Considered the pioneer of day-night Tests, Australia has dominated the format
The Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2024/2025 got off to an exciting start, with India and Australia bundling each other for low scores in the first innings. However, the second innings witnessed India altering the momentum, setting a big target for the Aussies. The Baggy Greens’s batting line-up faltered, similar to the first innings, and India sealed a historic victory by winning the game by 295 runs.
In short, the first game itself was as brilliant as a well-written climax of a thriller film. However, there’s more to come as the second match of the BGT is a pink-ball day-night Test—a format that the Aussies have dominated since its inception in 2015.
Australia started off the day-night Test journey in 2015 in Adelaide with a three-wicket victory over New Zealand. Over the years, they have played 12 pink-ball day-night Test matches, out of which, they have won 11 games.
The Aussies did not merely win those 11 games, but on several occasions, they have recorded huge victories. In 2022, the Baggy Greens recorded a 419-run victory over West Indies. 2022 also saw them scripting a convincing victory of 146 runs against England in Hobart.
England was also a victim of a 275-run victory in Adelaide in 2021, and who can forget India’s 36 all-out at the hands of the Aussies in 2020?! New Zealand, too, was embarrassed by Australia, who won by 296 runs in Perth in 2019.
And a win by an innings? Not once but twice—the Aussies did it twice, winning by innings & 48 runs against PAK in Adelaide in 2019 and another victory by innings & 40 runs against Sri Lanka in Brisbane in 2019.
So far, the only game that Australia has lost in this format is a game played earlier this year in January against West Indies. The Aussies lost by eight runs as West Indies scripted their first victory in Down Under since 1997. The win also broke Australia’s winning streak in the day-night Test format.
In a nutshell, the Australian domination in the pink-ball day-night Test has been unreal so far.
Moving on to India, the country is quite inexperienced when it comes to playing pink-ball day-night Test matches. After all, India has only played four such matches since 2019, and their last game was in 2022.
Out of four matches, three turned out to be positive outings for India on home soil. The country under Virat Kohli’s captaincy played its first pink-ball game at the Eden Gardens, defeating Bangladesh by an innings and 46 runs. In fact, the game was wrapped up in only three days.
However, India’s second day-night was the infamous Adelaide game against Australia. The incident that day left a dark and embarrassing chapter in the history of India’s cricket books.
India’s third game was again on home soil that they won by 10 runs against England in 2021. Finally, the fourth game India played in 2022 was against Sri Lanka, which the Men in Blue triumphed in by 238 runs.
While Australia has already retained its squad from the Perth game, India’s present squad is way different than what it was in 2020. The Men in Blue will hope to win their first day-night Test on foreign soil, whereas for Australia, it will be all about getting back to a winning position in the series.
