India v Australia 1st Test

The rarest result comes around again

When Allan Border won the toss at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai, known to generations of fans as Chepauk, on 18 September 1986, nobody could have expected the match to finish the way Brisbane had in December 1960. A tied Test was cricket's rarest possible result, and it had happened only once in more than a century of the format. Border chose to bat first on a pitch that would offer turn as the match wore on, in a city where the September heat and humidity are unforgiving even for players used to the subcontinent.

Five days later, after 574 runs from Australia, 397 from India, a declaration, a second Australian innings and a final-day chase that came down to the very last ball, the two boards were level again. It remains, alongside Brisbane 1960, one of only two tied Tests in the 2,537 matches held in the CricArcade Test archive to March 2024.

Jones and the heat

David Boon and Geoff Marsh put on 48 for Australia's first wicket before Boon and Dean Jones added 158 for the second, and it was Jones who then took the innings somewhere extraordinary. He batted for more than eight hours in Chennai's heat, adding 178 with his captain Allan Border for the fourth wicket, and reached 210 before he was finally bowled. It is widely reported that Jones was severely dehydrated by the end of the innings, vomiting on the field and needing intravenous fluids and hospital treatment once he was out, an ordeal that became one of the defining stories of Australian cricket in India. Border made 106 himself, Greg Matthews added 44, and Australia declared on 574 for 7, Shivlal Yadav the most successful Indian bowler with 4 for 142 from nearly 50 overs.

Kapil Dev's reply

India's reply had its own defining innings. Kris Srikkanth made 53 and Mohammad Azharuddin 50, and Ravi Shastri added 62, but with the score on 245 for 7 and the follow-on still a threat, Kapil Dev counter- attacked. He put on 85 with Chetan Sharma for the eighth wicket and reached 119 before he was last man out, Greg Matthews taking 5 for 103. India were all out for 397, a deficit of 177, just short of the 200 runs Australia would have needed to have the option of enforcing the follow-on in the first place.

Border's declaration

Australia batted again to set up a declaration rather than to bat India out of the match altogether. Boon made 49 and Border 27, and with quick runs from Greg Ritchie and an unbeaten 27 from Matthews, Border declared at 170 for 5, leaving India a target of 348 to win with a day and a bit remaining, or the whole final day to bat out for a draw.

Gavaskar and Amarnath build the chase

On the last day India batted with real intent rather than caution. Sunil Gavaskar made 90 and Mohinder Amarnath 51, the pair adding 103 for the second wicket, and Mohammad Azharuddin made 42 as the target came down steadily. When Gavaskar fell at 204 India still needed 144, and the innings passed through Kapil Dev's early dismissal before Ravi Shastri, unbeaten on 48, and the tail began to close the gap. Chandrakant Pandit made 39 as India kept pace with the required rate deep into the afternoon.

The tail keeps pace

Once the recognised batters were gone the chase should, by the usual logic of the game, have fallen away. Kapil Dev, the one player who might have settled it quickly with the bat as he so often had, was caught by Ray Bright for just 1 with the score on 253, and India were 251 for 4 and then 253 for 5 in the space of a couple of overs. Instead of subsiding, Chandrakant Pandit and Ravi Shastri kept the required rate within reach, Pandit striking 39 off only 37 balls before he was bowled, taking the total to 291 for 6.

Shastri, unbeaten at the end on 48, anchored what remained while wickets kept falling around him. Chetan Sharma made 23 before he was caught by Craig McDermott to bring up 331 for 7, Kiran More was out lbw without scoring at 334 for 8, and Shivlal Yadav made a brisk 8 before he was bowled, the total moving to 344 for 9. By the time Maninder Singh walked out, only three runs separated the scores, and Shastri could do nothing more than watch from the non-striker's end as India's last recognised hope for victory rested entirely on the number 11 surviving Australia's bowlers for as long as it took.

The last over

With the scores level and the last pair together, Ray Bright and Greg Matthews were sharing the bowling for Australia, Bright finishing with 5 for 94 and Matthews 5 for 146. Maninder Singh, India's number 11, came to the crease needing three more runs just to tie the match and the game still alive in every direction, a win, a loss or, if he and Shastri could get there, a tie. He was given out lbw to Matthews without scoring, and the match ended exactly level: India all out for 347, the same total Australia had effectively needed them to fall short of or match. The scorecard confirms the shape of the finish, Maninder Singh's wicket the tenth and last of the innings, with the scores reading 347 for both sides across the match.

Only two ties in Test history

Greg Matthews finished with 10 wickets in the match to go with his 71 runs, an all-round performance that the tie has never let anyone forget, and Dean Jones's 210 remains one of the most talked-about double centuries in the game precisely because of the state he was in by the end of it. Brisbane in 1960 had needed three run-outs in its final innings, with Wally Grout and Ian Meckiff both run out in the last over, to produce cricket's first tie; Chennai in 1986 needed five days of even cricket and a single lbw shout on the final ball of consequence.

The full Chepauk scorecard, innings by innings, is on this page, and the sides that produced it can be explored on the Australia and India team pages. In The Follow-On you can take either XI from that Chennai Test and try to finish what both sides very nearly managed twice over.

Sources

• CricArcade Test archive: the full scorecard, fall of wickets and partnerships on this page
• ESPNcricinfo: Australia in India 1986/87, the Chepauk Test scorecard and report
• Wisden Cricketers' Almanack 1987: the Australian tour of India