LAHORE: December 15 has a lot of significance insofar as the game of cricket is concerned. On this date exactly 87 years ago, India - then undivided - staged its first ever Test match on its own soil against England in Bombay (now Mumbai) on Dec 15, 1933.

England won the Test match by nine wickets. Though England was hot favourite, due to its vast experience of playing Test cricket as first nations along with Australia since 1877, some notable performance from the Indian side were the century from Lala Amarnath, who scored 118, followed by another good knock from then captain C.K Nayudu, who made 67, all in the second innings, after no half-century in the first innings.

Lala Amarnath (38) and Wazir Ali (36) were the top scorers of the first innings.

From the host side, paceman Mohammad Nisar proved wrecker-in-chief to crack the seasoned English batsmen, as he finished with a fine bowling figure of five for 90 in 33.3 overs to restrict England to a total of 438 in the first innings including a century from Bryan Valentine (136), followed by two half-centuries from Cyril Walters (78) and skipper Douglas Jardine (60). The All-India team earned a first innings total of 219 and second innings total was 258.

Before the All-India team became the sixth nation of playing Test cricket in 1932 by playing fist match in England and lost it, England (1877), Australia (1877), South Africa (1889), the West Indies (1928) and New Zealand (1930) had earned this status.

In these 87 years, from the All-India, three Test countries were emerged including India, Pakistan in result of the partition in 1947 and Bangladesh came on the map after getting independence from Pakistan in 1971. However, Bangladesh had a long journey to get the Test status in 2000, by playing first match against India in Dhaka.

Published in Dawn, December 16th, 2020