History of March 15

In 2004 Muttiah Muralitharan became the second spinner and the third bowler to reach 500 Test wickets when he bowled Michael Kasprowicz on the first day of the second Test against Australia at Kandy. He was the youngest (a month short of his 32nd birthday) and the fastest (87 Tests) to achieve this milestone. On the same day Sachin Tendulkar became the first to cross 13,000 ODI runs in his knock of 141 in the second ODI against Pakistan at Rawalpindi. He also became the first Indian to score a ODI century in Pakistan. India lost the match by 12 runs.

In 2005 Steve Bucknor became first umpire to stand in 100 Tests, at Kolkata between India and Pakistan. He,however, blotted his copybook by giving Sachin Tendulkar erroneously out caught behind in the second innings.

In 2007 Herschelle Gibbs hits six sixes in an over for South Africa against Holland in a World Cup game. The unfortunate bowler was DLS van Bunge.

In 2007 Manjural Islam was killed in a fatal road accident. At 22 he was the youngest Test cricketer to die.

Born on this day were: 

Joseph McMaster (1861-1929), English player whose entire first-class career consisted of a duck in his only Test (against South Africa at Cape Town in 1888-89); Iftikhar Ali Khan, Nawab of Pataudi Sr. (1910-1952), Indian Test captain who was the only man to play Test cricket for both England and India and who was the father of Mansur Ali Khan, India’s youngest Test captain;

Davenell Frederick ‘Dav’ Whatmore (1954-), Australian batsman who later turned to coaching and who masterminded Sri Lanka’s famous World Cup win in 1995-96, and in 2001, inspired them to nine successive Test victories; and

Heath Streak (1974-), Zimbabwe pace bowler and captain.


In 1877 Charles Bannerman completed the first ever Test century, 165 against England in the first ever Test, at Melbourne. This was the only century of his first-class career and he retired hurt when George Ulyett smashed one of his fingers. In all, he scored 67.35 per cent of his team’s total of 245, a record which still stands.


In 1977 the first ODI played in the Caribbean took place when Pakistan met the West Indies in Berbice, Guyana. West Indies won by four wickets.


In 1995 Bhupinder Singh Jr. and Pankaj Dharmani put on a world record seventh-wicket stand of 461 against Delhi in the second semi-final of the Ranji Trophy at Delhi. Bhupinder made 297 and Dharmani was undefeated on 202. They beat the record of Claremont Depeiza and Denis Atkinson who made 347 runs for the seventh wicket against Australia in the fourth Test at Barbados in 1954-55. The latter still stands as the Test record.


In 1997 Navjot Singh Sidhu made 201 in 673 minutes, in the second Test against West Indies at Trinidad. This was the second-slowest double century in Tests.


In 1999 Haryana’s Amarjit Kaypee became the highest scorer in the Ranji Trophy when he scored 148 against Madhya Pradesh at Rajnandgaon in a super-league match of the Ranji Trophy. He overtook Ashok Malhotra’s 7,274 runs and eventually ended his career with 7,894 runs in 117 matches. (It is said that he took his surname from a bakery signboard on a shop his father bought.)


In 2002 Nathan Astle of New Zealand hit the fastest double century in Test cricket history, 200 runs off 153 balls in 218 minutes on the fourth day of the first Test against England at Jade Stadium, Christchurch. He was dismissed for 222. This was 59 balls less than Australian Adam Gilchrist’s feat against South Africa in Johannesburg in February 2002. (In 1930 Sir Donald Bradman scored a double century against England at Leeds in 214 minutes but since there is no record of the number of balls he faced Astle’s is considered the fastest double hundred in Test cricket.) The Kiwis needing 550 for a win lost by 99 runs. This is the highest losing fourth innings total made by any teams.