Duleep Trophy 2026 was very special for the East Zone team. The final match of the tournament was played between East Zone and South Zone from 6 to 10 September at MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai. In this match, East Zone captain Ishan Kishan played a brilliant inning, while Vaibhav Suryavanshi also created a lot of discussion. Let us tell you that the final match was drawn but on the basis of the lead in the first innings, East Zone won the title of Duleep Trophy 2026. The players of the team performed brilliantly and captured the Duleep Trophy after 13 years.
Ishan Kishan was the hero of East Zone's victory. He scored a double century in the first innings and 80 runs in the second innings. However, the last day of the match was in the name of Mohammad Kounain Qureshi of East Zone, who scored unbeaten 116 runs in the second innings.
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What happened in the final match?
In the final match, East Zone won the toss and decided to bat first. The team batted for two consecutive days and was all out after scoring 708 runs in 163 overs. Ishan Kishan played a brilliant inning of 270 runs for East Zone. Apart from them, Kumar Kushagra scored 101 and Shikhar Mohan scored 85 runs. From South Zone, Tripurana Vijay took maximum 4 wickets. Chama V Milind and Shreyas Gopal got 2 wickets each, while Sheikh Rashid took 1 wicket.
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After this, South Zone batted 107.3 overs in the first innings and the entire team was all out for 336 runs. During this, Tilak Verma missed the century by just one run and was out after scoring 99 runs. Apart from them, Devdutt Padikkal scored 62 runs and Chama V Milind scored 43 runs. Talking about the bowling of East Zone, Mukesh Kumar took 3 wickets, while Mohammad Shami, Mohammad Kounain Qureshi and Shikhar Mohan got 2 wickets each.
East Zone batted 99.2 overs in the second innings and scored 388 runs at the loss of 7 wickets. After this the team declared the innings. After the innings were declared, the match was drawn, but East Zone was declared the winner on the basis of lead in the first innings. Mohammad Kounain Qureshi scored the highest score of 116 runs in the second innings of East Zone. Captain Ishan Kishan scored 80 runs and Shikhar Mohan scored 52 runs. Whereas, from South Zone, MD Nidhish took 2 wickets, while Mohammad Siraj, Tripurana Vijay, Sheikh Rashid and Chama V Milind got 1 wicket each.
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Ishaan dominated the entire tournament
Ishan Kishan played three matches in Duleep Trophy 2026. During this period he scored 409 runs in 5 innings. He scored 1 century and 1 half-century from his bat. At the same time, Tilak Verma was chosen as the Player of the Series of the tournament. Tilak scored 266 runs in 3 innings of 2 matches in the entire tournament. During this period he scored 1 century and 2 half-centuries.