The right-handed opening batsman who grabbed everybody’s eyeballs with his hard-hitting capabilities for his franchise side Pune Supergiants in the last edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) has been chosen as the captain of Maharashtra side for the ongoing Ranji Trophy.

Tripathi, who got his opportunity after Supergiant’s regular opener Mayank Agarwal failed to impress the team management and was left out of the team. He grabbed his chance to full playing some crucial knock at the top of the order and eventually scoring 391 runs in 14 innings. However, they lost the final against the Rohit Sharma led Mumbai Indians.

Since then, he didn’t have to look back as he was picked up for the Board president XI to play against the touring Australia side. Now, he has been selected as the captain of the Maharashtra by the selectors.

Last year, Indian star batsman Kedhar Jadhav and Swapnil Gugale shared the captain’s role for the Maharashtra team but this time Gugale has not been named as the captain despite being in the team. Maharashtra will miss the service of the experienced Kedhar Jadhav who will be busy with his national duties now being a regular member of the Indian side in the white ball game. Ankit Bawne will also miss the first few matches of the Ranji Trophy for his commitments for the India A side against the New Zealand A team.

The opener against Hyderabad which was slated to take place at Gymkhana Ground was washed off without a ball being played with both the teams sharing a point each.

Maharashtra will take on an experienced Uttar Pradesh side in the match of the Ranji Trophy which will take place on October 24 with the venue yet to be decided.