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Originally Posted by Communique
A small question. Does anyone here know how many years it took the current #1 ranked Test team to win it's first Test match after it got it's Test playing status ?
20 years !! That's right. Bangladesh has won it's first Test even before it completed it's first 10 years of Test cricket. Yes, it was against Zimbabwe, but don't you think there were minnows during India's time yet it took 20 damn years for them to win their first Test ? Also, Bangladesh was on the brink of winning a Test match against Pakistan back in 2003/04. Luckily Pakistan escaped. That was just 3/4 years after Bangladesh started playing Test cricket.
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Statistics, more statistics and lies....
Can you also ask a supplementary ? How many test matches did they play in those 20 years ? Very few players in those days had continuity of play.
For example, Pakistan played 59 test matches in their first 17 years. In October 1964 , in one test match, they had 6 new test caps since they had not played a single test between the summer of 1962 and October 1964.
India probably even fewer, since between 1936 and 1946-47
they did not play a single test match.
So number of years is not really relevant. It is simply our defensive psychology that we keep bring up these stats.
Sri Lanka started in 1984 (?) Within two years they were scoring 3 centuries in their only rest match at Lords. Wettimuny scoring 190. I think they even took a first innings lead.
The real reason for our current predicament is that when we first started playing, i.e. in 2000, our standard was lower than when they started - so the trend is not surprising.
We did not have the Hanif's, Hazare's, Mankad's , Fazal's etc. who could save matches or occasionally win some.
Our day will also come. The gap in standards is clearly narrowing. However, the "attitude" we take into a test match is still immature !