Duleep Trophy: Venkatesh Iyer forced to walk out after Gaja's wild throw

An ambulance made its way into the ground after a wild throw, on follow-through, by West Zone medium pacer Chintan Gaja, injured Central Zone's Venkatesh Iyer during their Duleep Trophy match in Coimbatore on Friday.

Iyer hit a six and opened his account off Gaja. He defended it right back to Gaja in the next ball, who threw it back at Iyer in anger, following which the batter was down on the ground in visible pain. The ambulance arrived in the middle of the ground, and the stretcher was out too, but the 27-year-old decided to walk out off the field.

However, Iyer did come back later, but was dismissed by Tanush Kotian on 14. The all-rounder did return to bat but he did not field for the Central Zone and was replaced by Ashok Menaria. 

After the West Zone came for batting, the team was bowled out for 257, among the list of notable contributors were Prithvi Shaw (60), Rahul Tripathi (67), Shams Mulani (41) and Tanush Kotian (36). 

Kumar Kartikeya (5/66) was a wrecker-in-chief for the Central Zone, who were bowled out for 128 in the first innings. Captain Karan Sharma (34) was the top scorer for the Central Zone. Jaydev Unadkat (3/24), Tanush Kotian (3/17), Atit Sheth (2/27), Chintan Gaja (1/25), and Shams Mulani (1/30) shared the spoils for Central Zone.

Duleep trophy is a domestic first-class cricket tournament organised in India. It was named after Kumar Shri Duleepsinhji of Nawanagar (also known as 'Duleep'). The competition was originally played by teams representing geographical zones of India.