On September 4, 1979, Team Indiacame close to completing the chase of 438 runs against England at The Oval. Winning the toss, England skipper Mike Bearley elected to bat first and the hosts posted a fine
total of 305 after batting for 124.5 overs. Graham Gooch and Peter Willey produced the knocks of 79 and 52 respectively. Opener Geoff Boycott, Ian Botham and captain Mike also made crucial contributions of 35, 38, and 34 apiece. For India, Kapil Dev and Srinivas Venkataraghavan took three wickets each. Karsan Ghavri and Bishan Singh Bedi also grabbed two wickets respectively.
Pursuing the total, India got bundled out on 202 after their 79.3 overs. Gundappa Viswanath’s 62 and Yajurvindra Singh’s unbeaten 43 helped India cross the 200-run mark. Botham got four wickets after bowling his 28-over spell. Bob Willis and Mike Henricke bagged three wickets apiece. In the second innings, Boycott solidified his team’s position as he smashed 125 runs which helped him put up 334/8 on the board.
India put up a tough fight against the hosts while pursuing the target of 438
Following the target, India got a solid start from their openers Sunil Gavaskar and Chetan Chauhan. Both batters stitched a 213-run stand for the first wicket and gave chills to the home team. Chauhan departed after hammering 80 runs off 263 balls and Dilip Vengsarkar joined Gavaskar in the middle.
Vengsarkar supported Gavaskar superbly and notched up 52 runs off 139 balls. Gavaskar went on to score 221 runs off 443 deliveries. His knock took India to 429/8. In the end, the game ended in a stalemate and England won the four-match series by 1-0. Gavaskar won the Player of the Match (POTM) award for his magnificent batting performance.
