On this day in 2007, Anil Kumble scored his only ton in international cricket
Aug 10, 2020
New Delhi [India], Aug 10 : On this day 13 years ago, former India spinner Anil Kumble smashed a maiden and only century in his 18-year-long illustrious international cricket career.
Kumble achieved the feat in the final Test of the three-match series against England. India were leading the series by 1-0 after winning the second game by seven wickets.
India won the toss and opted to bat in the third game at The Oval in London.
The visitors had a decent start as Dinesh Karthik and Wasim Jaffer put up a 62-run opening partnership. The latter was departed by pacer James Anderson after scoring 35 runs.
Skipper Rahul Dravid joined Karthik in the middle and went on to build a 127-run stand for the second wicket. Dravid (55) was bowled out by Anderson in the 49th over.
Karthik too departed after Dravid's dismissal, he was caught behind the stumps by Matt Prior off Ryan Sidebottom. The opener played a knock of 91-run including 10 fours and one six.
Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly then guided the side to 250-run mark and stitched a 77-run stand for the fourth wicket.
Ganguly departed after scoring 37 runs. VVS Laxman then joined Tendulkar in the middle, the duo batted steadily to surpass the 350-run mark.
Laxman scored 51 runs before being picked by Chris Tremlett. MS Dhoni and Tendulkar build a partnership of 63-run for the sixth wicket. Tendulkar was sent back to the pavilion by Anderson after accumulating 82 runs.
Anil Kumble came in to bat at number eight and joined Dhoni on the crease. The duo went on to stitch a 91-run partnership for the eighth wicket thanks to the quickfire knock of the wicket-keeper batsman.
Dhoni scored 92 runs off 81 balls studded with nine fours and four maximums. Kumble then played a major role in adding runs to the scoreboard. He had decent partnerships with three-tailender -- Zaheer Khan (11), RP Singh (11) and S Sreesanth (35) -- to reach his individual three-figure mark and etch his name in the history.
Kumble remained unbeaten for 110 runs including 16 fours and one six while India bundled out for a giant total of 664 runs in their first innings.
England somehow managed to hold on after India did not enforce the follow-on and the match was drawn, with India winning the 3-match Test series 1-0.
Kumble was awarded Player of the Match for his all-round performance in the game as he scalped five wickets after scoring a ton.
The Indian spinner announced his retirement from international cricket in 2008. He finished with 619 wickets in the longest format of the game.
He has the third-highest number of wickets in Tests, only behind Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan (800) and Australia's Shane Warne (708).
Kumble is the second bowler in the history of international cricket after England's Jim Laker to take all ten wickets in an innings of a Test match.
He had achieved the feat against Pakistan in 1999 at the Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium in Delhi. Kumble had bowling figures of 10-74 from 26.3 overs in the second innings of the Test match.
Kumble will be coaching Kings XI Punjab in the upcoming edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL).
