Joy of six for Malolan

Chennai: He is riding on the crest of a wave, but Malolan Rangarajan knows how to enjoy success and stay grounded. The off-spinner has been in top form this season having taken 37 wickets in nine TNCA first division matches, a five-for in the Duleep Trophy quarterfinals and a career-best six for 46 in the Ranji Trophy .

Malolan's splendid show helped Tamil Nadu earn six points in the contest against Baroda on Monday .

“It's a very good feeling to help the team win a game,“ said Malolan, who returned to TN's playing XI after being benched for the previous game against Saurashtra.

As R. Ashwin has been on national duty, the 24year-old Malolan has become a vital cog in TN's Ranji squad since his breakthrough year in 2011.

“Firstly, I would like to say that I have become a bowler who likes to outthink a batsman. It's never the conditions that bother me. Other than that, getting more control over the ball and imparting more revolutions is something I have worked on,“ said Malolan.

Malolan said the Chepauk wicket that assisted the spinners on the first two days slowed down fairly as the game progressed.

“The bounce was also a little lower in comparison to the first innings, so we had to work a little harder to get them out in the second innings,“ said Malolan.

The first hour of the final day saw Tamil Nadu adopt ing conservative fielding approach. Malolan said the team's plan was to keep Baroda batsmen at bay.

“We didn't want to give away easy runs like we did during the last session on Sunday . When we were batting, we realised that it wouldn't be easy to score runs. The plan worked well as we hardly gave away any runs in the first 15 overs. We were looking for one breakthrough and then we started attacking,“ he explained.

The majority of the second day was washed out by rain and the game was heading towards a draw, but Malolan said the home team believed that a result was still possible. “Ever since the start of the second innings, I believed that we could get them all out.
It's just that things didn't pan out well last evening.

It took a little time to get clarity on how we were going to do it but I was quite sure that we would win it,“ said Malolan.

The track was tailormade for spinners and TN's big victory can be attributed to the spin trio of Malolan, Rahil Shah and Aushik Srinivas.
“Rahil and I play for the same league team -Vijay CC. So it really helped.

Aushik and I have been playing together since the Ranji pre-season (Duleep).

Only thing we have always spoken about is if one person is taking wickets, the bowler at the other end should keep it tight. That's how we have been working. It was beautiful the way the three of us worked in this game. In the first innings, we shared the wickets. In the second innings, I got the wickets and the others complemented me by keeping it really tight,“ said Malolan.