On this day over four decades ago, Sunil Gavaskar-led Team India broke their Australia curse by registering their first-ever Test series win over the Aussie team in Bombay. India went into the sixth and last Test match of the series 1-0 up and all they needed was a draw to record their first tournament win over Australia in the red-ball cricket. On the other hand, it was a must-win affair for Kim Hughes-led Australia, if they wished to square the series.
Batting first, Indian openers Sunil Gavaskar (123 runs) and Chetan Chauhan gave the team a flying start by putting up a 192-run stand for the first wicket. Allan Border broke India’s opening partnership by removing Chauhan from the attack. After that, India lost a couple of early wickets in form of Dilip Vengsarkar (6 runs off 64 balls) and Gundappa Viswanath (10 runs off 40 balls).
Syed Kirmani was sent to bat at number five as nightwatchman to get India to the next day without losing any more wickets. However, he went on to score a magnificent hundred and in the process, further strengthened India’s position in the match. At the time, Kirmani was only the third nightwatchman to score a Test hundred.
Batting at number 9, Karsan Ghavri scored a quickfire 86 to guide India to the respectable total of 458 runs for the loss of eight wickets before declaring their innings.
In reply, Australia managed to score just 160 runs in their first innings with Graham Yallop (60) being the only cricketer to go past 25 runs mark in the Aussie team.
Aussie batter failed in countering India’s bowling attack even in their second innings after the follow-on was imposed with Allan Border (61) and Kim Hughes (80) being the only two players to reach double-figure. India bundled out Australia for 198 runs in the second innings and to register a thumping win an innings and 100 runs.
Following this win, India won the six-match Test series 2-0.
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