GUNDAPPA VISHWANATH – 114, 1981

Another century by a master stroke-maker from India at the MCG and another famous win in Australia for Team India.

Unlike the 1977 series, where India faced an Australian team which was devoid of its star power due to the Packer series, the 1981 series saw Team India face a full force Australian team captained by Greg Chappell.

Australia won the toss and fielded first, unleashing Dennis Lillee and Len Pascoe at the Indian batsmen.

Though India was reduced to 43/3 with Chetan Chauhan dismissed for a duck, Gundappa Vishwanath, the wristy magician from Hyderabad, took the onus on himself to make runs and scored a crafty 114 off 222 balls in 274 minutes with 11 fours. The next best scores came from Syed Kirmani (25) and Sandeep Patil (23). India managed to put on 237 on the board, as Lillee and Pascoe shared seven wickets in between them.

Allan Border’s 124 and fifties from Doug Walters and Greg Chappell took Australia to 419. Indian top order clicked in the second innings with Gavaskar (70), Chauhan (85), Vengsarkar (41) and other cameos taking India to 324 and set Australia a target of 143 runs to win.

After Karsan Ghavri and Dilip Doshi joined forces to remove the Australian top order, an injured Kapil Dev came to decimate the middle and lower order, taking 5/28 and keeping the Australian total to 83 runs and India registered a famous win by 59 runs, to equalize the 3-match series at 1-1.

Gundappa Vishwanath was given the Player of the Match award for his majestic 114.