Tour of Australia & New Zealand 1967-68       Captain: Nawab of Pataudi

India’s eleventh official Test tour

Second Test-playing tour of Australia, first tour of New Zealand

 (November 1967 –

           March 1968)

It was not until February 1968 that India won its first Test match and series away from home shores.  Young captain Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi marshalled his resources well on the tour of New Zealand, which affirmed that India's spin wizards, Prasanna and Bedi had mastered their skills. India went on to beat New Zealand 3-1 in the four Test series on pitches which were to their spinners’ liking. 

They had earlier lost to Australia 4-0, a ‘whitewash’ as in 1959 and 1962. Returning to Australia for the first time in twenty years, the Indians were unfortunate to engage Australia when its batsmen were playing so consistently well but defeat should be ascribed, too, to the tourists’ shortcomings.  The sole function of the opening bowling attack soon became to remove the gloss from the ball so it could gripped by the spinners. Of these, Prasanna had an excellent tour but he was let down by the other bowlers and poor fielding.  Too many catches were missed. India was also hampered by the hamstring injury to Pataudi who nevertheless played at Melbourne where he scored 75 and 85.

Jaisimha played the most unexpected innings of the series, a century at Brisbane, that took India within 39 runs of its target to win. He had had no match practice after just landing in Australia as a replacement for Chandrasekhar.  The leg-spinner Chandra did not play again on tour after injuring his ankle in the second Test match in Australia and went home (although his two months stay in a hospital in Bangalore was due to a road accident in India).

On the way back from Auckland the team played a match in Singapore.

Other Indian tours

Previous tour

England 1967

Next tour

West Indies 1970-71

Next Australian tour

1977-78

Next New Zealand tour

1975-76

Members of the Test tour  party  (16 + 1)

Opening batsmen:  Dilip Sardesai, Abid Ali [also Engineer]

Middle-order batsmen: Nawab of Pataudi, Ajit Wadekar, Chandu Borde, Venkata Subramanya, Ramesh Saxena

Wicket-keepers:Farokh Engineer, Prince Indrajitsinhji

Spinners: Bishan Bedi, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar, Bapu Nadkarni, Erapalli Prasanna

Fast bowlers:Ramakant Desai, Umesh  Kulkarni, Rusi Surti [plus Abid Ali]

Zonal representation

 Duleep Trophy teams

C: Central (0), E: East (1), N: North (1), S: South (5), W: West (9)

 Ranji Trophy teams

Bn - Bengal (1)

B  -  Bombay (6)

Gj – Gujarat (1)

H   - Hyderabad  (2)

Mh – Maharashtra (1)

My -  Mysore (3)

N Pj  North Punjab (1)

Sa – Saurashtra (1)

Bedi, Kulkarni and Saxena did not play in the Ranji Trophy in 1967-68 season. Prince (KS) Indrajirsinhji and Kulkarni did not play in the Duleep Zonal Trophy.

Average age of  team at time of first Test match

(23 December 1967) :

    28 yrs 0 months

Test Appearances made before the tour

Borde 46,  Nadkarni 34,  Jaisimha 29,  Desai 26,  Pataudi 24,  Sardesai 18,  Engineer 15,  Surti 15,  Chandrasekhar 14,  Prasanna 6,  Bedi 5,  Subramanya 5,  Wadekar 5,  Indrajit 3,  Saxena 1,  Abid Ali 0,  Kulkarni 0.

Tour Officials

Selectors

M Dutta Ray (chairman),  Col H R Adhikari,  Ghulam Ahmed,  M K Mantri,  with the Nawab of Pataudi co-opted.

Selection

The team was chosen from a list of 35 possibles who were at a Madras training camp.

Unavailable: Nawab of Pataudi (at first - later persuaded to lead the side) ; S.Guha (right knee injury); Hanumant Singh (thigh injury - this was probably a cover story after he was not selected).

Tour Party Announced :  8 November 1967.

Not selected : Budi Kunderan,  Hanumant Singh,  Saleem Durani

Tour stand-bys :  M L Jaisimha (Hd),  S.Venkataraghaven (Ms),  Ambar Roy (Bn),  S K Dharsey (Rly).

Time between selection and departure from India     9 days

 (8 November - 17 November)

Travel

Madras    Q  Perth

After the Khadakavasla camp preceding the tour, the team assembled in Madras on 16 November and flew out the next day, arriving in Perth on 18 November.

At the end of the Australian tour the team flew from Sydney to Auckland on 4 February 1968.

Time spent in Australia

   78 days

(18 November - 4 February)

in New Zealand42 days

On-tour selection committee

Nawab of Pataudi (captain),  Chandu Borde (vice-captain),  Ghulam Ahmed (manager).

Reinforcements

Jaisimha was summoned as cover for Pataudi (torn hamstring). He flew from Hyderabad, catching numerous connecting flights and arriving in Brisbane just before the Test match.

On 30 December, just before the end of the Australian tour, the tour committee decided to send Chandrasekhar home (torn ligaments on left foot). There was some talk of replacing him with Venkataraghaven but not in the end.  Chandrasekhar reached Madras on 3 February and the next day arrived home in Bangalore.

Ramakant Desai’s jaw was fractured by a ball from Motz at Dunedin, and did not play again in New Zealand

Fixtures/Results

Plans for the New Zealand tour were announced by the New Zealand Cricket Council on 12 October 1966. India was the only Test-playing country not to have visited New Zealand yet.

† not first-class

Time spent in Australia before First Test:

 35 days

(18 November - 23 December)

.

Test appearances on tour

(v Australia & New Zealand 1967-68)

8  -  Abid Ali,  Borde,  Engineer,  Prasanna,  Surti,  Wadekar.

7  -  Nadkarni,  Pataudi.

6  -  Bedi,  Jaisimha.

5  - 

4  -  Kulkarni,  Subramanya.

3  - 

2  -  Chandrasekhar,  Desai,  Sardesai.

1  -

0  -  Indrajitsinhji,  Saxena.

Highlights

•    Abid Ali took 6-55 in his first bowl in Test cricket at Adelaide and later played two innings of 78 and 81 opening the batting in the Sydney Test

•    The Nawab of Pataudi ‘s scores v Australia were 75, 85, 74, 48, 51 and 6, giving an average of 56.5

•    Jaisimha scored 74 and 101 after being put into the Test XI shortly after arriving in Brisbane

•    Prasanna took 6 for 94 to spin New Zealand to defeat at Dunedin, India’s first Test match win abroad

•    Prasanna took 24 wickets in the NZ series (average 18.9) and 49 wickets in only 8 Tests on tour.

•    Ajit Wadekar (143) scored his only Test hundred at Wellington

•    Rusi Surti scored 99 at Auckland in what turned out to be his last Test innings

Tour Summary

*  plus Singapore match result not yet known

Return to India

Auckland    Q  Singapore  Q  Bombay

The team left New Zealand on 13 March, flying from Auckland to Sydney, where Surti disembarked (he arranged to play for Queensland the next season). 

The team flew on to Singapore for a one-day match, which was spoiled by rain.

Pataudi had flown in advance to Bombay, arriving on 14 March, to spend some time with his sister on a brief holiday from the United States. 

The team left Singapore on 16 March, arriving back in Bombay in the early hours next morning. They were met at Santa Cruz Airport, Bombay, by Pataudi.

Engineer who had signed to play county cricket for Lancashire, flew direct to England.

Time away from India

  121 days  

(17 November to 17 March)

Finances

Accounts of the tour

Postscript