Nagpur: Vidarbha captain Harsh Dubey took nine wickets in one innings against Madhya Pradesh in the Ranji Trophy Elite on Monday, his career-best spell, to knock on the national selectors’ door once again.
After Madhya Pradesh opted to bat at the Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium in Jamtha, pacer Nachiket Bhute took the first wicket of the innings, dismissing opener Yash Dubey. Harsh then ran through the middle and lower order, picking up nine wickets for 53 runs in 23.1 overs. The left-arm spinner’s wickets included India international and Madhya Pradesh captain Rajat Patidar, who made just 2, and Saransh Jain.
At lunch, Madhya Pradesh had been reduced to 85 for 5, with Dubey already among the wickets. The afternoon session belonged entirely to him. Atharv Mahajan held out longest for the visitors with 85 off 123 balls, but he too eventually fell to Dubey, and the spinner finished with nine of the ten wickets to fall — a spell that will go down as one of the great individual performances of this Ranji season.
The performance continues a remarkable run for the 24-year-old slow left-arm orthodox bowler. Dubey first gained national prominence during the historic 2024-25 Ranji Trophy season, when he rewrote the record books by taking 69 wickets in a single season, surpassing the previous record of 68, while also contributing nearly 500 runs with the bat. He made a sensational entry into the Indian Premier League with Sunrisers Hyderabad in 2025.
Vidarbha, who have won all of their first three games this season and sit at the top of Group A, were already the form team of the competition before this match. Dubey had collected 10 wickets in the last two games before this one, and his nine-wicket haul against Madhya Pradesh takes his season tally further into territory that national selectors cannot ignore.
For Madhya Pradesh, the collapse was a sobering start to Round 4. Saransh Jain, who had taken 13 wickets in the previous round against Bihar, made 34 before falling to Dubey, and apart from Mahajan’s resistance, no batter was able to build a substantial innings against a spinner bowling with relentless accuracy and drift.
The spell is also a reminder of Vidarbha’s depth. With seamers led by Bhute starring in Srinagar earlier in the season and the spinners taking over on the red-soil pitch at Jamtha, Vidarbha have multiple ways to win matches — and in Dubey, they have a captain who leads from the front with the ball in hand.
Brief scores (Day 1, at time of writing): Madhya Pradesh first innings — Atharv Mahajan 85, Saransh Jain 34, Rajat Patidar 2; Harsh Dubey 9-53.
