It seems the sky is the limit for Gill ever since he embarked on the tour of England as the new captain of the Indian Test team. His batting has reached great heights in a matter of a fortnight, as he has broken two longstanding records held by Gavaskar for over 50 years
An ecstatic India skipper Shubman Gill celebrates his 200 against England at Edgbaston, Birmingham, yesterday. Pic/Getty Images
Shubman Gill’s talent and potential have drawn comparisons to legendary Indian batsmen Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli. But he is breaking the records of India’s greatest batsman ever, Sunil Gavaskar.
It seems the sky is the limit for Gill ever since he embarked on the tour of England as the new captain of the Indian Test team. His batting has reached great heights in a matter of a fortnight, as he has broken two longstanding records held by Gavaskar for over 50 years. Those records had stood the test of time as far as Indian cricket was concerned.
After scoring 269 in the first innings of the second Test at Edgbaston, which is the highest by an Indian batter in England, he went on to add a century in the second, thus becoming only the second Indian after Gavaskar to achieve the feat. Gavaskar had made 124 and 220 in the fifth and final against West Indies in 1971, his debut series, and that was only his fourth Test. Sunny’s aggregate in that match was 344, which was the most by an Indian batsman till Gill surpassed it at Edgbaston on Saturday.
Sunny’s record broken
Gill stepped out and hammered Shoaib Bashir over the mid-wicket boundary to cross 75, the figure he needed to surpass Gavaskar’s 344. Then just before the tea interval, he pushed Bashir for a single that brought up his eighth Test hundred in his 34th Test match to emulate Gavaskar’s record of a double century and a century in the same Test, in the presence of the original ‘Little Master’, who is here as a commentator.
In elite company
Gill also became only the fifth batter after Graham Gooch (333+123) 456 vs India, Mark Taylor (334+92) 426 vs Pakistan, Kumar Sangakkara (319+105) 424 vs Bangladesh, and Brian Lara (400) 400 vs England, to surpass 400 runs in a single Test, when he struck Joe Root for two successive sixes. Gill ultimately fell for 161, for a match aggregate of 430, the second-highest ever in Test history.
What’s amazing about Gill’s scoring spree is that he has already crossed the 550-run mark in successive Tests (147+08 at Leeds) and with three more to come at Lord’s, Manchester and The Oval, another of Gavaskar’s records is in danger. On his debut Test tour of West Indies in 1971, he aggregated 774, with four centuries in four Tests. Now with three more Tests for Gill to look forward to, it is quite possible that he may surpass that record too.
Gill was always considered a player of great talent, temperament and destined to touch great heights, and his recent performances have solidified his status. Gill is just 25 years old, and though not as many Test matches are played now as they were in Gavaskar’s and Tendulkar’s time, still, there is no knowing what heights Gill can climb hereon.
Indian skippers with centuries in both innings
>> Sunil Gavaskar vs WI (Kolkata, 1978)
>> Virat Kohli vs Australia (Adelaide, 2014)
>> Shubman Gill vs England (Edgbaston, 2025)
One
Shubman Gill becomes the first Indian to score a double century and 150-plus runs in the same Test
Two
Gill becomes the second Indian player after Virat Kohli to record three hundreds in his first two Tests as captain
Brief scores
India 587 & 427-6d (S Gill 161, R Jadeja 69*, R Pant 65, KL Rahul 55; J Tongue 2-93, S Bashir 2-119) vs England 407 & 72-3 (B Duckett 25; A Deep 2-36, M Siraj 1-29)
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