India’s Test specialist Cheteshwar Pujara would strive to stay relevant for the national team with a purposeful knock when Saurashtra clash with Rest of India, a side that is packed with five specialist openers, in the Irani Cup game starting here on Saturday.

While Madhya Pradesh are the 2021-22 Ranji Trophy champions, Saurashtra will be playing the Irani Trophy by virtue of being the 2019-20 champions.

The one-off match — played between Ranji champions and the Rest of India — wasn’t held for successive seasons due to the Covid-19 pandemic. And, the 2022 version is on the lines of being in the scheme of things for Team India so far as the reserve bench is concerned.

If majority of the Rest of India squad comprises players who have all featured in the recent A series against New Zealand, Saurashtra has a battle-hardened pro in Pujara.

The 34-year-old batter has had a dream run for Sussex in both red ball and white ball (List A) games. But he wouldn’t like to put a foot wrong before the away series in Bangladesh be - cause whether the selectors will persist with him in Tests going forward is another matter.

On his home ground, where he has scored truckloads of runs, though Pujara can prove to be more than a handful for young pacers Umran Malik, Kuldeep Sen, Arzan Nagwaswalla or upcoming spinners R. Sai Kishore and Saurabh Kumar.

However, the primary problem for Rest of India is having too many, and all inform, openers.

There is the India A pair of Priyank Panchal and Abhimanyu Easwaran who did well against New Zealand A, while Yashasvi Jaiswal was in fine form in the Duleep Trophy. Then there is Test opener Mayank Agarwal who is trying to make a comeback and young Yash Dhull who has scored 770 runs in five first-class games in his debut season.

Only skipper Hanuma Vihari and in-form Sarfaraz Khan are the two specialist batters apart from wicketkeeper KS Bharat.

$1.6m for Cup winners

Dubai: The winner of the upcoming T20 World Cup in Australia will take home prize money of $1.6 million, ICC announced on Friday.

The ICC said in a statement that the runners-up will get half the amount of the winning team’s prize purse.

The T20 World Cup will be held from October 16 to November 13. At the end of the 16-team tournament, the losing semi-finalists will each get $400,000 from the $5.6-million total prize pool.

“Like last year at the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2021, a win in each of the 30 games in the Super 12 phase will be worth USD 40,000,” the ICC stated.

PTI