India vs Australia: Memorable ODI encounters in Australia

Indian cricket team is set for another memorable tour of Australia. The visitors will begin their tour with a three-match ODI series on November 27 at Sydney Cricket Ground. Both teams have history of entertaining the audience with some unforgettable on-field moments. As the teams are getting prepared to add more, let’s look into five such notable matches between India and Australia played in Australia.

One-run win

The World Cup in 1992 saw India and Australia involving in one of the close encounters in the history of the tournament. Australia had the hosting rights and they were also the defending champions as well. The 12^th match of the showpiece event was between Australia and India and Australia won the toss at Brisbane.

Keeping faith on the batting line up, the Australian captain Allan Border elected to bat first. The team was almost the same as the 1987 World Cup with a few changes. David Boon once again clicked and scored a valuable 43 off 60 balls. Since both openers failed this time, as a one down batter he had to take that extra charge.

Dean Jones then scored 90 off 108 deliveries and helped Australia set the score of 237/9. Kapil Dev and Manoj Prabhakar were brilliant in this match. Both took three wickets each and finished with identical bowling figures (10-2-41-2). India, while chasing lost their first wicket at very early stage and Srikkanth was gone for a duck.

Mohammad Azharuddin took the lead this time and scored 93 off 102 balls to keep the game on for his side. He kept building partnerships with Ravi Shastri (25), Sachin Tendulkar (11), Kapil Dev (21), and Sanjay Manjrekar (47). Even after Azhar’s dismissal, Indians had their hope in Manjrekar. But once he was run-out, India started losing wickets in a heap. They lost last three wickets for just four runs and eventually lost the match by only one run.

Winning six by Lee

During the 2004 VB series India and Australia met at Sydney Cricket Ground for a day-night encounter. India did not have a good start and found themselves in slight trouble with 80/3 on board in the 16^th over. This was when Yuvraj Singh joined VVS Laxman who was going through the best phase of his ODI career.

Laxman scored three centuries in that week, second of which came in this match as remained unbeaten on 106. But his innings was overshadowed by the brilliance of Yuvraj Singh who played one of the best knocks by an Indian batsman Down Under. Singh scored 139 off 122 balls including sixteen crashing boundaries and two huge sixes. They added 213 runs for the 4^th wicket and Indians finished on 296/4.

The match was interrupted by rains multiple times and the adjusted target for the Aussies was finally 225 in 34 overs. Adam Gilchrist led the charge with his 72-ball 95 and along with Ricky Ponting took Australia to 150/1 in the 22^nd over.

However, Indians fought back strongly; young Irfan Pathan picked up Ponting and Damien Martyn on consecutive deliveries and Murali Kartik got rid off Gilchrist in the next over. Michael Clarke, their last hope was dismissed by Ganguly in the last ball of the 32^nd over. With Australia still requiring 15 runs in last two overs with two wickets in hand, Andy Bichel and Brett Lee kept the show on. Lee finally hit a huge six with one ball in hand to win the match.

Youngsters register historical win

India and Australia were joined by Sri Lanka in the 2008 Commonwealth Bank series. After a controversial Test series, India opted for a young ODI outfit without stalwarts like Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, and Anil Kumble. The young Indian team surprised everyone and reached the final along with host Australia. In the best of three final, India won the first game thanks to a Sachin Tendulkar century while chasing.

The teams met at Brisbane Cricket Ground to play the second final. Tendulkar again batted brilliantly to score 91 out of the team total of 258/9. He got good support from Yuvraj Singh (38), MS Dhoni (36), and Robin Uthappa (30).

Australia needed to win the match to keep their chance alive. But Praveen Kumar had a different idea. He sent Adam Gilchrist in the 1^st over followed by Ricky Ponting in the 3^rd and Michael Clarke in the 9^th over. At 32/3 Australia started their fightback. Mathew Hayden (55) and Andrew Symonds (42) added 89 runs in the partnership before both of them were dismissed in quick succession.

Michael Hussey and James Hopes built another partnership of 76 runs to take Australia close. However, Indian bowlers kept their cool- Sreesanth scalped the wickets of Hussey and Mitchell Johnson, Kumar returned to take his 4^th wicket of the day, and Irfan Pathan picked up two wickets in the 50^th over. India recorded a memorable 9-run victory and first ever tri-series win on Australian soil.

Pandey’s only century

Manish Pandey played 26 ODIs for India and his most memorable innings came at Sydney in the last fixture during India’s tour of Australia in 2015-16. Australia already won the series 4-0 and Indians were playing for pride. Indian bowlers had yet another failed outing as Australia scored a daunting 330/7 in their 50 overs.

There were centuries from David Warner (122) and Mitchell Marsh (102*). Jasprit Bumrah in his debut ODI finished with 2/40 whereas Umesh Yadav went for 82 runs in his eight overs. Indians looked good in their chase as the openers, Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma added 123 runs in 18.2 overs.

Australia’s opening bowler John Hastings provided the much-needed breakthrough by picking up Dhawan and then went on to scalp Virat Kohli in his next over. After these two quick dismissals Pandey joined Sharma and the duo added 97 runs within next 15 overs. Sharma was unlucky to be dismissed on 99 as he became the prey of Hastings and the fast bowler finished with three wickets for 61 runs.

With India still requiring 100 runs to win the match, MS Dhoni walked in. Indian captain contributed 34 runs off 42 balls in the 94-run partnership with Manish Pandey. On the other hand, Pandey recorded his maiden ODI hundred. His Man of the Match performance saw him finishing the match unbeaten on 114 off just 81 deliveries with eight fours and one six.

One-man show by Chahal

During India’s last tour of Australia, the teams met at Melbourne Cricket Ground in the final match of the three-match ODI series. It was the deciding encounter of the series with both teams managing to win one match each previously. Indian captain Virat Kohli elected to bowl first after winning the toss. It was a disciplined performance by Indian bowling unit as the bowlers picked up wickets on regular intervals.

The opening bowlers Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Mohammed Shami took two wickets each but the leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal was the star of the show. Chahal delivered his career-best performance as the crafty tweaker created a wave of spin of the Aussie batsmen and finished with 6/42. For Australia, Peter Handscomb could reach half-century and top scored with 58.

Chasing 230 runs, India had a shaky start with both openers falling cheaply. Thankfully two of their most experienced batters, Kohli and MS Dhoni built a partnership to provide stability. They stitched together 54 runs for the 3^rd wicket before Kohli was gone for 46 runs in the 30^th over.

MS Dhoni (87*) was joined by Kedar Yadav (61*) and the duo registered a perfect finish for India. They batted steadily and the Dhoni-Yadav partnership turned out to be the gamechanger for the visitors. They added unbeaten 121 runs for the 4^th wicket. Chahal was undoubtedly the Man of the Match and Dhoni finished with the Man of the Series award for 193 runs with three 50s.