INDIAN CRICKET

HISTORY

The Indian cricket team is one of the greatest cricket teams. 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 national sports team in the world (in terms of sponsorship).

Though the first match in India was recorded in 1721, when a group of sailors gathered to play in Western India, India's national cricket team didn't play their first Test match until 25 June 1932 at Lord's. They became the sixth team to play Test cricket. Traditionally much stronger at home than abroad, India proved weaker than Australia and England, winning only 35 of the 196 matches they played in their first fifty years. The team gained strength near the end of the 50-year period with the emergence of players. The Indian team has continued to be highly ranked since then in Test cricket and One Day Internationals. The team won the Cricket World Cup in 1983 and was runners-up in 2003. It also won the first World Twenty20 in 2007.

Cricket entered India through British in the early 1700s. In 1848, the Parsi community in Bombay formed the Oriental Cricket Club, the first cricket club to be established by Indians. After slow beginnings, the Europeans eventually invited the Parsis 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 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. The 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.

India recorded their first Test victory against England at Madras in 1952. Later in the year, they won their first Test series, which was 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 decade and lost badly to strong Australian and English sides. The next decade saw India's reputation develop as a team with a strong record at home. They managed to draw home series against Pakistan, England and Australia.
Indian pitches have had tendency to support spin and the spin quartet exploited this to create collapses in opposing batting lineups. They had a 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 such as the 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. Gavaskar famously blocked his way to 36 not out off 174 balls against England in the first World Cup in 1975, India scored just 132 for 3 and lost by 202 runs.

In contrast, India fielded a strong team in Test matches and were particularly strong at home where their combination of stylish batsman and beguiling spinners where seen at their best. India set a test record in the third Test against the West Indies at Port-of-Spain in 1976 when they chased 403 to win thanks to 112 from Vishwanath. This West Indian defeat is considered to be a watershed in the history of their cricket because it led to captain Clive Lloyd dispensing with spin altogether and relying entirely on a four man pace attack. In November 1976 the team established another record by scoring 524 for 9 declared against New Zealand at Kanpur without an individual scoring a century. There were six fifties, the highest being 70 by Mohinder Amarnath. The innings was the eighth instance in Test cricket where all eleven batsmen reached double figures.

During the 1980s, India developed a more attack minded batting line-up with stroke makers such as the wristy Mohammed Azharuddin, Dilip Vengsarkar and all-rounder Ravi Shastri prominent during this time. India won the

Cricket World Cup in 1983, defeating the then 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. Apart from this, 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 the subcontinent for the next 19 years. The 1987 Cricket World Cup was held in India. The 1980s saw Kapil Dev (India's best all rounder to this date) at the pinnacle of his career. Kapil Dev later became the highest wicket taker in Test cricket with 434 wickets.

The addition of Sachin Tendulkar 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 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. Tendulkar replaced Azharuddin 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.

Since 2000, the Indian team underwent major improvements with the appointment of John Wright as India's first ever foreign coach. India maintained their unbeaten home record against Australia in Test series after defeating them in 2001. The series was famous for the Kolkata Test match, in which India became only the third team in the history of Test cricket to win a Test match after following on. Australian captain Steve Waugh labelled India as the "Final Frontier" as a result of his side's inability to win a Test series in India. Victory in 2001 against the Australians marked the beginning of a dream run for India under their captain Sourav Ganguly, winning Test matches in Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka, West Indies and England. The England series is also known for India's highest ODI run-chase of 325 runs at Lord's which came in the Natwest ODI Series final against England. In the same year, India were joint winners of the

ICC Champions Trophy with Sri Lanka, and then went to the 2003 Cricket World Cup in South Africa where they reached the final only to be beaten by Australia. The 2003-2004 season also saw India play out a Test series in Australia where they drew 1-1 with world champions, and then win a Test and ODI series in Pakistan.

At the end of the 2004 season, India suffered from lack of form and fitness from its older players. A defeat in a following home Test series against Australia was followed by an ODI home series defeat against Pakistan followed by a Test series levelled 1-1. Greg Chappell took over from John Wright as the new coach of the Indian cricket team following the series, and his methods proved to be controversial during the beginning of his tenure. The tension resulted in a fallout between Chappell and Ganguly, resulting in Rahul Dravid being made captain. This triggered a revival in the team's fortunes, following the emergence of players like Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Suresh Raina, and the coming of age of players like Irfan Pathan and Yuvraj Singh. A thumping home series victory over Sri Lanka in 2005 and a level series with South Africa put India at 2nd place in the ICC ODI rankings. This was followed by a convincing ODI series win in Pakistan in early 2006 following a loss in the Test series, which gave India the world record of 17 successive ODI victories while batting second. Towards the middle of 2006 however, a 4-1 series loss in the West Indies gave rise to a slump in India's ODI form, while they achieved a 1-0 victory in the Test series that followed, giving them their first Test series victory in the Caribbean since 1971. India's ODI form, however, slumped further with a disappointing performance in the 2006 Champions Trophy and a drubbing in the ODI series in South Africa. This was followed yet again by an initial good performance in the Tests, giving India its first Test match win in South Africa, although they went on to lose the series 2-1. This Test series was marked by Ganguly's comeback to the Indian team.

The beginning of 2007 had seen a revival in the Indian team's ODI fortunes before the 2007 Cricket World Cup. Series victories against the West Indies and Sri Lanka, marked by the comeback of Ganguly, and strong form by Tendulkar, and the emergence of young attacking players to tip India as a real chance to do well at the 2007 Cricket World Cup. However, defeats to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka saw India fail to reach the final eight.
India's traditional strengths have always been its line-up of spin bowlers and batsmen. Recently, it has a very strong batting lineup with Goutham Gambir, Rohit sharma and Virender Sehwag all being selected to play for the ICC World XI in the 2005 "SuperTest" against Australia. In previous times, India was unique in that it was the only country to regularly field three spinners in one team, whereas one is the norm, and of the fifteen players to have taken more than 100 wickets, only four were pace bowlers from the last 20 years. However in recent years, Indian pace bowling has improved, with the emerging talents of Zaheer Khan, Irfan Pathan, Rudra Pratap Singh, Munaf Patel,Sreesanth, Praveen Kumar and Ishant Sharma many more playing in the national team.

In December 2006, it played and won its first ever Twenty20 international in South Africa, becoming the most recent Test team to play Twenty20 cricket. After winning the Test series against England in August 2007, Rahul Dravid stepped down as the captain of the team following which Mahendra Singh Dhoni was made the captain of the Twenty20 and ODI team. In September 2007, it won the first ever Twenty20 World Cup held in South Africa, beating Pakistan by 5 runs in a thrilling final. India now is the most successful 20-20 team, measured by the winning. Then they toured Australia with a controversial series that they lost 2-1 in test but come back for a whitewash final against them. percentage.

Governing body

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is the governing body over the Indian cricket team. The Board has been operating since 1929 and represents India with the International Cricket Council. It is amongst the richest sporting organizations in the world, it sold media rights to for India's matches in the next 4 years for $612,000,000 US dollars. It negotiates India's sponsorships, its future tours and the selection of its players.
The International Cricket Council determines India's upcoming matches through its future tours program. However, the BCCI, with its influential financial position in the cricketing world, has often challenged the ICC's program and called for more tours between India, Australia, Pakistan and England which are more likely to earn more revenue as opposed to tours with Bangladesh or Zimbabwe. In the past, the BCCI has also come into conflict with the ICC in relation to sponsorships and the legitimacy of the ICC Champions Trophy.

Selection Committee

Selection for the Indian cricket team occurs through the BCCI's zonal selection policy, where each of the five zones is represented with one selector and one of the members nominated by BCCI as the Chairman of the Selection Committee. This has sometimes led to controversy as to whether these selectors are biased towards their zones.

The current chairman of Selection Committee is Dilip Vengsarkar. Bhupinder Singh Sr., Sanjay Jagdale, Ranjib Biswal and Venkatapathy Raju are the other members of the selection committee whose terms started in October 2006 and end in September 2008 with BCCI holding the rights for a one-year extension.

Tournament History

ODI World Cup:
1975: Round 1

1979: Round 1

1983: Champions

1987: Semi Finals

1992: Round 1

1996: Semi Finals

1999: Super 6 (6th Place)

2003: Runners Up

2007: Round 1

Twenty20 World Cup:

2007: Champions

ICC Champions Trophy:

1998: Semi Finals
2000: Runners Up
2002: Joint Winner with Sri Lanka
2004: Round 1 2006: Group stage

Commonwealth Games:

1998: Round 1

Asia Cup:

1984: Champions
1986: Boycott
1988: Champions
1990/1991: Champions
1995: Champions
1997: Runners Up
2000: 3rd Place
2004: Runners Up 2008: Runners Up

Team colours

When playing one-day cricket, the Indian cricket team has in recent years worn a sky blue shirt and pants. At present, the shirt also contains a diagonal tricolour design which reflects the Flag of India and the name of their main sponsor, Sahara. The one-day cap is also sky blue with the BCCI logo on the front

STADIUMS

Eden Gardens, Kolkata

Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi

M. A. Chidambaram Stadium, Chepauk, Chennai

Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai

Green Park (now Modi Stadium), Kanpur

Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai

M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore

Nehru Stadium, Chennai

Vidarbha C.A. Ground, Nagpur

Sardar Patel Stadium (Gujarat), Naranpura, Ahmedabad

Punjab Cricket Association Stadium, Mohali, Punjab

Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium, Hyderabad

Barabati Stadium, Cuttack

Bombay Gymkhana ,Mumbai

Gandhi Stadium, Jalandhar

K. D. Singh Babu Stadium, Lucknow

Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur

Sector 16 Stadium, Chandigarh

University Ground

(Still to come more information)