Why Australia vs India is Test cricket's premier rivalry

Australia had us at “Hey, buddy.” It did not come to us through books, news or history. It came into our consciousness one morning before school. Via cricket. When we get old enough to talk about 'my days' we will no longer talk about the imagined tranquil greenery of England. We'll talk about loud, unashamed cricket from Australia: huge banners, Daddles the Duck, zinc cream on the lips and under the eyes, the reverse scores, the extra bounce, always miscellaneous and no extras, the feeling of wide open spaces and viewers dressed for summer, as we slowly shivered getting ready for school.

The exact moment of initiation may be different for different people. For me it was Ajay Jadeja who caught Allan Border in Tony Greig and Bill Lawry's hysterical commentary. The catch became part of “Bush Classic Catches”, along with David Boon's short-leg juggling attempt after a full-blooded film during the Tests earlier in the “summer”.

The background music for the package was Europe's “The Final Countdown”. The space-themed, David Bowie-inspired lyrics paired beautifully with this theater of dreams. At that moment, both represented possibilities. Australia was our zeitgeist, our pop culture, our ambition. It was our America.

Virat KohliRohit Sharma and R Ashwin, who are now at the end of their careers, and MS Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh before them were adolescents or touching adolescents in this period. They all grew up wanting to be like Australia, to beat Australia. We walked in to bowl our leg breaks like Shane Warne. When the obsessed Yograj Singh threw balls to his son from half a throw's length, he wanted Yuvraj to prepare for Australia. It was the first accent we picked up. Irfan Pathan started saying, “Inshallahmate” unironically.

To Australia we were nobody, kids who could never afford to buy what their glitzy store sold. After the 1992 World Cup, it took eight years for India to be invited to Australia again. When Australia came to India, they traveled with their own baked beans and Foster's. They woke up the homeless sleeping at train stations to take their poverty porn pictures, as evidenced Malcolm Knox in this Guardian part. A significant improvement in behavior from twenty years earlier, when Allan Border wrote about how they threw money out of the windows of their hotel in Kanpur, then poured water on the poor people looking for the notes.

Then India stopped their victory march in 2000-2001. The children were now teenagers and young adults. They would soon join forces with the older lone fighters of the 1990s and head to Australia, attempting to be their equals. Would do nothing less. Moreover, the BCCI had become rich and started pulling its weight. However, it knew that Australia had a model of success to emulate, so it set up academies modeled on the Center of Excellence in Australia, where a number of Indian children previously attended. The first program was designed by Rod Marsh. The pace academy in Chennai also brought in an Australian coach, Dennis Lillee.

One element of the rivalry was present. The cultures clashed. India, itself a victim of racism in the past, proved they could be racist against the only non-white player in the Australian team. Under fire, Australia's tough but fair mantle began to disappear. Australia showed themselves for what they were: tough, no-cost, top athletes. The new India saw nothing wrong in it. They emulated it.

The battle on the field was still lacking, but India made quick and dramatic moves. Probably without realizing it, their system was to draft hitters who were at home in Australia. Pace and bouncing no longer held them captive. With fitness standards improving, India could now throw a combination of bowlers at Australia that few others could. The other ingredient for rivalry was not far behind: money.

When Virat Kohli plays the Gabba Test, he will have played more testing in Australia in a career spanning 13 years than Sri Lanka has done throughout their history. And this despite the paternity leave he took during the last tour. India is now like the West Indies that it has created five test trips to Australia from 1979 to 1992 and never lost a series, just with a larger TV audience and expat population.

The result is a match with better cricket competition than these countries' more traditional foes – England and Pakistan – offer. The Ashes are rarely this competitive and matches between India and Pakistan are so bogged down by the fear of losing that they have often tended to produce dull Test cricket.

The series results in India-Australia Tests from the last fifteen years The balance may tip in India's favour, but the two teams were much closer than the results suggest. Since 2007 more than 39 testsIndia average 34.04 per wicket against Australia and 33.78 admit. That's an average difference of about five runs per test. Each of the ten Test series during this period saw the teams alternate as winners or with a difference in averages of less than ten runs per wicket. The only longer series of this kind was the Ashes in the run-up to 1903-04.

Only in terms of a pure cricket match South Africa vs Australia from late 2008 to present comes close to the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. South Africa led 11-10and the difference in means is only 0.11. It may be a closer match, but not as diverse in terms of attacks. Australia and India compete under a wider range of circumstances. South Africa achieved much of their success when Australia had not yet mounted an attack to match their all-time best attacks. It can be argued that since the mid-2010s, India and Australia have fielded teams that are among those countries' best ever.

In the last eight years, only Australia has challenged India in India, and only India has challenged Australia in Australia. Plus there was the drama, the politics, the pettiness, the gamesmanship and the moolah that came with it. Not to mention the three knockout matches between these sides in the last four ODI World Cups. The 23-25 ​​head-to-head records in bilateral ODIs since 2007. And 7-8 in tournament play.

The Border-Gavaskar Trophy does not have the rich history and tradition or the post-colonial dread that many teams feel when playing against England, but has created a solid string of memorable matches and performances in a short period of a decade and a half. and controversies. Together, these two teams overcame the tragic death of Phillip Hughes and agreed to schedule changes. careful bouncers try before eventually and inevitably letting their competitive nature take over. They ridiculed each other's injuries, made accusations cheat And pitch doctoringtried to injure tail guards with bouncers, and have gone from friendship to hatred to begrudging respect for each other.

One look at the celebration and anticipation of the match in Australia, Kohli in particular, and you know this is no longer the one-sided love affair of the '90s, when we were in love even when India weren't playing. Now Australia is investing much more in this than India. Not just because of the money, but because this is true the match in Test cricket.

And yet, sporting empires are so fragile that India goes into the latest edition of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with people quietly fearing the worst. They are a team in transition who have just ended their 12-year home dominance a stunning whitewash to New Zealand. There are no niceties these days, with result rolls and brutal attacks making blowouts more likely. In Australia you can't rule it out.

This could also be the last time some legends from these two sides face each other in Tests. If India can somehow, on the road alone, go into the final Test with the series still alive – as has been the case in all the last four series between these sides – these two teams will have serious claims to have taken part to the greatest rivalry in cricket.