Rahul Dravid practising with tennis ball:

Hard work pays off!
Rahul Dravid is seen practising the swing deliveries with bowling machine.Enjoy the video!

Rahul Dravid: test records

After the superb performance in first 2 test matches, it's time to update a few records of Rahul Dravid.

1. Dravid is the 3rd Indian (6th in World) to score more than 10,000 test runs.

2. Has been involved in the most century partnerships in Test history - 79 (till 27 Nov 2009).

3. Scored nearly 23% of the total runs put up by India (with a batting average of 102.84) in the 21 Test matches won under Ganguly's captaincy. This is the highest percentage contribution by any batsman in Test cricket history in matches won under a single captain where the captain has won more than 20 Tests.

4. 2nd longest streak of consecutive Tests since debut (93 + 1 in ICC XI) missed 95th test at Ahmedabad due to fever, behind Adam Gilchrist (96).

5. Only player to score a century against every Test playing nation away from home.

6. Involved in highest partnership made away from home for any wicket for India with vice captain Virender Sehwag of 410 runs vs Pakistan at Lahore in 2006 (also, the highest partnership between a captain and the vice captain). Only Pankaj Roy and Vinoo Mankad have scored more runs in a partnership for India, 413 vs New Zealand in Chennai (6-11 Jan 1956).

7. Dravid is one among the only four batsmen to hit Test centuries in four consecutive innings. The other three are Jack Fingleton, Alan Melville and Gautam Gambhir. Dravid achieved this by hitting scores of 115, 148, 217 and 100* in three successive matches against England and one against the West Indies. Only Everton Weekes, with centuries in five consecutive innings, has achieved a longer sequence of consecutive Test hundreds.

8. With scores of 50 or more in 7 consecutive Tests Dravid is behind only to Tendulkar(8) among the Indian batsmen. IVA Richards holds the record for most with 11.

9. He is currently 2nd among batsmen who have scored most away runs in Tests (6430 as of April 2009). Only Sachin Tendulkar (7165) has scored more away Test runs.

10. He has played 150 innings of 94 tests at number 3. He has scored more than 8000 runs at this position. Both feats are world records.

11. 2nd Indian batsman to score twin hundreds in a Test twice, after Sunil Gavaskar. Gavaskar and Ponting are the only batsmen to score twin hundreds in a Test thrice.

12. One of only two Indians to score 5 double hundreds.(each bigger than the previous 200* vs Zimbabwe, 217 vs England, 222 vs New Zealand, 233 vs Australia, 270 vs Pakistan).

13. Dravid holds the record for the most number of catches by a non-wicketkeeper (184) in the world.

14. Partnering with Tendulkar, has scored more runs than any other pair, excluding opening pairs. They are the 3rd best in terms of total number of partnership runs scored by a pair in test cricket.

Rahul Dravid 144 (dropped) Herath (bowled) Laxman

Dropped catches do affect the fielding side, but have you ever seen it other way round? It did happen today and the victim was none other than Rahul Dravid. What happened was that VVS Laxman hit the ball straight towards the bowler who (cleverly?) dropped the catch and the ball was travelling so fast that it went on to hit the stumps. At the non-strikers end was Rahul Dravid, who had few milliseconds to react to save himself, but he couldn't. Probably that's the only way he could have got out today. All VVS Laxman could do was watch his partner return to the pavilion in frustration.Rahul added 59 to his overnight score (at Strike rate of 80). Fortunately, Rahul's wicket didn't hamper the dominance of team India in this test match.Laxman with fine 63 and Yuvraj with aggressive 67 took the score past 600.



What did Rahul Dravid achieve today?
1.He went past the great aussie batsman Alan Border to place himself 4th in the table of highest run scorers in Test cricket.
2.He scored 28th century.

Higher than The Wall!

This article has been written by Kunal Pradhan, a columnist for The Indian Express.

At a Thai restaurant in Islamabad, after the first day’s play in the final Test in 2004, Rahul Dravid politely declined to stay for dessert, saying he needed to sleep because he had to bat the “whole day tomorrow”. Not early, not in the morning; the whole day.

It led to a few involuntary sniggers at the dinner table, but Dravid had chosen his words carefully. Ten not out overnight, he was unbeaten on 134 when stumps were drawn the following evening. And then, for good measure, he batted almost the whole of the next day as well, finishing on a career-best 270. It wasn’t the most attractive knock, and not nearly his most fluent — in fact, at 12 hours and 20 minutes it was the longest innings by an Indian player ever — but Dravid had ensured, almost single-handedly, that India won their first Test series in Pakistan.

Adelaide, Kolkata, Leeds, Kingston — he will be remembered when, years from now, people talk about what had happened in those cities at the turn of the century. For, scratch a famous Indian victory, and you will uncover a Dravid gem underneath.

Through his career, he has been associated with hard, unwavering grit with a bat in his hands and soft, natural refinement off the field of play. It’s been hard to pick between the great batsman and the perfect gentleman. But, as the French philosopher Voltaire said, “The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.” So, while Dravid invoked deep admiration and steadfast affection, he did not immediately move fans as much as some of his more naturally attractive peers from this generation of astonishing batsmen.
Perhaps history will judge his true place in Indian cricket, and put him higher than the fifth or sixth place he occupies on the list of most experts. Perhaps history alone will finally realise that “The Wall” is too simplistic a nickname for a batsman of his ilk.

I’ve always believed that Dravid’s famous sobriquet is completely misplaced. As a batsman, he is skillful and prudent, with far more character than a block of brick and mortar. Maybe, at times, he stood firmly like a defensive barrier. But they weren’t necessarily his best moments. There were more occasions when he attacked the very heart of the opposition. “The Wall” barely begins to describe him, so how can it sum him up?

There was a time when Dravid was in grave danger of being consumed by his own quest for technical perfection. Former Australian captain Ian Chappell once said he needed to be told that matches were won not by hours but by runs or wickets.

In those days, when he did manage to get a big score, he was invariably overshadowed by a colleague. Right from his debut 95 at Lord’s in 1996 (when Ganguly cracked 131) to the 148 at Headingley in 2002 (when Tendulkar trumped him with a 193). But at The Oval in the following Test, Dravid smashed a flawless 217. The next highest score was Tendulkar’s 54. The spell was broken, and there was no looking back after that.

This week, seven years later, there were glimpses of the Dravid we know so well in his 177 at Ahmedabad. But the innings was different because it seemed to have the fluency that usually comes only with abandon. Beaten by Dammika Prasad midway through his knock, he hammered the next ball down the ground for four. The Dravid of old would’ve never done that — he would’ve scarcely scored a run for the next few minutes, cross with himself for the momentary lapse of concentration.
Treated unkindly by the national selectors with his sudden inclusion and abrupt exclusion from the one-day team in recent weeks, one might say it was Dravid’s way of showing he should not be trifled with. But, knowing him, that was perhaps the last thing on his mind. He is too clever a student of the art of batting to let anything come in the way of the next ball, next over, next session.

Dravid fell early on the second morning of the Test, having already made a statement with his most entertaining century since Adelaide 2003 — removing not just the scars of the recent one-day snub but also, to an extent, of his only modestly successful stint as captain that ended suddenly in 2007.

The innings was significant for all those reasons. But, situationally speaking, there was nothing new. India was in trouble, and Dravid, its great No 3, batted the whole day again.

177 in a day by Rahul Dravid : he was completely different!

I don't know where to start from- 11k mark or 177 in a day or terrible strike rate or staying till the end right from the 4th over.

Let's start with 32/4 (!). Not a score any team would like to live with, especially after electing to bat first on Indian wickets.Back in April 2008, team India was all out for 76 on the same wicket and today the history was almost being repeated.The swing bowling along with the in-cutters revealed the holes in batting technique of Gambhir, Shewag and Laxman. Sachin threw his wicket away cheaply to an incoming delivery, inviting the ball to go through his gap between bat and pad. It was just the 8th over in progress and team India was not even in position to play out a session.

But one man who can be relied on in such situations- The Wall- started turning the tables on SriLankans.Yuvraj too was positive in his approach and these two started building a quick and solid partnership. Rahul Dravid played the in-swinging deliveries beautifully, hitting a few of them to the boundary.On the other end, Yuvraj was looking a bit shaky (lack of patience), but escaped luckily on certain risky shots.
At lunch, the scoreboard read: 105/4 (Dravid 45*, Yuvraj 35*)



After the lunch, the pair continued to trouble Sri Lankans with boundaries.But finally Yuvraj ran out of patience and scooped a ball to the short cover off Murali.
157/5 (Dravid 64*)

"I knew we needed a partnership.I had that South African game [April 2008] at the back of my mind, where we were bowled out in 20 overs and the wicket became good later on. I knew that if we could get through to lunch, batting would get a lot easier. Yuvi [Yuvraj Singh] came and batted really well. He was very positive and played some good shots. We were able to put on a 100-run partnership and that set the platform for me and Mahi [MS Dhoni]. We showed character today to be able to fight back."

The platform was perfectly built for MS Dhoni, who played a brilliant innings. He kept the scoreboard ticking with singles and twos.On the other end, Rahul Dravid was on song.He was picking and timing the ball correctly, making life miserable for the fielders on boundaries.The pair added quick 64 before the tea break.
221/5 (Dravid 98*, Dhoni 29*)


Dravid completed his century and reacted in unexpected way. It was the first time out of 27 that he reacted a bit aggressively. Was it just a rush of blood? Or was it the proof that he is still capable of playing ODIs? Who knows.
He played shots all over the ground, major chunk of which came off the mid-off region. Both Dravid and Dhoni made the lankans sweat for their wickets.Dhoni started to free his arms when he hit a typical dhoni six off Murali.Dravid went on to score 150 and quickly reached 160.Dhoni, on the other hand, succeeded in scoring his 2nd century. At his indivisual score of 110, Dhoni nicked one to the keeper, just 2 overs before the stumps. India managed to survive those 12 balls without throwing any more wickets.
385/6 (Dravid 177*, Harbhajan 2*)


Some achievements of Rahul Dravid from this game:
1.Fifth test player to cross 11000 runs mark.
2.Record no. (78) of 100+ partnerships.

You made my (our) day Rahul!

You can watch the highlights of Day 1 here.

Tribute to a Great by another Great:

Courtesy: Mumbai Mirror

Before getting a call-up for the Indian team, I had played a couple of matches against Sachin Tendulkar in the Duleep Trophy and in the Wills Trophy. When I entered the Indian dressing room, Sachin was already the vice-captain of the team, a known face and a great achiever.

We were of the same age but he had already been part of the team for seven years. He was star, one of the most recognisable faces in world cricket.

I grew up watching and reading about him. My Karnataka team-mates Anil Kumble and Javagal Srinath were playing with Sachin and they would narrate stories about him. For a newcomer like me it was a huge thrill to share the dressing room with a player of his class. I learned so much by observing his work ethics.

First we played together as players. Then I played under his captaincy, and later he played under my captaincy. But let me tell you that the equation never changed between us.

Together we have won so many matches that it has been truly satisfying. Winning against the unstoppable Australians lead by Steve Waugh, winning in Australia, playing well to reach the 2003 World Cup final, and even our first ever Test and ODI series win in Pakistan were memorable.

Much was said about me declaring in the Multan Test when Sachin was batting on 195. The decision was not personal; it was taken in the team's interest, directed at team goals. Whatever transpired was just between the two of us.

On the third day of the Test I went to Sachin's room. We sat together, chatted, and the matter was sorted out. Sachin, being such a great team man, was always ready to give more than 100 per cent for its cause.

That is the kind of trust and understanding we have between us. Whenever we have an issue, the openness has always been there. We never needed any middleman to sort it out. We have always relied on a face to face talk. I also appreciate the balance that Sachin has struck both on and off the field.

Honestly, in India it is not easy to be Sachin Tendulkar. The kind of fan following he has is mind-boggling. Sachin still has the drive to improve. He is too focussed as far as cricket is concerned.

It's a tribute to the man that he retains the quality after 20 years. Phenomenal achievement by a phenomenal person - that is what Sachin is.

Rahul Dravid's 78 hands Karnataka a 100+ lead:

In another Ranji Trophy match, Rahul Dravid was a lone scorer for Karnataka, scoring 78 off 122 balls. After wrapping Delhi's innings for 156. Karnataka kept on losing the wickets. The Wall stood tall and made sure that his team gets crucial 1st innings lead of 106 runs.

Scorecard (Stumps Day 2):
Delhi: 156/10 ( Vinay Kumar 8/32)
Karnataka: 260/10 (Rahul Dravid 78)
Delhi: 93/2

Follow the game here.

Rahul Dravid scores 97 against Uttar Pradesh:

In the first match of Ranji Trophy super league, Rahul Dravid scored 97 against Uttar Pradesh squad.Manish Pandey played brilliantly to stay at the crease with 194 on his name.

Karnataka: 372/5 (90.0 overs)

• Manish Pandey 194* (238 balls)
• Rahul Dravid 97 (185 balls)

The RCB teammates added massive 273 runs together for the 4th wicket.Rahul Dravid was ran-out and missed his century.
Scorecard