Best innings of the decade

At the end of a batsman dominated decade, the toughest thing is to pick a list of the best innings of the decade. The usual disclaimers that “this is a personal opinion (surely biased) based on the limited cricket that I followed during the last decade” applies. Here we go, the best 11 innings of the decade in no particular order:

VVS Laxman’s 281 vs Australia at Eden Gardens Kolkata, 2001

In my book, this is simply the best innings that I have seen marginally ahead of even Lara’s 153. This was on par with Lara’s 153 as far as the context, the pressure and the quality of opponent was concerned. But what makes this better is that in this innings when he started playing there was absolutely no hope for India, through the innings we thought we would go down fighting, towards the end we even entertained thoughts of victory – this change in context through the innings influences the batting style a great deal. For instance when you have no hope, you can counterattack like Laxman did in Sydney 1999, but once you start sensing hope your instincts don’t allow you to continue to counter attack with gay abandon, you want to have a greater control and try to mix caution with aggression, later when you move to a stage of sensing victory, you get into the territory of “fear of winning” which makes a batsman lot more circumspect. But this Laxman innings had no such change in gears, it was a counter attacking innings of the highest quality from start to finish with no noticeable change through the innings. Ian Chappell kept on harping about how the quality of stroke play and the frequency with which he was piercing the field was so strikingly similar to Lara’s 277 in Sydney throughtout the innings. Now, when you have the best attributes of 2 of Lara’s very best clubbed in one innings – that’s the cricketing equivalent of Nirvana!

Nathan Astle’s 222 vs England at Christchurch, 2002

Oh boy, this was one hell of an innings. I remember my friend’s brother (who stayed in the same apartment as we did) banging our door early in the morning to wake us up to ensure that we don’t miss out on this madness of an innings. I’ll be forever grateful to him for that intrusion! To put this madness in perspective, let me give a background of the match. The match was over in four days with England winning by 98 runs – as comfortable as it gets after NZ were set a mammoth 550 runs target in the fourth innings. What appears to be an easy England victory didn’t appear that easy when we were watching live. Starting the 4th day at 28 for no loss, after giving a valiant fight NZ looked dead and buried at 301 for 8. And that’s when Astle decided to let it rip. Let it rip – well, he did a little more than that. The next one hour was quite simply the most maddening passage of batting I have seen in a long long time in test cricket. He was launching all the English bowlers out of the park with almost a contempt, literally dancing down for every non-short delivery. It was like a celebration, a six hitting competition or something. Caddick who had taken a 6 for by that time, was taken to the cleaners and so was Hoggard. In between Chris Drum got out and in came Chris Cairns at no.11 (coz of an injury). With Carins for company, Astle blasted 118 runs in 55 minutes of 69 balls to go onto become fastest scorer of double century in tests. And during the course of the partnership if you had a look at Hussain’s reactions, you wouldn’t have believed that this is a captain defending 550 in the fourth innings with the opponents on the mat at 333 for 9. Hussain had serious fears of the match slipping away. Another hour and it was gone! If an innings can instill the fear of a loss in the opponent when chasing 550 and still more than 150 runs adrift with only one wicket in hand, it ought to be rated among the very best.

Brian Lara’s 226 vs Australia at Adelaide, 2005

This was the series that WI played in Australia immediately after that ill-conceived idea of a super test between Australia vs Rest of the world. Lara carried on his bad form from the super test into the test series as well. His 6 innings in Australia before the Adelaide test read: 5, 36, 30, 14, 13 ,45. Now this is not at all surprising with Lara and so was what followed. Before this test there was an interview of Mcgrath, Warne and Lara in an Australian newspaper where all 3 were asked the same question – Do you ever doubt your ability? I don’t remember what Mcgrath said, Warne said that he goes through phases of self-doubt when he’s in the middle of a bad patch and Lara in his characteristic style said “no, never”. That’s what makes the man – the extraordinary self-belief. So he comes out to the crease at 19 for 2 and a baggage of bad form (both personal and the team’s) against Mcgrath, Lee, Warne & Macgill and puts on a show of breathtaking stroke play like only Lara can. It had all the makings of a quintessential Lara innings – the pull, cover drive, the cut, the flick, the straight drive, the hoist over mid-wicket off both the spinners and the usual team collapsing around him! When he got out, the score was 381 and Lara scored 226 out of that!

Rahul Dravid’s 148 vs England at Headingley, 2002

The innings that truly began Dravid’s journey to greatness. In windy conditions, on a damp pitch against a decent English bowling attack, Ganguly took a huge gamble of winning the toss and batting first. This decision as per Ted Corbett’s opinion should have resulted in England folding India out for less than 250 – that’s what a good bowling attack would on a headingley first day pitch against an Indian batting line up. And at 15 for 1, we could sense the all too familiar collapse. That’s when Dravid constructs a masterpiece (with adequate support from Sanjay Bangar) of such brilliance that it seemed like he was “meditating in Mint Street”. England bowlers gave all that they had in their repertoire in favorable conditions only to see Dravid smiling and almost asking – “Oh that’s all that you have. Is it?”. By the time Dravid finished his innings, the sun was out, the bowlers were tired and then Sachin & Sourav had a feast to set up the perfect match for India. Despite a 193 from Sachin, the choice of Dravid for man of the match was unanimous.

Rahul Dravid’s 233 vs Australia at Adelaide, 2003

The doppelganger of Kolkata…After scoring 556 in the first innings and having the opponent on the mat at 85 for 4, any team could have afforded to relax leave alone Australia. But they didn’t! That’s what a good memory can do! If it was Laxman playing the lead role then, it was Dravid now. After a terrible series the previous time he had come down under and failing in the first innings in the first test in Brisbane, Dravid came into this test with all kinds of self-doubts about his ability to score runs in Australia. Under that kind of pressure and with the team reeling at 85 for 4, he summoned all his mental resolve and his water tight technique to play what must be regarded as one of the most critical innings in Indian cricket’s history. What more, he comes back in the second innings and stays there till the end scoring 72 to finish off the target of 233. It was such a huge moment for Indian Cricket that Indian news channels were showing the last few runs live!

Sachin Tendulkar’s 103 vs England at Chepauk, 2008

Could anyone have written a better script? If it was a movie script we would have called it the heights of suspension of disbelief and what if it happened in reality – Well, tears in your eyes and a lump in your throat as if you scored those runs! Sachin had some unfinished business with a fourth innings chase and Chepauk. Also this was the test series immediately after the Mumbai attacks, in fact the ODI series preceding the test series was abandoned half way through because of the terrorist attack. As if all this had to come together, we almost let England run away with the match only for the Mumbai’s most proud son to enter the scene and snatch the match away from England with the perfect innings for the situation. What more, he got to his hundred with the winning shot too. Poetic justice has never had a greater meaning!


Virender Sehwag’s 83 vs England at Chepauk, 2008

If Sachin’s innings was a masterpiece, it was so close to being a non-event but for Sehwag. England set India a target of 387 in 119 overs at 3.25 per over. The typical fourth innings chase which has the chasing team in the corridor of uncertainty all the time. To go for a win or play for a draw? What if in going for a win we end up losing and what if we if in going for a draw we don’t give ourselves a chance to win or worse in playing for a draw what if we still end up losing? Before Dhoni could even completely work through this puzzle, Sehwag had come back to the pavilion after playing 23 overs of the remaining 29 overs on the fourth day. By then Dhoni didn’t even have to think – going for the win was the only option. The equation changed from 387 at 3.25 with 10 wickets in hand to 270 at 2.81 with 9 wickets in hand! There was also the little matter of the Sehwag effect which the bowlers’ would take time to recover from…This was also the innings which changed English Cricket upside down. As England were withstanding the Sehwag carnage, Pieterson was so clueless that he ended up complaining that he didn’t get enough tactical assistance from Peter Moores!

Virender Sehwag’s 201 vs Srilanka at Galle, 2008

After the first test humiliation when the greatest players of spin bowling on the planet were made to look like novices by the M&M duo, this test didn’t seem to be much different but for Sehwag again. After a solid opening partnership India lost its way completely with only Laxman getting into even double digits. The awesome foursome were struggling to decipher the Murali-Mendis (especially Mendis) magic, Sehwag was sending them on a leather hunt – one out of sheer contempt and another coz he couln’t pick his doosra and chose to attack him all the time and it paid off! In a team score of 329, he ended up scoring 201 with only 2 other batsmen crossing double digits and what more he carried his bat through as well!

Virender Sehwag’s 292 vs Srilanka at Mumbai, 2009

After getting out for 131, if a batsman feels he has missed out – who could it be?

At 10 AM Srilanka was leading by 393 runs and at 4.30 PM Srilanka are 50 runs behind – what could be the reason?

If Sambit Bal says someone is more destructive than even Viv Richards – who could it be?

Virender Sehwag.

With one innings he made the world’s most successful bowler hasten his retirement plans! To make 284 runs in just 79 overs of play is outrageous even at club level, at test cricket level it is plain barbaric – its just not on. I have never felt so sorry for any opponent when India is dominating them, really. ..He could so easily have become the second batsman after Bradman to make 300 in a single day if he had 90 overs of play. Sehwag’s batting stats at the end of the game read: 293 runs from 254 balls with 40 fours and 7 sixes at a strike rate of 115.35! As outrageous as this is, it’s only a small part of the Sehwag destruction story! Recently in Cricinfo, the commentators and columnists were asked to pick their favorite bits of the decade and out of all the cricket played in the decade, Ian Chappell picked this innings! I thought Lara played Murali masterfully but this guy has gone even further – treated him with utter disdain. I have not seen a more audacious innings in my life.


Ricky Ponting’s 156 vs England at Old Trafford in 2005

We don’t always get too see Ricky Ponting bat under real pressure like Lara or Sachin. He played for a champion team almost from the beginning of his career who also boasted of great openers from Taylor-Slater to Hayden-Langer. So he walked in at no.3 counter attacked every opponent on his way to becoming one of the all time greats. And in the ashes of 2005 and under his own captaincy, he came across situations that outside of India he wouldn’t have faced and the pressure reflected on his batting returns. With nothing much to boast about in the first 2 tests, he comes into the 3rd test and fails in the first innings to the deadly swing bowling off Simon Jones with a single digit score. With a target of 423 in 108 overs in the fourth innings, it required a gritty solid batting performance from Australia to bail themselves out of jail. And under pressure with literally no support from his teammates, Ponting plays an absolute blinder handling the conventional swing off Hoggard with the new ball and the reverse swing of Jones and Flintoff with the old ball with equal felicity. And just as he was about to reach the finish line safe, he got a beauty from Harmison but Brett Lee held his nerves to give Australia a draw which Ponting’s back to the wall effort so thoroughly deserved. This is my favorite Ponting innings.


Kumar Sangakkara’s 192 vs Australia at Hobart, 2007

This is another Astle kind of innings but with less madness and more method. Chasing 507, Sanga walks in at 15 for 1, plays a typical counter attacking innings that we associate with him till when he decided to do an Astle as he started losing partners at frequent intervals. Once Jayasuriya got out, the rest started folding and in no time it was 290 for 8. As Aussies started licking their lips in anticipation of another crushing victory, Sanga took Lee, Johnson and Clark to cleaners almost threatening to pull of a highly improbable chase only for Rudi Kuertzen to make a howler which put paid to SL’s outside chances. As great as the innings was, equally great was Sanga’s gesture to Kuertzen’s apology at the end of the match!


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