Chennai Test: 5th and final day's statistical highlights...

Mohandas Menon

•  Harbhajan Singh (15-217) now occupies the second position among Indian bowlers and the 12th position among by Test bowlers with maximum wickets in a Test match. Only leg-spinner Narendra Hirwani (16-137) against West Indies in January 1988 at this very ground has taken more wickets in a Test match for India.

•  It was also the fifth best match figures by any bowler against Australia and the previous best by an Indian bowler against Australia was the 14-124 by off-spinner Jasu Patel at Kanpur in December 1959. However, Hirwani's 16-137 remains the best match figures at this venue.

•  Harbhajan's 8-84 in the second innings was the second best figures by an Indian bowler against Australia after Jasu Patel's 9-69 at Kanpur in 1959.

•  Curious enough, the last bowler to take eight or more wickets in an innings against Australia was Kapil Dev when he claimed 8-106 at Adelaide in December 1985 and the last spinner being another Indian and off-spinner Jasu Patel (9-69) at Kanpur in December 1959.

•  Harbhajan's 32 wickets in this series was the fourth highest in a three-match Test series after the 35 wickets by England's pace bowler George Lohmann (in 1895-96 in South Africa), 34 wickets by England paceman Syd Barnes (in 1912 against South Africa) and 33 wickets by New Zealand's Richard Hadlee (in 1985-86 in Australia). However his tally was the best by a spinner in a three-match series bettering the 30 wickets by Pakistani leg-spinner Abdul Qadir (in 1987-88 against England).

•  Harbhajan (32) now has the second most wickets by an off-spinner in a Test series against Australia after England's Jim Laker (46 wickets in 5 matches in 1956).

•  He also went past left-arm spinner Bishan Bedi's 31 wickets (in 5 matches in Australia in 1977-78) - the maximum wickets in a series by an Indian bowler against Australia - both at home or away.

•  Harbhajan has now taken 28 wickets in the last two matches (13 at Calcutta and 15 here at Chennai). Only England's Jim Laker (11 at Leeds and 19 at Manchester - against Australia in July 1956) has taken more wickets (30) than Harbhajan, in two successive Test matches, who in turn went past the 27 wickets by Englishman Syd Barnes (10 at Durban and 17 at Johannesburg - against South Africa in December 1913).

•  Meanwhile, Harbhajan's 32 wickets out of the 50 Australian wickets that fell during this series, represents 64% of the total wickets taken by Indian bowlers. This was Test cricket's most dominating performance by an individual bowler in a series. He bettered the previous best such performances by New Zealand's Richard Hadlee (33/56 - 58.93%) in Australia in 1985-86 and England's George Lohmann (35/60 - 58.33%) in South Africa in 1895-96.

•  VVS Laxman (503 runs) during his second innings score of 66 became the first Indian batsman to aggregate over 500 runs in a three-match Test series. He bettered the previous best of 447 runs by Sunil Gavaskar in 1978-79 in Pakistan.

•  However, Laxman failed to surpass the 557 runs made by Pakistani batsman Salim Malik in Pakistan in 1994-95 - which still remains the maximum runs scored by a batsman in a three-match Test series against Australia.

•  A record that went un-noticed when Mark Waugh held the catch offered by Ganguly, he became the third fieldsman in Test history (all Australians) to take 150 catches. He now has 152 catches in 111 matches, with only Mark Taylor (157 catches in 104 matches) and Allan Border (156 catches in 156 matches) ahead of him.

•  Incidentally Mark Waugh now has 29 catches in 14 matches against India with only West Indian Viv Richards have taken more - 39 catches - but in 28 matches.

•  Mark Waugh's also held six catches in the match while claiming four in the second. His four catches in the second innings equals the maximum taken by three Australian fieldsmen (including himself) - Alan Davidson at Delhi in December 1959, Dave Whatmore at Kanpur in October 1979 and Mark Waugh at Melbourne in December 1999.

•  He also equals Whatmore's (see above) six catches in a Test match against India - the maximum by any fielder from any country against India.

•  In retrospect, Matthew Hayden's 203 in the first innings now becomes the third highest score by an Australian batsman for a losing side. Only Victor Trumper (214 not out against South Africa at Adelaide in January 1911) and Neil Harvey (205 against South Africa at Melbourne in February 1953) have made larger scores than Hayden while Australia lost the Test match.

•  Hayden now becomes the first batsman to score a double hundred against India - for a losing side. The previous highest was by Zimbabwean Andy Flower had made an unbeaten 183 when his team had lost the Delhi Test in November last year.

•  This win by two wickets equals India's narrowest in terms of wickets in Tests. India had beaten the same team by the same margin at Bombay's Brabourne Stadium in October 1964.

•  India becomes the sixth Test team in history to make a "come-back" to win a three-match series after losing the opening match.. The other teams being: England v South Africa in 1888; South Africa v New Zealand in 1994-95; Pakistan v Zimbabwe in 1994-95; Sri Lanka in Pakistan in 1995-96, Sri Lanka v New Zealand in 1997-98 and last occasion happened just six days ago when England won the series against Sri Lanka. This was the first such defeat for Australia in Tests.

•  Australia after winning a record 16 Tests in a row since October 1999, has now lost two consecutive Tests for the first time since March 1999 when the West Indies won two in a row at Kingston (by 10 wickets) and at Bridgetown (by 1 wicket). Interestingly the last occasion India won two consecutive matches in the same series was when it beat Australia at Chennai and Calcutta in March 1998. India had recently beaten Bangladesh at Dhaka and Zimbabwe at Delhi in November last year in successive matches but in two different series.

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