Indian Cricket: History, Milestones and Exam Facts

The correct answer is B, Lord's. India played its first Test match in June 1932 at Lord's in London, becoming the sixth country to be granted Test status after England, Australia, South Africa, the West Indies and New Zealand. It was a single Test of the tour, England won it, and India's opening bowlers Mohammad Nissar and Amar Singh took early wickets that made the match memorable for Indian followers. Option A, the Oval, is where India won its first Test in England many years later, in 1971. Option C, Headingley in Leeds, and option D, Old Trafford in Manchester, are both famous English grounds but neither hosted that first match. The link to carry into the exam hall is that both of India's World Cup finals of 1983 and the first Test of 1932 were played at Lord's, which is why the ground is asked about so often.

The correct answer is A, C.K. Nayudu. Cottari Kanakaiya Nayudu led India in its first Test match at Lord's in 1932 and is regarded as the first great Indian cricketer; the Board of Control for Cricket in India named its lifetime achievement award after him. Option B, Lala Amarnath, scored India's first Test century in 1933 and captained the first Indian team to tour Australia after independence in 1947 and 1948, so he is a first in two other senses and is offered here for that reason. Option C, Vijay Hazare, was the captain when India won its first Test match, against England at Madras in 1952, and the domestic one-day tournament carries his name. Option D, Vijay Merchant, was a distinguished batter of the same era with a very high first-class average but was not the first captain. Keep the three firsts apart: first captain Nayudu, first century Amarnath, first win under Hazare.

The correct answer is B, Lala Amarnath. Lala Amarnath scored 118 against England at the Bombay Gymkhana ground in 1933, in the first Test match ever played on Indian soil and in his own debut Test, and it was the first century by an Indian in Test cricket. He later captained the first Indian side to tour Australia in 1947 and 1948 and the team that won India's first Test series, at home against Pakistan in 1952. Option A, C.K. Nayudu, captained India in its first Test in 1932 but did not make the first century. Option C, Vinoo Mankad, is remembered for the record opening partnership with Pankaj Roy and for the match at Lord's in 1952 that is still called Mankad's Test. Option D, Polly Umrigar, scored 223 against New Zealand in 1955, among the earliest Test double centuries made by an Indian. Examiners often group these four names, so fix one landmark against each.

The correct answer is C, the West Indies. On 25 June 1983 India, led by Kapil Dev, bowled out the West Indies for 140 while defending a modest total of 183, and won the Prudential World Cup against a side that had won the first two editions in 1975 and 1979. Mohinder Amarnath was named player of the match in the final and in the semi-final against England. Option A, Australia, had been beaten by India in the group stage of that tournament but did not reach the final. Option B, England, was the host and lost to India in the semi-final at Old Trafford. Option D, Pakistan, lost its semi-final to the West Indies. Two details from the same campaign are asked almost as often: Kapil Dev's unbeaten 175 against Zimbabwe at Tunbridge Wells, and Madan Lal and Mohinder Amarnath taking three wickets each in the final.

The correct answer is A, Mahendra Singh Dhoni. India beat Sri Lanka in the final at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on 2 April 2011 under Dhoni, who finished the chase himself with a six and was named player of the match; it was the first time a team had won a World Cup final on its own soil. Yuvraj Singh was named player of the tournament, and Gautam Gambhir made 97 in the final. Option B, Rahul Dravid, captained India in the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies, from which the team went out in the group stage. Option C, Virender Sehwag, opened the batting in the 2011 final but never captained India in a World Cup. Option D, Sourav Ganguly, captained the side that reached the 2003 World Cup final in South Africa and lost to Australia. Dhoni is also the only captain to have won all three major white-ball trophies of the International Cricket Council.

The correct answer is A, Pakistan. At the Feroz Shah Kotla ground in Delhi in February 1999 Anil Kumble took ten wickets for 74 runs in Pakistan's second innings, becoming only the second bowler in the history of Test cricket to take all ten in an innings, after Jim Laker of England, who did it against Australia at Old Trafford in 1956. Option B, Australia, was the side against which Kumble took many of his other famous hauls, which is why it is the common distractor here. Option C, Sri Lanka, and option D, England, are unconnected with the feat. Two related facts are worth keeping: Kumble is the highest wicket-taker for India in Test cricket, and the only other bowler to take ten in an innings since 1999 is Ajaz Patel of New Zealand, who did it in Mumbai. A question may also ask for the ground, which was the Feroz Shah Kotla.

The correct answer is B, Ranjitsinhji. Kumar Shri Ranjitsinhji, the prince of Nawanagar who played for England in the 1890s and was famous for the leg glance, gave his name to the trophy for the national first-class championship, which was first played in the 1934 and 1935 season and was won by Bombay. Option A, Duleepsinhji, was his nephew and also played for England; the zonal first-class tournament, the Duleep Trophy, is named after him, and the two names are deliberately placed together in this question. Option C, Vijay Hazare, has the domestic one-day tournament named after him, while the domestic Twenty20 tournament carries the name of Syed Mushtaq Ali. Option D, C.K. Nayudu, has the Board's lifetime achievement award and the under-twenty-three tournament named after him. The Irani Cup, first played in 1959 and 1960, is contested between the Ranji Trophy champion and the Rest of India.

The correct answer is B, South Africa. The inaugural ICC World Twenty20 was staged in South Africa in September 2007, and India beat Pakistan in the final at the Wanderers in Johannesburg, Joginder Sharma bowling the last over and Irfan Pathan taking three wickets. Mahendra Singh Dhoni led a young side from which several senior players had withdrawn, and Yuvraj Singh hit six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad of England in the same tournament. Option A, England, hosted the 2009 edition. Option C, the West Indies, hosted the 2010 edition. Option D, Sri Lanka, hosted the 2012 edition, in which India did not reach the final. Keep the pair in mind that the 2007 title was won in South Africa under Dhoni and the 2011 World Cup at home in Mumbai, again under Dhoni.

The correct answer is A, Sunil Gavaskar. Gavaskar reached ten thousand Test runs in 1987, the first cricketer of any country to do so, and he had earlier passed Don Bradman's record of twenty-nine Test centuries, finishing his career with thirty-four. He also scored 774 runs in his debut series in the West Indies in 1971, which remains among the greatest starts to a Test career. Option B, Sachin Tendulkar, went far beyond that figure and holds the record for the most Test runs and the most international centuries, but he was not the first to the ten thousand mark. Option C, Rahul Dravid, is another Indian in the ten thousand club and is remembered for his long partnerships and his slip catching. Option D, Allan Border of Australia, passed Gavaskar's aggregate later and was the second to the mark. Questions on this topic ask for the first, so read the stem closely.

The correct answer is C, 2008. The Indian Premier League, the franchise Twenty20 competition run by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, played its first season in April and May 2008, and the Rajasthan Royals, captained by Shane Warne, won that edition. Option A, 2006, is the year the Board took over the administration of women's cricket in India, not the year of the league. Option B, 2007, is the year India won the first ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa, the success that created the appetite for a domestic Twenty20 league, and it is the most common wrong answer for exactly that reason. Option D, 2010, was the third season of the league and the year the West Indies hosted the World Twenty20. The sequence to remember is the World Twenty20 title in 2007 and the first season of the league in 2008.

The correct answer is C, New Zealand. India won the series in New Zealand in 1968 under Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, taking three of the four Test matches, and it was India's first series win on foreign soil after thirty-six years of Test cricket. Pataudi had become captain at the age of twenty-one and led the side with the spin bowling of Bishan Singh Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna and Bhagwath Chandrasekhar. Option A, England, is where India won a series for the first time in 1971, under Ajit Wadekar, the Oval Test being decided by Chandrasekhar's six wickets. Option B, Australia, is where India won a Test series for the first time much later, in the 2018 and 2019 season. Option D, South Africa, had no cricketing ties with India in that period because of apartheid. The order to remember is New Zealand in 1968, the West Indies and England in 1971.