Tour of Pakistan 1954-55      Captain: Vinoo Mankad

India’s seventh Test tour

First Test-playing tour of Pakistan by India

(December 1954 -

                March 1955)

This second Test series between India and Pakistan (like the third, held six years later) consisted of five drawn matches and a good deal of dull, over-cautious cricket. It was the first five-match Test rubber to produce five drawn games. The tour inspired only one written account, a book appropriately entitled "Cricket without Challenge".

The Tests were four-day affairs, not long enough to achieve a result when batsmen score at such a slow pace.  Three of the matches were played on matting pitches. Lala Amarnath, back in favour with the Indian authorities and managing the team, tested his own form in one match with a view to appearing in the 4th Test match because of his players' lack of experience on matting wickets, like that at Peshawar.  In the end he chose not to play and in any case the ground authorities agreed that the match would be played on turf.

Other Indian tours

Previous tours

West Indies 1952-53

Next tour

England 1959

Next tour of Pakistan

1978-79

Members of the Test tour  party  (17)

Opening batsmen:Pankaj Roy, Pananmal Punjabi.

Middle-order batsmen: Vijay Manjrekar, Coimbata Gopinath, Prakash Bhandari, Polly Umrigar, Chandrasekhar Gadkari

Wicket-keepers:Madhav Mantri, Naren Tamhane.

All-rounder:  Vinoo Mankad.

Spinners: Sabhash Gupte, Jasu Patel, Ghulam Ahmed, Chandu Borde.

Fast /medium bowlers:Bal Dani, Dattu Phadkar, Gulabrai Ramchand.

Zonal representation

 E: East (2), N: North (2), S: South (2), W: West (11)

 Ranji Trophy teams 

Ba - Baroda  (1)

Bn  - Bengal  (2)

B  -   Bombay (8)

D   - Delhi  (1)

Gj  -  Gujarat (2)

Hd  - Hyderabad (1)

Ms  -  Madras  (1)

Sv  -  Services (2)

Average age of players at time of first Test match

(1 January 1955):  

   27 yrs  3 months. 

Test Appearances made before the tour

Mankad 30,  Phadkar 22,  Umrigar 20,  Roy 16,  Ghulam Ahmed 13,  Manjrekar 13,  Ramchand 12,  Gupte 8,  Gopinath 5,  Gadkari 3,  Mantri 3,  Dani 1,  Bhandari 0,  Borde 0,  Patel 0,  Punjabi 0,  Tamhane 0.

Tour Officials 

Selectors 

Homi Contractor (chairman),  M Dutta Ray,  Cota Ramaswami and the tour manager, Lala Amarnath, chose the team after witnessing two trial matches.

Selection 

Unavailable  None.   Vijay Hazare?

Tour Party Announced : the names of ten players were given out on 6 December 1954 and seven more (•) on 13 December.

(*)  The seven names added were ….

Not Selected : Madhav Apte, Ramnath Kenny.

Time between selection and departure from India

14 days  

(13 - 27 December)

Travel

Calcutta  Q Chittagong

The western Indian players took the train from Bombay’s Victoria Terminus to Calcutta. The team flew out on 27 December to Chittagong in East Pakistan. Ghulam Ahmed, C V Gadkari, C D Gopinath and the manager left later because of a delay in obtaining visas. 

At the end of this first section of the tour, the team flew from Dacca by a Pakistan International Airlines flight, reaching Karachi on the night of 6 January 1955.

Time spent in Pakistan

   67 days

(27 December - 4 March)

On-tour selection committee 

Mankad (captain),  Umrigar (vice-captain),  Phadkar (senior professional),  Amarnath (team manager).

   Phadkar was not among the first tranche of players selected but he was a professional cricketer.

Reinforcements 

None required.

Fixtures/Results 

† not first-class

¹ Gymkhana Ground 

² Punjab University

³  Bagh-e-Jinnah

⁴   National Stadium

⁵    now Sahiwal 

⁶    now Faisalabad

. Time spent in Pakistan before First Test:

 5 days

(27 December - 1 January)

Test appearances on tour 

5  -   Gupte, Manjrekar, Mankad, Punjabi, Ramchand, Roy, Tamhane, Umrigar.

4  -   Ghulam Ahmed.

3  -   Gadkari, Phadkar.

2  -   Gopinath.

1  -   Bhandari, Mantri, Patel.

0  -   Borde, Dani.

Highlights 

•    Polly Umrigar again topped the Indian Test and tour batting averages with 271 runs (average 54.2)

•    Like Umrigar, Manjrekar scored 271 runs in the Test matches, starting with 3 consecutive fifties.

•    Gupte, with 21 wickets including five in an innings three times, was the leading Indian bowler.

    .

Tour Summary 

Return to India

Karachi  Q Bombay

The team returned home from Karachi on 4 March 1955.  They flew to Bombay in a Pakistan Royal Air Force jet, specially flown for the team. 

Then Roy and Gopinath flew to Madras for a Ranji Trophy match; Ghulam Ahmed flew to Hyderabad, Amarnath to Kanpur; Bhandari by train to Delhi; Borde and Patel flew to the north-west.

Time away from India

  67 days  

(27 December to 4 March)

Finances 

“Players were paid Rs 1,000 plus weekly expenses for the tour. The professionals,like Vinoo Mankad, Dattu Phadkar and co asked for Rs 3,000. The Board settled for Rs 2500.”

                                                                                                  (Pradeep Vijayakar, Times of India, 2 March 2004)

Published accounts of the tour 

"Cricket Without Challenge"   by Qamaruddin Butt.

Postscript

The Indians did not make a return tour to Pakistan until 1978-79.