India’s 500th Test Milestone

When India wrapped up their First Test victory by 197 runs over New Zealand at Kanpur, nobody was surprised. Go back fifty years or more, and it would have been a cause for celebration. This was India’s 500th Test match, excluding the two cancelled or abandoned, which is a genuine landmark in the nation’s sporting history.

In total, they have won 130, lost 157 drawn 212 and tied one, the classic against Australia in 1986. But those results, spread over 84 long years, are too broad to tell the true picture of India cricket.

Of the first ton, spanning 35 years, India won a mere 10, losing 40, and it took 25 matches and 20 years before they notched their first success, against England at what was then Madras. Mind you, Donald Carr’s wasn’t the greatest side ever to tour the Asian sub-continent, but Vinoo Mankad’s twelve wicket haul is impressive against any opposition.

The next 100 took just 15 years, and the win percentage improved to 25%. That period included a 15-game unbeaten run in 1979-80, although all bar three (drawn) were played on home soil. Those were the days of Gavaskar, Vengsarkar, Venkat and a young Kapil Dev. Just before that sequence, there had been and that famous series success against the otherwise all-conquering West Indies.

From heroes to zeroes. Between 1982 and 1984, India went 21 without a single win, and the third century comprised a 21:26 win:loss ratio. It wasn’t as if they had bad players in the early Nineties, and in 1993 Mohammad Azharuddin’s team featuring Tendulkar, Kamble and Kumble destroyed Gooch’s England 3-0.

Between 1996 and 2006, India finally won more than they lost (32 vs 31), albeit aided by the introduction to Test cricket of Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. It was still a struggle for them on their travels but there were some memorable match victories, none more so than an innings trouncing of Mark Taylor’s Aussies at Eden Gardens in ’98.

However, it’s in the fifth hundred that offers the evidence of India’s progress. With 42 triumphs and 30 draws, the past decade has seen the nation become the best side in the world before slipping back in transition. Nevertheless, that transition is looking close to completion.

This week’s win over the Black Caps took their latest unbeaten run to eleven, of which eight were won. Snapping at the heels of Pakistan, a return to the ICC number one position is surely just a matter of time. It’s strange to think that their current top-scoring batsman, Virat Kohli, has fewer than 4000 Test runs to his name.

For ages the Achilles heel has been the bowling, and it still looks a very inexperienced attack. Only Ravi Ashwin has taken more than 100 wickets, but he is breaking records galore. His 203 have come in a mere 37 Tests, quicker than even Muralitharan managed. That’s even more remarkable when he seems to be one of the side’s heaviest run-makers, too. Jadeja’s miserly maiden-fest deservedly won the Man of the Match at Kanpur but he remains more of a one-day man. Should more of India’s ODI and T20 specialists spread their wings in the five-day format, India’s sixth century of Tests could be very special indeed.

Remembering Azharuddin - the cricketer

Mohammad Azharuddin has every right to celebrate his lengthy campaign to overturn a lifetime ban from cricket imposed in 2000 by the BCCI for match-fixing. Mind you, I haven't seen any quotes where he maintains his innocence. However, as a parliamantarian a shady past isn't always a virtue and there must be more votes in being a legendary batsman and captain of your country rather than a sleazy cheat. By the way, why is it that some international cricketers tainted by dubious practices seem to gravitate towards politics? Hmm, hard to answer that one....

Back to Azha, he really was one of the all-time great Indian batsmen. In my book, he would eclipse both Ganguly and Laxman in the fantasy middle-order. His Test career began and ended with a hundred, but his misdemeanours robbed him of reaching the milestone of 100 Tests just one short. That 'missing' appearance will be with him all his life, as will the reason for it. It would be so much more rewarding to be remembered instead for the start of his international career.

He made his debut aged 21 at Eden Gardens against England in December 1984 in a side captained by Sunil Gavaskar. While the result was a rain-affected draw, he struck 110 and shared a double-century stand with Ravi Shastri. In the next game, Fowler and Gatting each passed 200 but the young Azharuddin responded with a second innings 105 but couldn't stave off defeat. His very next knock, at Kanpur, was 122, and featured his third 150+ partnership. Unfortunately his next three Tests in Sri Lanka yielded a paltry top score of 43, but you can't have everything. History had already been made.

He reached three figures in successive Tests again in 1990, and in three out of four in 1986-7. There were 22 hundreds in all, many beautifully crafted. The 111-ball 122 at Lord's in 1990, consisting of 22 fours, should be remembered by all who witnessed it, but will be a mere statistical footnote to a game which featured Graham Gooch's 333 and 123! He enjoyed a great record against England, New Zealand and Sri Lanka in particular, but struggled against the West Indian pace attacks. He certainly wasn't alone in that failing!

As well as the five-day game, he also represented India in 334 ODIs, scoring more than 9000 runs. In a fifteen-year career there were no bookending hundreds in this format, and of course he didn't get a chance to play Twenty20, where his inventive play could have produced many wristy flicks to the boundary. His athletic fielding would have been an asset in any form of cricket and only Ganguly has skippered India on more occasions in Tests.

I don't know what he is like as an MP but he was a batsman in the classical mode who apparently got greedy in a time when bookies were getting their hooks into many top players, from Jadeja to Cronje, and many more who managed to avoid serious punishment. No excuses for that but just watch Azha in full flow and wonder why it all went wrong.

England v India - India's Best XI

With only five home Tests against England in the last decade, my picks for India's best XI of the past forty years is short of players likely to feature in the forthcoming series. No Dhoni, Zaheer Khan, Gambhir or Sehwag. However, it's a formidable line-up in anyone's book.

Legendary opener Sunil Gavaskar played 22 times in these fixtures but only in 1982 did he really show his true talent. His average of 36 was well short of his Test career figure of 51 but his aggregate of 1331 runs makes him an automatic choice. No other opener has scored particularly highly, so I'm making Sunil's partner his 1970s team-mate Farokh Engineer. A wicket-keeper who usually batted at six or seven, his highest score in five-day cricket came at the top of the order at Bombay in February 1973. He was a fine 'keeper, too, and he needed to be when standing up to India's spin quartet of that era.

The middle-order is so hard to pick. Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar didn't disappoint against England, scoring over 1400 runs between them. The Little Master has aggregated 848 in eleven games at more than 60. So what about Ganguly and Laxman? Well, they don't make it. Neither does Duleep Vengsarkar, the elegant strokeplayer from an earlier age. Instead, disgraced former captain Mohammad Azharuddin is my number five. He is the only man in the past four decades to have notched four centuries in the India vs England series, peakng with 182 at Eden Gardens in 1993, and averaging 93 in only six Tests. Creeping in at number six is another regular from the '70s, Gundappa Viswanath. More squat than Vengsarkar, he nonetheless compiled more than 1000 runs and struck by far his top Test score, 222, in the 1982 draw at Chennai towards the end of his career.

Kapil Dev outstrips Ravi Shastri in the all-rounder stakes, averaging almost 48 with the bat and capturing 42 wickets at 35 apiece. In any case, there are so many other fabulous spinners to choose from. The most prolific wicket-taker in these series is also one of the highest wicket-takers in Test history: Anil Kumble. He played only nine Tests at home to England yet snaffled 56 victims at only 23 apiece, utterly dominant in both 1993 and 2001 in particular.

I've already mentioned the Fab Four spinners from the '60s and '70s and three of them could easily join this particular fantasy XI. However, poor Kapil Dev can't be expected to shoulder the pace burden alone, so I'm pairing him on the new ball with Madan Lal. Maybe not an all-time great, and he looked very ordinary on English pitches, but he proved to be an admirable foil for his more illustrious compatriots in 1981-2. That leaves only two more places. Harbhajan Singh was in the frame, as was Prasanna, but the line-up is completed by Bishan Bedi and Bhagwath Chandrasekhar. Both took more than 50 wickets at home to England at averages below 25. They bowled so many overs they often simply ground down visiting batsmen into submission. Were Indian pitches in those days realy prepared for spinners? Bedi, Venkat, Chandra and Prasanna reigned supreme together in the Indian attack for more than a decade but their longevity also owes much to the dearth of seam talent at the time. After all, English fast men were also quite successful on those same strips, as I shall elaborate upon next time....

A recap on my India vs England Eleven:-

Gavaskar, Engineer (+), Dravid, Tendulkar, Azharuddin (*), Viswanath, Kapil Dev, Kumble, Madan Lal, Bedi, Chandrasehkar.