With Australia having a lead of almost 350 and with a day to go in the final test match at the Sydney Cricket Ground, there is no predicting when the Australian team would declare. Steve Smith would want to play it safe and set a target that is way beyond the reach of Indian batting line up.
Whatever the target is, one thing we are sure of is that Indian captain Virat Kohli will definitely have a chance to get another record to his name before the test series ends only if the weather doesn’t play a spoil sport.
Firstly let us take a look at a list of visiting batsmen to score most number of runs in a Test series against Australia:
|
Player |
Matches |
Innings |
Runs |
HS |
100s |
Winner |
|
Wally Hammond (Eng) Ashes-1929/28 |
5 |
9 |
905 |
251 |
4 |
England |
|
Alastair Cook (Eng) Ashes-2010/11 |
5 |
7 |
766 |
235* |
3 |
England |
|
Herbert Sutcliffe (Eng) Ashes -1924/25 |
5 |
9 |
734 |
176 |
4 |
Australia |
|
Aubrey Faulkner (SA) – 1910/11 |
5 |
10 |
732 |
204 |
2 |
Australia |
|
Jack Hobbs (Eng) Ashes -1911/12 |
5 |
9 |
662 |
187 |
3 |
England |
|
Geoff Boycott (Eng) Ashes – 1970/71 |
5 |
10 |
657 |
142* |
2 |
England |
|
John Edrich (Eng) Ashes – 1970/71 |
6 |
11 |
648 |
130 |
2 |
England |
|
Virat Kohli (Ind) BG – 2014/15 |
4 |
7 |
646 |
169 |
4 |
Australia |
|
Michael Vaughan (Eng) Ashes – 2002/03 |
5 |
10 |
633 |
183 |
3 |
Australia |
|
Rahul Dravid (Ind) BG – 2003/04 |
4 |
8 |
619 |
233 |
1 |
Drawn |
Stat updated till 9 January 2015
BG – Border Gavaskar Trophy (India in Australia)
Ashes – The Ashes (England in Australia)
With 905 runs, Wally Hammond tops the list and there seems no possibility of Virat Kohli overtaking him. But there is a good chance for him to jump from the 8th spot and reach upto the 2nd position. If he does manage to do so, he would also become the first visiting player to hit 5 centuries in a Test Series against Australia. However this would all depend on when Australia declares their innings and invites the Indian to bat. Virat currently has 646 runs and would need exactly 121 runs to get past Alastair Cook.
India is playing against Australia in a 4 match series and had it been a 5 match one, the form Virat currently is in, there is no doubting that he would have scored over 905 runs and become the player with most runs in a series against Australia.
Another Indian to make it to this list is Dravid with 619 runs in the Border Gavaskar trophy in 2003/04.