Bihar-lad Apoorva Anand creates record in BCCI U-19 tournaments

New Delhi, July 29: Bihar's Under-19 cricketer Apoorva Anand has claimed a unique record in Cooch Behar Trophy and Veenu Mankad Trophy for young cricketers.

Both these domestic tournaments are organised by the BCCI for the Under-19 players where they can perform well and attract the attention of both states as well as national selectors towards them.

Apoorva Anand has picked up 62 and 17 wickets respectively in Cooch Behar Trophy and Veenu Mankad Trophy to create a record. The left-arm spinner has scalped 79 wickets in 16 games. Stats claim that the record of picking up most wickets in a single season of Cooch Behar and Veenu Mankad Trophies was previously held by legendary India spinner Bishan Singh Bedi.

Before Apoorva, the record was held by Mihir Diwakar who picked up 33 wickets in the two tournaments, combined, during 1999-2000 season for undivided Bihar. Apurva is leading the U-19 Bihar side and apart from being the leading wicket-taker in the tournament, he also has the best economy rate in the season.

It is expected that his performance in the U-19 tournaments will earn Apoorva a spot in Bihar's Ranji Trophy squad for the upcoming season.

Apoorva has been playing cricket from the age of seven and considers New Zealand spin great Daniel Vettori as his role model and inspiration. He studied in Dehradun in his early years and later shifted to Delhi. Apoorva has played for Jharkhand in U-16 before shifting to Bihar.