Test Cricket

India has the finest test cricket players in the world. Test cricket is the longest version of cricket sport. It is an ultimate test between cricketing countries like India among the cricketers’ abilities to play the game. Today, it remained the highest form of game since the matches in it involved tests of strength and abilities. In India, the most popular test cricket players include the names of Nawab Patudi, Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar, Anil Kumble, Sachin Tendulkar, and Rahul Dravid. Their contributions and performances in terms of test cricket are hardly measured.

Nawab Patudi

Nawab Patudi is fondly called as “Tiger”. He became the captain of the Indian Cricket Team in 1962. He made his test cricket debut in 1961 during the test match in Delhi against England. He scored 13 runs during this match. However, after his test cricket debut, he lost his right eye vision through a car accident.

The captaincy of Nawab Patudi had led the Indian Cricket Team in 40 matches whereas 12 of it were won by the team. Though the winning percentage of his captaincy was not very high, he was known as captain full of winning confidence, which he had instilled on his players. In addition, he often boosts up the morale of his players that considerably made them won various cricket victories. He was given the credit of being the first Indian Cricket captain who brought the team to its first Test Cricket victory internationally.

The Test Cricket career of Nawab Patudi includes 2,793 runs and 46 matches in 6 centuries. His batting average has 34.91 runs. In 1975, he played his last test match at Mumbai against the West Indies where he scored 18 runs.

Kapil Dev

Kapil Dev had leaded the Indian Cricket Team to the 1983 World Cup victory. Among his test cricket career achievements include breaking the record of Richard Hadlee of 431 wickets; the first Indian to score in ODI century; being the only cricketer to take 400 wickets and score 4,000 test runs; and was named as the “Indian Cricketer of the Century.

In 1978, Kapil Dev made his test cricket career debut during a match at Faisalabad against Pakistan. In a test match held at Karachi, he scored during the third match with just 33 balls. This is the undisputed score ever made by an Indian cricketer. On the same year, he made his debut in an ODI match played at Quetta against Pakistan where he took one wicket of 27 runs, and score of 13 runs.

Kapil Dev was a household name in Indian Cricket Team for the 1983 World Cup victory. Against the Zimbabwe, the team won by 31 runs. It was a crucial match yet Kapil scored a big 175 runs off 138 balls. His innings played at the match were regarded by Wisden Magazine as one of the topmost ODI batting performances of all time.

Sunil Gavaskar

Sunil Gavaskar is regarded as one of the best opening batsmen in test cricket history. Among his achievements include being awarded by Padma Bhushan; as the 1980 Wisden Cricketer; highest number of runs in a test debut series against West Indies; one of the only two cricketers to score centuries in every innings in three consecutive times; and the first player to score more than 10,000 runs in tests.

On March 6, 1971, Sunil Gavaskar made his test cricket debut during a test match held at Port of Spain against the West Indies. During this match, he scored 132 runs, which made India won its first test cricket victory. The victory as well as the test performances made by Sunil Gavaskar was not repeated after a period of 35 years until the year 2006 came.

The overall performance of Sunil Gavaskar on his test cricket career includes 125 test matches; 10,122 runs with 45 half-centuries and 34 centuries; 51.12 runs in batting average; and 236 highest score of not out.

Anil Kumble

The test cricket career of Anil Kumble began in a test series held at Manchester against England in August 1990. He gave 105 runs in 43 overs, and took three wickets. His achievements include being the highest wicket-takes in India both for Tests and ODIs; best Indian bowling figure in ODI; one of the two bowlers to take ten wickets in test innings; only player who score 2,000 runs and take over 500 test wickets, after Shane Warne; and 1996 Wisden Cricketer of the Year.

Anil Kumble was a right-handed batsman and specialized in right-arm leg spin bowling. He had taken more than 300 wickets in test matches, and has the third biggest number of wickets in the test cricket history.

Sachin Tendulkar

Sachin Tendulkar is regarded as one of the greatest batsmen in history of Indian Cricket. In 1989, he made his test cricket debut in a match held in Karachi against Pakistan. In this match, he scored 15 runs prior he was bowled out by Wagar Younjs. His achievements include having the most centuries and most runs in ODIs; highest number of test centuries; being the first cricketer in ODIs to make 10,000 runs; has the most runs in the history of World Cup; has the highest individual score by an Indian; 1997 Wisden Cricketer of the Year; and the 1997-1998 Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award.

Rahul Dravid

Rahul David made his cricket career debut in ODI Cricket in a match played Sri Lanka and India. The game was on April 3, 1996 at Singapore. In this match, he scored just three runs. Apparently, his test cricket career debut was made on June 20, 1996 against England where he scored 95 runs. Among his achievements include being the 2004 ICC Player of the Year; having a great partnership with Sachin Tendulkar of 331 runs in the ODI cricket history against New Zealand; having the best career test average among other new test batsmen; and has the longest streak of consecutive tests from the time of his debut.

Among the remarkable achievements of Rahul David is getting the first Man of the Match Award in a Test Match in the year 1996-1997. The match was held in South Africa. In this match, he scored 81 and 148 runs, which were both top score respectively in both innings.