Star Goa bowling allrounder Abhinav Tejrana on Thursday created history to become the first from the state to smack a double hundred on first-class debut, joining an elite list of batters to achieve the feat.
The milestone came in Goa’s season opener against Chandigarh at the Goa Cricket Association Academy Ground in Porvorim.
Batting at No. 3 for Goa on his domestic debut, Tejrana reached triple figures on the very first day of the game. He became only the third cricketer to score a hundred on his first-class debut for Goa.
Notably, Arjun Tendulkar, son of batting legend Sachin, is on this exclusive list as well, having scored 120 against Rajasthan three years ago.
On the second day, Tejrana built on his overnight score of 130* by adding 70 more runs to bring up a brilliant double hundred, reaching the milestone in 301 balls. With this achievement, he became the first batter from Goa to score a double century in the Ranji Trophy and only the 13th overall in the tournament’s history, a list that includes legends like Gundappa Viswanath and Amol Muzumdar.
Before Tejrana, the most recent cricketer to reach the landmark was Saurashtra’s Jay Gohil, who struck 227 off 246 deliveries against Assam, stepping in for Cheteshwar Pujara, who was unavailable because of national duties.
On Thursday, Tejrana had Delhi’s Ayush Doseja for company. He scored a 279-ball 209, making his first-class debut against Hyderabad.
Madhya Pradesh’s Anshuman Pandey, Manprit Juneja, Jiwanjot Singh, Abhishek Gupta, Ajay Rohera, Mayank Raghav, Arslan Khan, Sakibul Gani, Pavan Shah and Suved Parkar are the other cricketers on this elite list.
Tejrana scored a brilliant 205 off 320 deliveries, smacking 21 fours and four sixes during his knock. His fourth-wicket stand with Lalit Yadav was worth 309 runs, falling just one run short of Goa’s record partnership for that wicket, set by Rahul Keni and Ajay Ratra.
