Dishant Yagnik, as the wicketkeeper, had an unfair advantage as he picked one up.

It was decided that the three professionals — captain Hrishikesh Kanitkar, and opening batsman Aakash Chopra and all-rounder RR Parida would get to keep one stump each. Yagnik will consider himself among the lucky few.

Each player in the team was given time to pose with the Ranji Trophy, while the non-playing members — Aniket Chaudhary and Shamsher Singh — would get jerseys autographed by every member of the victorious team.

Kanitkar’s strategy for the year involved smart cricket, the soul of which lay in adopting a patient approach.

“It never bothered me that we might be playing boring cricket. There is a set format and clear rules. Batting big and batting for long periods is our strength. We had a similar set of players as last season and with Vineet (Saxena), Chopra and Parida and myself, our strength was our batting,” Kanitkar said.

Like how they had done earlier this season, Rajasthan fell back on their tried-and-tested strategy in the final.

“We knew Tamil Nadu had a long batting line-up as well and we had planned that we would bat long. So we decided to make 600-plus runs and go about it in a way that has proved to be successful for us,” Kanitkar added.

Patience pays

Chopra was a key figure in Rajasthan’s patience pays strategy. “The onus was on me to be patient. I was an opener, and also a senior player. If you are able to put the new-ball factor out of the equation then half the job was done. Saxena and I were aware that we had to bat for long periods and we successfully implemented the strategy,” Chopra said.

In Rajasthan’s first innings, Chopra batted for 440 minutes while Saxena was at the wicket for 907 minutes.

Saxena and Chopra started off the proceedings knowing fully well that if possible they would have to bat out two full days if not three.

The bowlers also stuck to the creed of patience first.

Medium pacers Sumit Mathur, Rituraj Singh and Pankaj Singh bowled long spells, bowled a stump-to-stump line and used reverse swing as a weapon as and when it kicked in.

“I knew what my job was with the ball. Right from the start the entire bowling unit was mentally prepared to bowl long spells,” Mathur said.