Over the past month, Karnataka batsman, Mayank Agarwal amassed over 1,000 runs in the Ranji Trophy. Only 18 players since tournament’s inception in 1934 have reached the milestone in an entire season and Agarwal has scored that in the space of 27 days.
In doing so, he becomes only the third Karnataka batsmen after KL Rahul and Vijay Bharadwaj to surpass the number.
Going into the knockout stage of the tournament, he is only 351 runs short of surpassing VVS Laxman’s all-time record of 1,415 runs in a season.
Agarwal has at least two more innings in the knockout match against Mumbai and potentially two more matches after that, if Karnataka progress to the finals. With five centuries under his belt in only six matches, he has everything to play for.
The 1,000 run club at the Ranji trophy is pretty exclusive. Till 1989, only one player, Rustomji Modi had scored 1,000 runs in a season. But since Laxman’s monumental 1999-00 season, ten players have reached the mark. Seven of them have done it since 2010.
Of the 18 players who’ve scored over 1,000 runs, 13 have gone on to play for India in at least one format. Laxman, Wasim Jaffer and Ajinkya Rahane are the most decorated alumni of this small club.
But its important to note, that they’re not career-defining for national team players. Virat Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar didn’t hit mammoth scores in their domestic careers. With the exception of his 1994-95 season, Tendulkar has never scored more than 600 runs in a single Ranji season. That also has a lot to do with the fact that he was mostly away on India duty during the domestic season.
For various reasons, Kohli’s record in the tournament is dismal in comparison. He has failed to score above 400 runs in a single Ranji season. Agarwal’s season comes with a disclaimer: Though his march towards Laxman’s record will define his season, it’s by no means an assured spot on the national team, where Kohli has enough selection headaches at the top of the order.
But the Karnataka batsman has made sure his name will feature in the mix when the selectors meet to pick a squad.
