It’s been a little over ten days since the silver jubilee of that Test match was celebrated, with much pomp and fanfare. That Test match, of course, was India versus Australia, a game that seemed headed in only one direction even after the third day before the hosts staged the mother of all comebacks, turning near-certain defeat into one of the most storied triumphs in the five-day game.
The venue of that breathtaking outing between 11 and 16 March 2001? The theatre of dreams that answers to the name of Eden Gardens in Kolkata, the City of Joy.
Guess what? That remains the last time India have locked horns with their fiercest rivals (the India-Pakistan rivalry is passe, a has-been, not helped by the fact that the teams haven’t played each other in a Test since December 2007) at the Eden, when VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid and Harbhajan Singh and Sachin Tendulkar (with the ball) pulled off a miracle. If that doesn’t merit a mention in Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, few others do.
For what it’s worth, Eden Gardens is in good (if that’s the right word) company; Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium, which last year turned 50, hasn’t hosted an India-Australia Test since 2004 when, on a veritable minefield, Murali Kartik’s left-arm spin allowed him to outperform senior tweakers Anil Kumble and Harbhajan and bowl India to a consolation victory in the fourth and final Test after the series had already been surrendered.
The two marquee series in India, which will potentially come around every two years now, are the five-match showdowns against Australia and England. The last time England were here, between January and March 2024, the Tests were played in Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Rajkot, Ranchi and Dharamsala. Nearly 12 months previously, when Australia came calling for four Tests, the venues were Nagpur, New Delhi, Indore and Ahmedabad. Australia are scheduled to travel to India in January next year for their first series of five or more Tests since 1979-80. The staging centres? Nagpur, Chennai, Guwahati, Ranchi and Ahmedabad, which boasts the world’s largest cricket stadium.
Let’s take a pause, and reflect on these facts. Australia haven’t played a Test in Kolkata since 2001, and in Mumbai since 2004. They won’t in 2027 either. Ahmedabad staged a Test last October (against West Indies) while Guwahati debuted as a Test centre in November, when only a smattering of fans turned up to watch Temba Bavuma’s side consign the Indians to their heaviest defeat by runs in the five-day format. Clearly, you’d think, something was off?
India boasts the most number of ‘active’ Test venues in the world. That’s a great development because it shows infrastructural advancement across the length and the breadth of the country. But at a time when Test cricket is perceived to be under threat from the 20-over iteration in the main, isn’t there a compelling case to ensure that it is staged in the ‘traditional’ centres where there has been tremendous patronage for the red-ball variant instead of taking it to the hinterland if only because of where the power centres are housed?
To be fair, Guwahati – the hometown of current Board of Control for Cricket in India secretary Devajit Saikia — threw up an excellent playing surface for the South Africa Test. The margin of defeat, a whopping 408 runs, has nothing to do with the nature of the pitch. Unlike in Kolkata the previous week when a rank turner that bordered on the underprepared greeted the sides, the deck at the Barsapara Cricket Stadium was a true track ideally suited for a five-day game. There was value for strokes, but there was also joy to be had for the faster bowlers if they bent their backs – like Marco Jansen did – and for the spinners if they put their body and brain into play – like Simon Harmer did. India’s totals of 201 and 140 were their own doing, not due to any diabolical tricks the pitch played.
But the turnout was worse than disappointing. Various reasons were proffered for the sparsely populated stands, including roadworks in the vicinity of the stadium. Whether that changes and bigger crowds turn up for the Australia Test isn’t the big question. What is, is why this continued short shrift when it comes to Australia Tests to the Eden and the Wankhede, two of India’s more easily identifiable and iconic grounds where spectator interest has been anything but underwhelming?
BCCI announces schedule for 2026/27 home season
On Thursday, the Board of Control for Cricket in India announced the fixtures for the 2026-27 international home season, running from September this year to next February. India will host 22 games – five Tests, nine ODIs and eight T20Is, spread across 17 venues. Guwahati, Ranchi, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Ahmedabad have been pencilled in to conduct two matches apiece, while among the one-time traditional centres, Chennai’s MA Chidambaram Stadium alone has been fortunate enough to snare a five-day game. Is there a (not-so-) subtle message in that? Is that suggestive of a seismic shift in mindsets when it comes to hosting five-day outings? Or are we just over-thinking things and provocatively going off on a tangent? Take your pick.
