2003
VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid put on 303 on this day against Australia from 93.5 overs in the second Test, in Adelaide, to turn the match around for India. They had been 85 for 4, but Dravid scored one of the finest hundreds played overseas by an Indian batter. He posted 233, helping them keep in touch with Australia, who had posted 556 on the back of Ricky Ponting's 242. The ghosts of Kolkata 2001 - when India beat Australia after following on, and which was the last time an Indian pair had put on more than 300 - were alive and well. And those spirits were even more animated two days later, when India became the first side since Kepler Wessels' South Africans to take a series lead in Australia. Ajit Agarkar, whose only claim to fame in Australia was scoring a string of ducks on India's previous tour, in 1999-2000, took career-best figures of 6 for 41.
1938
It's hard to believe that Charlie Griffith, who was born today, began life as a spin bowler. He soon gave up that slow-bowling nonsense to form, with Wes Hall, one of the most fearsome fast-bowling partnerships in history. Griffith would make any cricket bad-boy XI. Many people felt he chucked his faster ball - he was twice no-balled for throwing - and, bowling for Barbados in a tour match against the Indians in 1961-62, Griffith fractured their captain Nari Contractor's skull so severely that his life was briefly in danger.
1969
Although Bishan Bedi doesn't feature in the top 50 in the list of bowlers who have taken seven or more wickets in an innings and ended up on the losing side, it might be best not to remind him of the Calcutta Test in 1969, when he produced just such a performance and Australia beat India by ten wickets to take a 2-1 lead in a series marred by crowd trouble. Rioting had disturbed play in Bombay, but in Calcutta six fans died in a clash with the police, who tried to control a rush at the ticket counters by using teargas. On day three, Bedi took six wickets to make a final haul of 7 for 98, but Australia took the lead. In India's second innings there was more crowd trouble - this time fans pelting stones at each other and invading the pitch. Australia went home unhappy and unpopular; especially captain Bill Lawry, who was accused of striking a photographer with his bat during the pitch invasion at Eden Gardens. They made their next tour to the country ten years later.
1903
The most prolific batting debut of all. RE "Tip" Foster cracked 287 in the first Test in Sydney; it remains the highest score by an Englishman in a Test in Australia, and is one of only five debutant Test double-hundreds. England took a huge first-innings lead, and though Australia fought back with a brilliant 185 not out from Victor Trumper, England sealed a five-wicket victory on the sixth day of the timeless Test.
1974
Viv Richards made his first Test hundred, against India in Delhi, and it was a typically subdued affair: in only his second Test, Richards clubbed an unbeaten 192, with six sixes and 20 fours. Given it was an attack of Bedi, Prasanna and Venkataraghavan doing most of the work, these were no easy pickings. Lance Gibbs went on to take eight wickets and West Indies sealed an innings victory early on the fourth day.
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