Bengal spearhead Ranadeb Bose works out as coach Paras Mhambrey watches at the Eden on Tuesday, the eve of the Ranji tie vs Rajasthan. A Telegraph picture

Calcutta: Bengal are within two points of making the Ranji Trophy semi-final and that seems to be their priority as they take on Rajasthan in their final group league encounter of the Super League at the Eden from Wednesday.

Their stupendous triumph over Hyderabad, courtesy Ranadeb Bose’s 10-wicket match-haul, is now a thing of the past and Deep Dasgupta and Co. is more focused on the task at hand. The availability of Sourav Ganguly is also sure to spur the players as they ooze confidence and look determined to raise the bar further.

“The availability of Sourav will obviously be a big boost… We are aiming for the first innings lead and confirm our semi-final berth. We do not want to complicate the situation by having to depend on the permutation and combination,” Deep said after nearly five hours of training on Tuesday.

Sourav wasn’t present during practice, but did visit the Eden for a brief while in the afternoon for a chat with the selectors.

If Bengal don’t manage two points against the lowly-placed Rajasthan (four points from five matches), their fate will hang on the Mumbai-Maharashtra and Hyderabad-Punjab matches. Bengal lead the Group B standings with 12 points followed by Mumbai (10) and Hyderabad and Punjab (8 each). Bengal will also hope that at no point the quotient rule comes into effect while deciding the semi-finalists since they are the worst-placed among the five teams.

There was a slight fitness worry for Bengal with Ranadeb suffering from side strain, but he confirmed later that he would play. The mediumpacer has so far taken 32 wickets in the tournament. The presence of some grass in the pitch along with the morning dew, which will aid lateral movement, should serve as an inspiration for the Ranadebs.

The injured Rohan Gavaskar has already ruled himself out and it is likely that Subhomoy Das will replace Amitava Chakraborty in the XI. Subhomoy will open with Arindam Das with Sourav likely to come in at No.4.

Rajasthan will be without their foreign imports, Vikram Solanki and Kabir Ali, who have returned to England. Moreover, Gagan Khoda is unavailable because of personal reasons.

Captain Ajay Jadeja is also unsure of playing. “There is nothing at stake for the team… I will decide on playing only tomorrow morning,” Jadeja said after match-eve nets.

Despite putting up a promising line-up, Rajasthan have failed to get their act together this season. They will have to depend largely on the new and untested players in their bid to put up a good show.

Bengal will look to bank on this inexperience and make the most of their final group league game.

TEAMS

Bengal (likely): Arindam Das, Subhomoy Das, Avishek Jhunjhunwala, Sourav Ganguly, Manoj Tewari, Deep Dasgupta, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Sourashish Lahiri, Ranadeb Bose, Ashok Dinda, Sourav Sarkar.

Rajasthan (from): Ajay Jadeja, Rahul Kanwat, Md Aslam, Nikhil Dora, Naresh Gehlot, Rajesh Bishnoi, Rohit Jalani, Rohit Sharma, Suhanshu Vijay, Robin Bisht, Sumit Mathur, Pankaj Singh, Sailendra Gehlot, Afroz Khan, Sumit Khatri.

Umpires: Tej Handu (Maharashtra), Anil Dandekar (Mumbai).

Match Referee: J.N. Jadeja (Saurashtra).

bengal vs rajasthan: highs & lows

Bengal and Rajasthan have met 10 times in Ranji Trophy so far. While Rajasthan have won outright on four occasions, Bengal have managed the feat twice. On another two occasions, Bengal prevailed by virtue of their first innings lead while Rajasthan grabbed two points only once. The 2002-03 encounter ended in a stalemate as neither team could obtain the first innings lead.

HIGHEST TOTAL

Bengal — 614/7 decl. in Calcutta, 1986-87
Rajasthan — 465 in Calcutta, 1986-87

LOWEST TOTAL

Bengal — 74 in Jaipur, 1969-70
Rajasthan — 146 in Jaipur, 2001-02

HIGHEST SCORES

Bengal — 287 by Arun Lal in Calcutta, 1986-87
Bengal — 143 by RJ Kanwat in Calcutta, 1999-2000

BEST BOWLING

Bengal — 6/48 Shabbir Ali in Jaipur, 2001-02
Rajasthan — 6/18 Sanjeev Sharma in Jaipur, 2003-04

Compiled by Mohandas Menon