Vidarbha are placed in Elite Group A with strong teams like defending chamipns Saurashtra, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Haryana, Services, and Manipur. Last season Vidarbha team led by stumper Akshay Wadkar failed to make it to the knockouts. However this time, under the coaching of new coach Usman Ghani Vidarbha would like to qualify for the knockouts and regained its lost glory.
Two professional players Dhruv Shorey and Karun Nair have strengthen the Vidarbha's batting line up that also included experienced Faiz Fazal, R Sanjay and IPL auction star Shubham Dubey.
Vidarbh has good pace attack in the form of Indian fast bowler Umesh Yadav, young Yash Thakur and Darshan Nalkande. Veteran Akshay Wakhare and young Harsh Dubey will be the spin option.
As far as opponent Services are concerned they had poor last season. In group 'C'', they finished seventh with only two victories under their belt. Therefore, they are also eager to make the winning start.
The 2023/24 Ranji Trophy will feature the usual 38 teams, split into four Elite Groups, featuring eight teams each, and a Plate Group with six teams.
The two worst-performing teams from the 32 Elite teams will be relegated to the Plate group for the 2024/25 edition, while the top two Plate teams will be promoted to the Elite group of 32.
The top eight teams from the Elite Groups will qualify for the quarter-finals, which will be followed by the semi-finals and a final. The Plate Group will have its own semi-final and final as well.
Teams (from):
Vidarbha : Akshay Wadkar (captain & wk), Aditya Sarvate (vice-captain), Faiz Faizal, Dhruv Shorey, Karun Nair, R. Sanjay, Shubham Dubey, Darshan Nalkande, Akshay Wakhare, . Harsh Dubey, Yash Thakur, Yash Rathod, Siddhesh Wath (wk), Lalit Yadav, Umesh Yadav, Mohit Kale and Aditya Thakare.
Services: Rajat Paliwal, Varun Choudhary, Vineet Dhankhar, Anshul Gupta, Vikas Hathwala,
Lovekesh Bansal, Nakul Sharma, Pulkit Narang, Nitin Yadav, Poonam Poonia, Raj Bahadur, Ravi Chauhan, Shubham Rohilla, Arjun Sharma and Nitin Tanwar.