COLOMBO: Virat Kohli’s India are one Test series away from matching Ricky Ponting’s Australia for the most consecutive Test series wins. It is the eighth Test series in a row the Indians have won — a run that began in Sri Lanka in 2015.
Ravindra Jadeja bagged his ninth five-wicket haul in Test cricket on Sunday to help India crush Sri Lanka by an innings and 53 runs in the second Test and secure the three-match series 2-0 with a match to be played.
The only team to have won more consecutive series is Australia, which won nine in a row under Ponting between the 2005 one-off Test against an ICC World XI and 2008’s three-Test tour of the West Indies. Coincidentally, it was India that ended Australia’s winning streak by taking out the 2008 Border-Gavaskar at home.
The only other side to have won eight series in a row is England. That run stretched from 1884 to 1890 and was ended by Australia before the English had the chance to trump South Africa in a one-match series they were playing at the same time.
The Indians will not get the chance to equal Australia’s nine-series run until November-December, when they face Sri Lanka on home soil. If the Indians come out on top in that series, their nine-campaign streak will have featured three wins over Sri Lanka (two away, one at home), one over the West Indies in the Caribbean, and one each against South Africa, New Zealand, England, Bangladesh and Australia at home.
To topple Australia’s record, India would then have to beat South Africa in South Africa — something no Asian side has ever pulled off.