South Zone never batted again, and East Zone have the Duleep Trophy for the first time in 13 years
Ishan Kishan’s 270 put the final out of reach inside three days, and East Zone batted out the rest of it to take the title on first-innings lead.
Sep 10, 2026
East Zone never had to bowl South Zone out a second time. They never even had to ask them to bat. The Duleep Trophy final at the MA Chidambaram Stadium was drawn on Thursday, and the trophy went to East Zone on first-innings lead, their first in the competition since 2012-13.
Kishan batted for 522 minutes
The match was settled inside three days, and Ishan Kishan settled it. East Zone’s captain made 270 from 334 balls with 30 fours and seven sixes, a stay of 522 minutes and his second double hundred in first-class cricket. He retired hurt on 250 from 301 balls with cramp, came back out, and was caught at long-on off Tripurana Vijay late on the second day.
Around him, East Zone kept finding runs. Kumar Kushagra made 101 from 132 balls with eight fours and five sixes. Shikhar Mohan contributed 85. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, opening, took 44 from 37 balls and put on 100 with Abhimanyu Easwaran inside 14.4 overs, which set the tempo for everything after it. East Zone were bowled out for 708 in 163 overs. Vijay finished with four for 180.
Tilak Varma got to 99 and no further
South Zone’s reply had to be enormous. It was 336 in 107.3 overs, 372 behind. Tilak Varma played the innings of their match, 99 from 211 balls with nine fours, and fell one short of the hundred the scorecard deserved. Devdutt Padikkal made 62 from 104. Chama Milind, a bowler batting low down, chipped in with 43.
Mukesh Kumar took three for 62. Mohammed Shami, playing his 100th first-class match and only the sixth Indian bowler to get that far, finished with two for 42. Md Kounain Quraishi took two for 99.
Then East Zone batted again anyway
With a lead of 372 and the follow-on available to them, East Zone took the safest route to the trophy: bat, and keep batting. They reached 388 for seven before declaring, Quraishi unbeaten on 116 from 190 balls, Anukul Roy making 64 and Kishan adding 80 from 98. Sooryavanshi’s second innings lasted eight runs before Vijay drew him down the pitch and Narayan Jagadeesan took the bails off.
By the declaration East Zone had batted 262.2 overs in the match and South Zone 107.3, with the overall lead at 760. There was no prospect of a result and no need for one. In a final decided on first-innings lead, the side in front does not have to win the match. It only has to make sure nobody else can.
Thirteen years between titles
East Zone had not reached a Duleep Trophy final since 2012-13, let alone won one. The gap covers a stretch in which the tournament kept being rebuilt around them: India Blue, Red and Green from 2016-17 to 2019-20, four teams called A, B, C and D in 2024-25, and only from last season a return to the zonal format the competition was built on when it started in 1961-62. For the players in this squad it is still the trophy that puts a zone’s name on the board.
Kishan was named player of the match, which stopped being a question on the second evening. He finished the final with 350 runs. His two Tests for India both came on the 2023 tour of the West Indies, and a second first-class double hundred in a title-winning final is about as loud an argument as the domestic calendar allows a wicketkeeper to make.