group cricket. The KPL stint helped him financially. But he persisted indefatigably as the net bowler with the Karnataka senior team.

“He is a humble guy and a wholehearted cricketer. Even during the last two seasons, when he did not get a chance with Karnataka team, he would bowl tirelessly in the nets, at times for over two hours without complaining. He is this fun-loving, jovial guy with a toothy grin,” Khan noted. Behind his jovial nature and toothy grin, is a story of a personal turmoil, doggedness and the burning desire to play and excel at the highest level. Prateek is a welcome addition to the burgeoning arsenal of talented medium-pacers that Karnataka have at their disposal.

Brief Scores: Railways 98/6 (Arindam Ghosh 32 not out, Prateek Jain 4/14, Abhimanyu Mithun 2/18) vs Karnataka.

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First uploaded on: 28-01-2020 at 01:11 IST
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