India Cricket History


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World T20, 2nd Semi-Final

India vs West Indies

at Mumbai, Mar 31, 2016
West Indies 196/3 beat India 192/2 by 7 wickets


India Cricket History

Indian Cricket Team

The Indian cricket team is an international cricket team representing India. It is governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, the cricket governing body in India. The Indian Cricket Team is currently the highest paid sports team in the world
Debuting in Test cricket at Lord's, England on 25 June 1932, the Indian cricket team became the sixth Test playing team. For nearly fifty years, India was weaker than most of the other Test cricket teams, such as Australia and England, winning only 35 of the 196 matches it played during this period. The team gained strength near the end of the 50-year period with the emergence of players such as Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev and the Indian spin quartet. The Indian team has continued to be highly ranked since then in both Test cricket and One-day Internationals. The team won the Cricket World Cup in 1983 and was runners-up in 2003
In December 2006, it played and won its first ever Twenty20 international in South Africa, becoming the most recent Test team to play 20-20 cricket.

Indian Cricket History

Upto 1950

The British brought cricket to India in the early 1700s, with the first cricket match being played in 1721. In 1848, the Parsi community in Mumbai formed the Oriental Cricket Club, the first cricket club to be established by Indians. After slow beginnings, the Parsis were eventually invited by the Europeans to play a match in 1877. By 1912, the Parsis, Hindus, and Muslims of Bombay played a quadrangular tournament with the Europeans every year. In the early 1900s, some Indians went on to play for the English cricket team. Some of these, such as Ranjitsinhji and KS Duleepsinhji were greatly appreciated by the British and their names went on to be used for the Ranji Trophy and Duleep Trophy-two of the major domestic tournaments in India. In 1911, an Indian team went on their first official tour of England, but only played English county teams and not the English cricket team. India was invited into the Imperial Cricket Council in 1926 and made its debut as a Test-cricket-playing-nation in England in 1932 led by CK Nayudu. The match was given Test status despite being only 3 days in length. The team was not strong in its batting at this point and went on to lose by 158 runs. Indian team continued to improve throughout the 1930s and '40s but did not achieve an international victory during this period. The team's first series as an independent country was in 1948 against Sir Donald Bradman's Invincibles (a name given to the Australian cricket team of that time). Australia won the five-match series, 4-0.

1950 - 1970

India recorded their first Test victory against England at Madras in 1952 and later in the year won their first Test series against Pakistan. They continued their improvement throughout the early 1950s with a series win against New Zealand in 1956, however they did not win again in the remainder of the 1950s and lost badly to strong Australian and English sides. The next decade developed India's reputation as a team that is considered very strong at home. Although they only won two series (both against New Zealand), they managed to draw home series against Pakistan, England and Australia.

1970 - 1980

The key to India's bowling in the 1970s were the Indian spin quartet. This period also saw the emergence of two of India's best ever batsmen, Sunil Gavaskar and Gundappa Viswanath. Indian pitches have had tendency to support spin and this was exploited by the spin quartet to create collapses in opposing batting lineups. These players were responsible for the back-to-back series wins in 1971 in the West Indies and in England, under the captaincy of Ajit Wadekar.
The advent of One-Day International cricket in 1971 created a new dimension in the cricket world. However, India was not considerably strong in ODIs at this point and batsmen like captain Gavaskar were known for their defence-based approaches to batting. India began as a weak team in ODIs and did not manage to qualify for the second round in the first two editions of the Cricket World Cup.

1980 - 2000

India developed a more competent batting line-up. Batsmen like Mohammed Azharuddin, Dilip Vengsarkar and all-rounder Ravi Shastri were prominent during this time. India won the Cricket World Cup in 1983, defeating the favourites West Indies in the final, owing to a strong bowling performance. In spite of this the team performed poorly in the Test arena, including 28 consecutive Test matches without a victory. In 1984, India won the Asia Cup and in 1985, won the World Championship of Cricket in Australia. However, India, remained a very weak team outside the Indian subcontinent. India's Test series victory in 1986 against England remained the last Test series win by India outside subcontinent for the next 19 years. The 1987 Cricket World Cup was held in India. The 1980s saw Gavaskar and Kapil Dev (India's best all rounder to this date) at the pinnacle of their careers. Gavaskar made a Test record 34 centuries as he became the first man to reach the 10,000 run mark and Kapil Dev who later became the highest wicket taker in Test cricket with 434 wickets. The period was also marked by an unstable leadership, with Gavaskar and Kapil exchanging the captaincy several times.
The addition of Sachin Tendulkar (aged 16 at the time) and Anil Kumble to the national side in 1989 and 1990 further improved the team. The following year, Javagal Srinath, India's fastest bowler since Amar and Nissar Singh made his debut. Despite this, during the 1990s, India did not win any of its 33 Tests outside the subcontinent while it won 17 out of its 30 Tests at home. After being eliminated by neighbours Sri Lanka on home soil at the 1996 Cricket World Cup, the team underwent a year of change as Rahul Dravid, Saurav Ganguly, later to be become captains of the team, made their debut in the same Test at Lord's. Azharuddin was replaced by Tendulkar as captain in late 1996, but after a personal and team form slump, Tendulkar relinquished the captaincy and Azharuddin was reinstalled at the beginning of 1998. With the captaincy burden removed, Tendulkar was the world's leading run-scorer in both Tests and ODIs, as India enjoyed a home Test series win over Australia, the best ranked team in the world. After failing to reach the semifinals at the 1999 Cricket World Cup, Tendulkar was again made captain, and had another poor run, losing 3-0 on a tour of Australia and then 2-0 at home to South Africa. Tendulkar resigned, vowing never to captain the team again, with Sourav Ganguly appointed the new captain. The team was further damaged in 2000 when former captain Azharuddin and fellow batsman Ajay Jadeja were implicated in a match-fixing scandal and given life bans.
India's performance in the remaining World Cups has been considerably consistent. In the 1987 Cricket World Cup, the team advanced to the semi-finals as favourites, they did the same in 1996; both times they suffered defeats in the semi-finals. India was weaker in the 1999 Cricket World Cup, and did not make it past the Super Six round. In the 2003 Cup, India lost only two games (both against reigning champions Australia) and advancing to the finals, where they were defeated by Australia.

Since 2000

The Indian team underwent major improvements with the appointment of John Wright as India's first ever foreign coach. India maintained a very good record against Australia and, and had not been beaten by them in a test series in India since 1969. This was the reason for Australian captain Steve Waugh labelling India as the "Final Frontier". India also won a historic test and ODI series against arch-rivals Pakistan.

Editor: Nishanth Gopinathan.