Shewag delights with massive double

The 1999-2000 Duleep Trophy quarterfinal between North and South Zones was held at the Maharaja Bir Bikram College Stadium in Agartala in the first week of December. North Zone were led by Vikram Rathour and boasted a strong batting line-up that had Virender Shewag batting at No.6. South Zone were hampered by the late withdrawal of their skipper Mohd. Azharuddin but still possessed a well balanced side.

North won the toss and chose to put runs on the board. They certainly succeeded in raising a fair bit of runs, 589 to be precise, batting through the first two days before being all out on the third morning. The dazzling Shewag was the toast of the North camp, bludgeoning his way to 274 off just 327 balls.

It certainly hadn't looked all that easy for North when they commenced their innings on the first day. Ashu Dani, Vikram Rathour and Reetinder Sodhi all fell cheaply and when Pankaj Dharmani followed for a useful 59, North were down to 149/4. Shewag now joined the dour Himachal skipper Rajiv Nayyar and the two batted out the day to allow North rest a little easier on 229/4. On the second morning Shewag resumed on 66 and continued to flay a South attack that included Sunil Joshi, Venkatapathy Raju, Aashish Kapoor and Robin Singh.

Having batted just under seven hours, he was finally dismissed just before stumps with the total on 530. Shewag and Nayyar had added a monumental 381 for the fifth wicket of which the former's share was 274. Indeed when Shewag was out, Nayyar, who'd come to the crease one place before his partner at No.5, had just completed his century which shows how completely the 21 year old Delhi strokemaker had dominated the proceedings. 36 fours and four sixes had rained from Shewag's blade during the blitz.

South were bowled out for 424 on the fourth day to give North a 165 run lead which was the basis for North's eventual victory and passage into the semifinal. Shewag took 1/34 from eight overs and also struck 22 (28 balls, 4 fours) in the second innings but the match was dead as a contest by this time. North declared at 257/8 and South had reached 100/1 chasing 423 when the match was mercifully called off. North duly went on to win the title negotiating two more hurdles, against Central in the semifinals and West in the finals.