OTD| The first-ever day and night Test was played in Australia in 2015

There are very few occasions that are remembered as transformational. One such event in the world of cricket happened today. On this day the first-ever day and night test match was played between Australia and New Zealand in Adelaide. The whole idea behind introducing day and test matches was to make the longest format of the game more interesting and appealing. Over the past few years, we have seen the number of day/night test matches increasing gradually but, in this article, we will go down memory lane and recapitulate how the first day/night test match panned out. 

First Innings

The New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum won the toss and elected to bat first. The Aussies started the inaugural day/night test match on a high as Josh Hazlewood dismissed the opener Martin Guptill in his initial spell. New Zealand kept losing wickets at regular intervals and half of the side was back in the pavilion even before they could put 100 runs on the board. Courtesy of contributions from BJ Watling and Mitchell Santner in the middle order New Zealand barely managed to cross 200 runs. 

In reply, Australia made 224 runs in the first innings and took a minor lead by 22 runs. In the top order, Steve Smith was the savior with his half-century and later in the innings Peter Nevill also scored a half-century which helped Australia sail past New Zealand’s first-innings total.

Second Innings

New Zealand could not improve much on their first innings batting display. They could only manage to score 208 runs as no Kiwi batter could capitalize on the starts that they got. Josh Hazlewood was the star for Australia with his lethal spell of bowling where he picked up 6 wickets to put the Kangaroos in pole position. As a result, Australia got a low target of 187 runs to chase in the last innings. 

The chase appeared to be an easy one but the Kiwi bowling lineup exploited the conditions really well to trouble the Australian batters. Trent Boult wreaked havoc with his intimidating bowling as he got 5 scalps to his name. Somehow the Australians managed to chase down the total with 3 wickets in hand and registered the victory in the first-ever day/night test match.