Sunil Gavaskar scored his 34th and last Test century against Sri Lanka?
(13 Aug 2001)

By December 1986, Sunil Gavaskar, at 37 was obviously nearing the end of his illustrious Test career. He still had a few ambitions left, most notably being the first to score 10,000 runs in Test cricket. But he also had some minor ambitions, among them being the fact that the Green Park in Kanpur was the only ground among the six major centres in India on which he had not got a Test hundred. He had notched up centuries at Madras, Bombay, Calcutta, New Delhi and Bangalore. But in 13 innings from eight Tests dating back to 1972-73, Gavaskar had scored just 453 runs at an average of 34.84 with five half centuries and a highest score of 81. Moreover, as he frequently mentioned both in his columns and his books, Kanpur was always a special place for him for it is the city from where his wife hailed from.

While he did fulfill his main ambition of getting to 10,000 runs in March 1987, against Pakistan at Ahmedabad, Gavaskar finally did get a century at Kanpur against Sri Lanka on the fourth day of the first Test match in the 1986-87 series. Opening the innings, Gavaskar saw Srikkanth and Lamba go early before he added 117 runs for the third wicket with Vengsarkar (57). Gavaskar meanwhile had got to his hundred. He then proceeded to add 153 runs for the fourth wicket with Md Azharuddin. Ultimately, Gavaskar was fourth out at 380 for 176. It proved to be his 34th and last Test century. It was in the nick of time for Gavaskar did not play a Test at Kanpur again. Indeed, he played only six more matches before bidding adieu to Test cricket.

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