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Mohandas Menon & Roshan Paul The Australians visited India for the first time in October and November of 1956 to play 3 Test matches. They were on their way back from a closely fought 1-2 loss to England and had a very strong team with the likes of Neil Harvey, Richie Benaud, Peter Burge, Ray Lindwall and skipper Ian Johnson. They would have been even stronger if Keith Miller and Alan Davidson, both of whom played in England, had made the trip to India. India's Subash Gupte and Australia's Richie Benaud were the two best leg-spinners in the world at that time and everyone looked forward to a battle for supremacy between the two of them, according to India's premier opening batsman in that series, Pankaj Roy. Roy also confessed that the team was nervous at the prospect of facing the Aussies. "We were especially worried about their fast bowlers. In those days, bowlers easily bowled above 95 mph and we had no protection like today and also there were no restrictions on bouncers or beamers." The first Test was at Madras and India elected to bat on a turning track. However, Richie Benaud took 7 wickets to bowl India out for 161. Around lunch on the third day, the Aussies were 200-8 and the match hung in the balance. However skipper Ian Johnson and pace bowler Pat Crawford added 87 for the ninth wicket to extend Australia's lead to 158. On the fourth day, Ray Lindwall came back from a stomach ailment to run through the Indian team. He took 7/43 as India went down by an innings and 5 runs.
India In the second Test at Bombay, the Indians put up a better fight. However, the Australians were still far and away the superior team. A century from G. S. Ramchand led India to 251 in the first innings. The Aussie replied with 523, an innings remarkable for the way Neil Harvey destroyed the famed Subash Gupte. India batted out the rest of the time for an honourable draw, thanks to battling innings' by Pankaj Roy and captain Polly Umrigar.
Australia The third Test at Calcutta was a big disappointment as the Indians let slip a golden opportunity to level the series. Neither team crossed 200 runs in any innings but India batted worse to fold for 136 in each innings; and this on a wicket that helped the spinners. Although off-spinner Ghulam Ahmed took 7 Australian wickets in the first innings and 3 in the second, he was overshadowed by Richie Benaud, who took 11 wickets in the match and bowled his team to a 2-0 series victory.
Australia
Australia
2nd Innings 189 for 9 dec
Result: Australia won by 94 runs Thus, the Australians easily won the series and Richie Benaud won the battle of the leg-spinners with 23 wickets at 16.86 to Gupte's 8 at 32.9. However, Gupte did have 2 less innings' to bowl than Benaud, thanks to the might of the Australian batting, led by the left-handed Neil Harvey.
In hindsight, Australia was by far the better team in terms of bowling arsenal; and that made the difference. Roy felt that "historically, teams with great fast bowlers have dictated terms to others" and in that series, Australia had far superior fast bowlers.
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