Sachin secures draw for India

Sachin Tendulkar, the man approaching towards a world record of the highest run getter in Test Cricket, at least drive India to draw the first Test against Australia at the M Chinnaswami Stadium in Bangalore on Monday. However, he fell short of 14 runs to the world record.

Both, Sachin (49) and VVS Laxman (42 not out) played a key part while chasing a target of 299 to win but only managed to get 177 for 4 in their second innings before bad light came out to play, and the match abandoned as a draw.

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Heading to an unlikely victory on the last day of the Test match, India lost early wickets which forced it to defend the match. Virender Sehwag (6) and Rahul Dravid (5) couldn’t contribute many runs to cement Indian innings.

Gautam Gambhir and Sachin Tendulkar added 53-run for the third wicket before Gambhir was dismissed for 29 bringing down the score to 77 for 3. Then it was Laxman who held the innings first with Tendulkar and then Sourav Ganguly (26) despite repeated interruption of play due to bad light.

Debutant spinner Cameron White recorded his first wicket, that of none other than Sachin Tendulkar. Sachin got out for 49, 14 short of equaling Brian Lara's record of 11,953 test runs.

The second test in the four-match series starts in Mohali on Friday.

Brief Scores:

Australia: 430 all out and 228 for 6 declared

India: 360 all out and 165 for four in 67 overs. (Sachin Tendulkar 49, VVS Laxman not out 41; Stuart Clark 1/12, Brett Lee 1/26).