Sports desk53 minutes ago
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January 1960. It was more than 13 years since India became independent. Pakistan, which came into existence from the partition of India, was trying to compete in every case. India was going ahead in areas like science, technology, but Pakistan’s team started getting better results in sports, especially cricket and hockey.
Pakistan played 29 Test matches till the beginning of 1960 since independence and won 8 of them. He was defeated in 9. On the other hand, the Indian team played 54 Test matches in the same time and won only 6. 22 had to face defeat.
Troubled by this weak performance, BCCI tried to understand the reason for this by calling the meeting of his members. Most of the members were of the opinion that the Ranji Trophy is not getting talent worth Test cricket. The Ranji Trophy was taking place since 1934 but many of its matches were unilateral. There was a strong team on one side and often a weak team on the other.
It was decided that a new domestic tournament would be started in the country. All the teams playing in it will be competing and the best cricketers will be revealed by tough matches. It was decided that the teams of the states will not clash in it. The competition will be on the zonal basis. A team including all the states in the North Zone of the country. Similarly, teams of South, East, West and Central Zone were formed. The first tournament was played in 1961 among them. It was named Dalip Trophy.
The way the Ranji Trophy was named after Ranjit Singh Ji alias Ranji of Nawanagar, who played Tests for England. Similarly, the new zonal tournament was named after Ranji’s nephew and Duleep Singh ji who played for England.
Foreign teams and foreign players also played Dalip Trophy
IPL is not the first tournament in India in which foreign players play. This Tamaga Dalip Trophy is available. Foreign players were also included in the second season of the Dalip Trophy to make the matches more competitive.
In 1962, four of the five teams included one of the West Indies players in the team. Then the famous West Indies fast bowler Roy Gilchrist played for South Zone. In the final, Gilchrist also made the team champion with 3 wickets. After this, foreign players were not given a chance for 4 decades.
From 2004, a foreign team was included in the tournament for the next few years. In 2004, Bangladesh Cricket Board XI participated in the tournament. Former Bangladesh captain Mohammad Ashraful was also present in this team. In 2005, Zimbabwe President came to play the XI Duleep Trophy. Under the captaincy of Hamilton Masakadja, the team was out after losing both their league matches.
In 2006 and 2007, the A team of Sri Lanka and England got a chance to play the Duleep Trophy. Former Sri Lanka left arm spinner Rangana Harath, former England batsman Kevin Pietersen, former England batsman and Afghanistan coach Jonathan Trot attended the tournament.
Duleep Trophy’s reign near West Zone
Mumbai has been the center of Indian cricket from the beginning. The Mumbai West Zone comes in the Dalip Trophy, the West team also benefited a lot. West Zone has won the title 19 times. The team won the first four seasons. North Zone has won this trophy 18 times.
Most of the runs of Wasim Jafar’s name
The most run in the history of the tournament is the name of Wasim Jaffer of West Zone itself. Jafar scored the highest 2545 runs in this tournament. He scored an unbeaten 173 against North Zone at Eden Gardens in Kolkata in the 1999 final. You can see other big records related to the tournament in the next graphics.
Who will be the new champion of 2025?
This time too, the tournament will be played in the zonal trophy. The tournament will start from August 28 and run till 11 September.
