Meghalaya slumped to one of the worst starts in Ranji Trophy

In a Ranji Trophy match at the Bandra-Kurla Complex in Mumbai, the hosts reduced Meghalaya to 2-6, the second-worst start in the history of first-class cricket.

Ahead of their last group-stage match of the 2024-25 Ranji Trophy, against Meghalaya, the buzz around the Mumbai camp revolved around whether their national stars would feature in the game.

In the end, four of them did not. Shivam Dube had already been called up to the Indian T20I side as replacement for the injured Rinku Singh. With the ODI series and the Champions Trophy in the wings, Rohit Sharma, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Shreyas Iyer were not included either.

However, all that took a backseat when home captain Ajinkya Rahane won the toss and opted to field. Shardul Thakur and Mohit Avasthi struck in their respective opening overs, reducing Meghalaya to 1-2. Then, in the third over, Thakur completed a hat-trick(he became the fifth to do this for Mumbai in the first-class cricket), dismissing B Anirudh, Sumit Kumar, and Jaskirat Sachdeva with the last three balls of the over.

This quickly became four in four for Meghalaya when Avasthi claimed another wicket with the first ball of the fourth over, leaving Meghalaya reeling at 2-6.

At the time of writing, however, Meghalaya had “recovered to” 24-6. They have gone past Hyderabad’s 21 (against Rajasthan at Jaipur in 2010-11), the lowest first-class score on Indian soil. At the crease are Pringsang Sangma (6) and captain Akash Kumar Choudhary (14).

Lowest score at which a team lost their sixth wicket in first-class cricket

Score Final score Team Opposition Venue Season
0-6 16 in 18 overs MCC Surrey Lord’s 1872
2-6 ongoing Meghalaya Mumbai Mumbai (BKC) 2024-25
3-6 32 in 35.2 overs Oxford University MCC Lord’s 1867
4-6 28 in 21.2 overs Leicestershire Australians Leicester 1899
4-6 60 in 31 overs Northamptonshire Kent Northampton 1907
4-6 40 in 14.4 overs Delhi NWFP Peshawar 1938-39
4-6 27 in 12 overs Kerala Mysore Bangalore (CCG) 1963-64

Note
- Peshawar was part of India when Delhi became 4-6 against North-West Frontier Province. The lowest sixth-wicket score outside India or England is 5-6, by Tasmania against Victoria in 1868-69; by Griqualand West against Eastern Province in 1906-07; by Orange Free State against Transvaal in 1906-07.
- The previous lowest sixth-wicket score in the 21st century was Delhi’s 5-6 against Saurashtra in 2022-23.
- It is worth a mention that the fall-of-wicket scores of some early first-class matches are not available.

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