Ranji Trophy: Wasim Jaffer back in Vidarbha, named batting consultant | Cricket News

Mumbai: The Vidarbha Cricket Association has named former India opener Wasim Jaffer as the batting consultant of all its cricket teams for the 2025-26 domestic season, TOI has learnt. The domestic colossus, who was the head coach of the Punjab senior team last domestic season, will be the batting consultant of all the age group sides of Vidarbha-right from the Under-14 team to the senior team.Vidarbha are the defending Ranji Trophy champions and reached the final of the 2023-24 Ranji Trophy, where they lost to Mumbai by 169 runs at the Wankhede Stadium.Jaffer has had a successful relationship with Vidarbha in the past. Towards the end of his career, he featured for the Nagpur-based side as a ‘Pro’ and played a key role in their back-to-back Ranji Trophy and Irani Cup triumphs in 2017-18 & 2018-19. His ‘partnership’ with former India stumper Chandrakant Pandit, who was the team’s head coach, worked wonders for Vidarbha’s cricketing fortunes at that time. In another case of Vidarbha’s Mumbai connection in the upcoming season, former Mumbai fast bowler Vishal Mahadik has been named as the Vidarbha Under-19 team’s head coach. Mahadik made his Mumbai Ranji Trophy debut against Baroda under Sachin Tendulkar’s captaincy in 1993-94.

Jaffer has had stints with Punjab, Uttarakhand and Orissa as their head coach. The 46-year-old was also the batting coach of Punjab Kings from 2019-2021, and later the batting consultant of the Bangladesh Under19 and their high-performance team (‘A’ side).Jaffer played 31 Tests in which he scored 1944 runs@34.10, with five hundreds, besides two ODIs. A colossus in domestic cricket-he scored a massive 19,410 runs in 260 First-Class games with 57 centuries-Jaffer holds the record for being highest run-getter in the history of the history, having amassed 12,038 runs in 238 innings in the tournament during his epic career. He captained Mumbai to two Ranji Trophy titles in 2008-09 and 2009-10.