Australia vs Pakistan - Hobart, 1999 - The Test that revolutionized the unthinkable - Opinion
Scores over 400 as targets in Test Cricket were considered to be improbable missions that adventurists would be overwhelmed by. For any side which posted 400 or 350 as the final innings target, was bound to win the match. This fact held true for most part
of the 1990’s until a historic Test match unfolded, changing the manner in which the game was played. Things turned around eventually and oppositions began to believe that any score can be overhauled with inelegant ease.
In 2008 for example, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/West-Indies-c760 outfit chased down a mammoth 418 against Australia
in 2003, which lead to the emergence of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/RR-Sarwan-c2371 as a fantastic player. That chase was the highest in Test history, yet years before these two games, the Hobart Test match of 1999 played between Australia and Pakistan, was what had revolutionized the
game with a distinct color that irked conformists.
The Test match featured legendary cricketers such as http://www.senore.com/Cricket/RT-Ponting-c2377 and Saqlain Mushtaq, and was by a distance, one of the most astonishing games in the history of the game. What made it so astounding was the ability of the Australians
to pull up their sleeves and consider any daunting target as a walk in the park. This mentality and belief was nonexistent before and came to the fore in cricketing folklore. This Test victory was the start of a legacy which made oppositions choke under pressure
and helped Australia be consistently ranked as the best Test Side in the world.
They were taking on the second, if not third best in world cricket at the Bellerive Oval in Hobart in 1999. After bowling out Pakistan for 222, Australia were dismayed at 246 all out in their first innings after the mystic http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Saqlain-Mushtaq-c88743 deployed his array
of deliveries from the top drawer. Things had looked ominous for http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Harold-William-Stephenson-c61707 Waugh’s Australians from then on, as Pakistan piled up a formidable 392 which left the Aussies to chase a score of 369 in the final innings to win the Test match.
The classical school of thought would have felt that http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 was all over Australia and there were no signs of pulling back at all for the wounded Wallabies. With half the side out for fewer than 150, people began to mutter about a sad script that would
haunt Australia for years. Then the penny dropped which rewrote the manner in which fourth inning totals were approached.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Adam-Gilchrist-c918 staged an unbelievable partnership worth 238 runs which helped Australia sneak through the backdoor and win the Test from a precarious, 126 for 5. The stroke play was not only ruthless but majestic too as the thunderbolts
deployed from the Pakistanis went in vain. The game see-sawed continuously but the strange sense of the inevitable never evaded http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746. Here was a side on a mission and the end result was a miraculous win from the jaws of defeat.
That victory meant that Test cricket became a revelation, a game which even consumerists could not help being overwhelmed at. The aim was not to draw the game anymore but draw out sums of money, from an inflated wheel that kept on rotating as yet another
team chases down an unthinkable score line. All hail the wounded Wallabies
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