Rivals confident yet guarded against history

It has been a fairytale run for both Bengal and Uttar Pradesh this season. Both were rank-outsiders in the beginning, especially Bengal who were on the brink of relegation the previous season. But both teams had the grit to fight back and push aside heavyweights such as Mumbai, Railways, Baroda to set up the summit clash.

Both teams scored contrasting victories in the semifinals, Mohammad Kaif leading Uttar Pradesh to an emphatic five-wicket away victory over Mumbai while Deep Dasgupta had to settle for the first-innings lead against Baroda at Eden Gardens. The Ranji Trophy final, to be played at KD Singh Babu Stadium in Lucknow, is most likely to be a five-day affair and the side that has the most amount of patience owns the trump card.

The teams
The only change for Bengal will be Rohan Gavaskar, who missed the semi-finals due to illness, replacing Kamal Mondal, who made just five on his debut against Baroda. Bengal, with three centurions in their last match, will clearly rely on their batting with Dasgupta, who has 538 runs at 44.83 including two vital hundreds this season, leading the way. In the bowling stakes, he may well be rubbing his palms in anticipation with the successful duo of Saurasish Lahiri, the talented young offspinner, and Shib Paul, the right-arm fast bowler, coming good. Lahiri, Bengal's leading wicket-taker, is ranked fifth in this season's bowling tally, and together with Paul may prove difficult for UP to deal with on the low Lucknow surface.

As for the hosts, their confidence comes from three outright victories in the last three games and, that too, in away encounters on different surfaces. Kaif maintains that if his bowlers can take 20 wickets three times outside home, then they definitely hold the upper hand, home advantage and all. Praveen Kumar, with 34 wickets, is the highest wicket-taker between both sides, while Piyush Chawla, the much-talked-about legspinner who is also part of the India Under-19 team for the World Cup, has 30. Not to be overlooked in UP's bowling attack is Ashish Winston Zaidi, who at 34, is still very capable of sending down his wily medium pacers and teasing the batsman.

The pitch
The pitch at the KD Singh Babu Stadium is known to be sluggish in nature - predominantly there is minimal lift for the fast bowlers - and on current view the hard and shiny surface looks to have just a flicker of grass on the good-length areas, which still require some rolling. Essentially, whoever calls right at the toss will definitely not think twice about batting. In three matches at this venue, UP have posted 400-plus scores twice - in one they made Punjab follow-on - and one outright victory against Hyderabad. The key, thus, will be in getting a sizeable first-innings score.

Guiding lights
Kaif, returning to the side when left out of the national squad, has been UP's energizer-bunny. UP started on a disastrous note, losing their first two games at home and drawing the next two. But once Kaif joined the bandwagon and brought with him a much-needed vigour, a spirit of self-belief was instilled in the struggling team and since then they have won three matches.

If Kaif brought his international experience to the fore when UP were suffering, Paras Mhambrey, the former Mumbai and India fast bowler, played the big brother role for Bengal admirably. Mhambrey, after helping Mumbai secure the Ranji title the previous season, took over the coach's role at a time when Bengal were becoming stale. He opted for the untested and untried fervour of youth instead of experienced players who looked well past their sell-by date. His strategy worked, and Dasgupta and his side did not miss an opportunity to acknowledge Mhambrey's role in their success.

Final count
This will be Bengal's 12th appearance in the Ranji final, which they won twice in the 1938-39 and 1989-90 seasons. UP have come close to winning on three occasions, the last time in 1997-98, but they have yet to lift the crown.

Cold fervour
The premier cricket tournament in India stopped attracting the crowds in the last decade due to a lack of international stars making their presence felt. It would be hard, thus, to expect Lucknowites, who are well swathed in their woolens, to flock to the KD Singh Babu Stadium over the next five days.

Uttar Pradesh:
Jyoti Prakash Yadav, Shiva Shukla, Praveen Kumar, Mohammad Kaif (capt), Suresh Raina, Gyanendra Pandey, Rizwan Shamshad, Piyush Chawla, Amir Khan (wk), Ashish Winston Zaidi, Shalabh Srivastava, R Prakash, R Mishra, Praveen Gupta.

Bengal:
Deep Dasgupta (capt/wk), Arindam Das, Subhomoy Das, Abhishek Jhunjhunwala, Rohan Gavaskar, Manoj Tiwary, Laxmi Ratan Shukla, Saurashish Lahiri, Shibsagar Singh, Ranadeb Bose, Shib Paul, Subhojit Paul, Ashok Dinda, MY Lodhgar.