Ishan Kishan hammered 114 off 107 balls for Jharkhand against Madhya Pradesh in the Buchi Babu invitational cricket tournament in Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu.

The lefthander is leading Jharkhand in the tournament. At the end of the third day, Jharkhand were 37/1 in their second innings needing another 138 runs to win their opener.

Jharkhand rode Kishan’s century to reach 289 in reply to Madhya Pradesh’s 225 in the first innings. In the second innings, Madhya Pradesh could only manage 238.

Kishan’s innings of 114 included five boundaries and 10 sixes. The 26-year-old didn’t play in the Ranji Trophy last season and as a consequence, the BCCI dropped him from the players’ central contracts.

This is Kishan’s first red-ball match since India’s tour of West Indies in July last year, where he made his Test debut.

He last played for India in November 2023 during the five-match T20I series against Australia at home, that followed the ODI World Cup. He turned out for Mumbai Indians in IPL 2024, scoring 320 runs in 14 matches at a strike rate of 148.84.

Kishan has also been selected for the Duleep Trophy, which begins on September 5. He has been named in ‘Team D’, led by Shreyas Iyer, who had also been snubbed from the central contracts list.

A good performance in Duleep could put him back in the reckoning for a India call-up.