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And not a wicket fell all day...

Anant Gaundalkar

For cricket fans it is a treat to watch the scoreboard ticking at a run-a-minute with over 300 runs scored in a day's play and not one wicket falling all day.

In the contemporary era, this happens but rarely. The latest instance occurred on the third day of the opening Test between Australia and South Africa at the Wanderers, Johannesburg, which the Aussies won by a huge margin.

The Australian middle-order pair of Steve Waugh and Greg Blewett took the overnight score from 191 for four to 479 for four at the end of the day, adding 288 runs without being separated.

In Test history, spanning over 120 years, there have been only 11 such instances when two batsmen have occupied the crease throughout a day . Also, there have been two other occasions when two pairs of batsmen from different countries stayed at the wicket without losing a single wicket, after the first country had declared their innings.

India has the honor of accomplishing this feat twice, the more noteworthy being the first day unbroken stand of 234 by Vinod Mankad and Pankaj Roy at Madras in 1955-56 which ultimately resulted in a world record opening wicket stand of 413.

Following are the complete details of instances when two batsmen occupied the crease throughout a day in Test cricket:


Runs    Country   Batsmen       Oppenents   Venue      Season

283 England J B Hobbs Australia Melbourne 1924-25 (283-0) & H Sutcliffe

307 W.Indies D St E Alkinson Australia Bridgetown 1954-55 (187-6 & C C Depiza to 494-6)

234 India M H Mankad New Zealand Madras 1955-56 (234-0) & Pankaj Roy

357 W.Indies C G Hunte Pakistan Kingston 1957-58 (147-1 & G St A Sobers to 504-1)

207 W.Indies G St A Sobers England Bridgetown 1959-60 (279-3 & F M M Worrell to 486-3)

263 Australia W M Lawry West Indies Bridgetown 1964-65 (263-0) & R B Simpson

217 India G R Viswanath England Madras 1981-82 (178-2 & Yashpal Sharma to 395-2)

240 Sri Lanka A Gurusinghe Pakistan Colombo 1985-86 (83-3 & A Ranatunga to 323-3)

192 New Zealand J J Crowe Sri Lanka Colombo 1986-87 (214-5 & R J Hadlee to 406-5)

301 Australia G R Marsh England Notingham 1989 (301-0) & M Taylor

288 Australia S Waugh South Africa Johannesburg 1996-97 (191-4 & G Blewett to 479-4)

Following are instances of two pairs of batsmen from different countries staying at the crease after the first country declared their innings:


218 West Indies (310-7 to 365 -7d) A I Kalicharran & T M Findlay New Zealand 

(163-0) Georgetown 1971-72 G M Turner & J W Jarris  

306 India (70-1 to 361-1d) S M Gavaskar & D B Vengsarkar West Indies (15-0) Calcutta 1978-79 A B Williams & S F A F Bacchus

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