Just-retired Murali Vijay was a thorn in Australia’s side

Vijay was capped for the fourth and final Test of the 2008-09 Border-Gavaskar Trophy at Nagpur, replacing the injured Gautam Gambhir. He opened the batting with Virender Sehwag and scored 33 and 41

Murali Vijay

Murali Vijay, who announced his retirement from all forms of international cricket on Monday, should be proud of his performances against Australia, the best Test team in the world when he made his debut way back in November 2008. Vijay was capped for the fourth and final Test of the 2008-09 Border-Gavaskar Trophy at Nagpur, replacing the injured Gautam Gambhir. He opened the batting with Virender Sehwag and scored 33 and 41. 

Two years later, in his second Test against the men from Down Under at the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore, he carved 139 before Sachin Tendulkar reached his double century which helped India cross Australia’s first innings total of 478. The hosts totalled 495 before the Indian bowlers dismissed Australia for 223. In the second innings, Vijay scored a quickfire 37 off 45 balls in India’s seven-wicket win.

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This newspaper’s columnist, Ian Chappell was mighty impressed with Vijay. Judging only from his maiden innings in the 2008 Nagpur Test, Chappell wrote in Sunday mid-day: “There are signs that India have some viable replacement batting options. In Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir they have a dynamic opening combination that should be around for some time to terrorise opposition. The promising debut of Murali Vijay should give cause for confidence that there’s a replacement opener on call for any emergency. He [Vijay] also looked like he could easily fill a top-order batting slot if necessary.”

Vijay figured in 61 Tests for India and of his 3982 runs, 1324 were scored against the Australians in 15 Tests over which he smashed four centuries. The highlight for the Tamil Nadu batsman was the 2014-15 Test series in Australia, where he scored 482 runs at 60.25 which included a 99 at Adelaide and 144 at Brisbane.

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