The Curse Of Gambhir!! India Bowled Out Under 200 For Fourth Time In 6 Tests At Home
This match also saw an old record being broken for the lowest ‘highest individual score’ across the first two innings of a Test
Gautam Gambhir was appointed as India’s head coach in July 2024. Since then, India have played seven Tests at home. Of which, two were played against Bangladesh before the New Zealand tour of India and two against the West Indies, a team hardly considered competitive these days, right before this South African tour of India.
Thus, the first Test against the Proteas, currently underway at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata, is the sixth Test in a row since the New Zealand series. By getting all out for 189 in their first innings, the Indian team has now had four scores of under 200 in their last six Tests at home.
Co-incidentally, Gambhir, since John Wright in the early 2000s, became the first coach to have his team score less than 200 in four innings across back-to-back seasons. While they had one innings of below 200 in each of the three Tests against New Zealand, the Indian team continued to do that in the very first innings against South Africa too.
In this match, no team was able to cross the 200-run mark, and it led to another record being broken. The 39, scored by KL Rahul during India’s innings, is also the lowest “highest individual score” in the first two innings of any men’s Test match since the 2010 Durban Test.
That game in South Africa was played between South Africa and India, where VVS Laxman’s 38 remained the highest individual score across the first two innings of the game, which India won by 87 runs.
In this match, with India getting bowled out for 189, the first innings lead that they could accumulate was 30, and it could turn out to be crucial as the wicket was turning and bouncing big time. At Tea on Day 2 in Kolkata, South Africa, were 18/1, trailing by 12 runs.
