India national cricket team
The India men's national cricket team represents India in international cricket. It is governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India and is a full member nation of the International Cricket Council with Test, One Day International and Twenty20 International status. India are the current holders of the T20 World Cup, the ICC Champions Trophy and the Asia Cup.
The team has played 598 Test matches, winning 185, losing 188, with 224 draws and 1 tie. As of August 2025, India is ranked fourth in the ICC Men's Test Team Rankings with 107 rating points. India have played in two of the three World Test Championship finals, finishing runners-up in 2021 and 2023.
The Indian team has played 1,075 ODI matches, winning 571, losing 450, tying 10 and with 44 ending in a no-result. As of September 2025, India is ranked first in the ICC Men's ODI Team Rankings with 124 rating points. India have appeared in the World Cup final four times and have won the title twice. They have also won the Champions Trophy a record three times.
The national team has played 268 Twenty20 International matches, winning 179, losing 74, tying 7 and with 8 ending in a no-result. As of August 2025, India is ranked first in the ICC Men's T20I Team Rankings with 271 rating points and also won the T20 World Cup twice.
History
Early history (1700s–1918)
The British first brought cricket to India in the early 1700s, with the first cricket match played in 1721. It was played and adopted by Kolis of Gujarat who were sea pirates and outlaws who often looted the British ships. The East India Company tried to manage the Kolis through cricket and were successful. In 1848, the Parsi community in Mumbai formed the Oriental Cricket Club, the first cricket club to be established by Indians. After slow beginnings, the Europeans eventually invited the Parsis to play a match in 1877. By 1912, the Parsis, Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims of Bombay played a quadrangular tournament with the Europeans every year. In the early 1900s, some Indians went on to play for the England cricket team. Some of these, such as Ranjitsinhji and Duleepsinhji were greatly appreciated by the British and their names went on to be used for the Ranji Trophy and Duleep Trophy – two major first-class tournaments in India. In 1911, an Indian men's cricket team, captained by Bhupinder Singh of Patiala, went on their first official tour of the British Isles, but only played English county teams and not the England cricket team.Test match status (1918–1970)
India was invited to the International Cricket Council in 1926, and made their debut as a Test-playing nation in England in 1932, led by C. K. Nayudu, who was considered the best Indian batsman at the time. The one-off Test match between the two sides was played at Lord's in London. The team was not strong in their batting at this point and went on to lose by 158 runs. India hosted its first men's Test cricket series in 1933 when England toured India. The visitors won the three-Test series 2–0 with the matches held at Bombay, Calcutta and Madras. The Indian team continued to improve throughout the 1930s and 1940s but did not achieve an international victory during this period. In the early 1940s, India did not play any men's Test cricket due to World War II. The team's first series as an independent country was in late 1947 against Don Bradman's Australia. It was also the first Test series India played which was not against England. Australia men's cricket team won the five-match series 4–0, with Bradman tormenting the Indian bowling in his final Australian summer. India subsequently played their first Test series at home not against England, but against the West Indies in 1948. West Indies won the five-Test series 1–0. India recorded their first Test victory, in their 24th match, against England at Madras in 1952. Later in the same year, they won their first Test series, which was against Pakistan. They continued their improvement throughout the early 1950s with a series win against New Zealand in 1956. However, they did not win again in the remainder of the decade and lost badly to strong Australian and English sides. On 24 August 1959, India lost by an innings in the Test to complete the only 5–0 whitewash ever inflicted by England. The next decade saw India's reputation develop as a team with a strong record at home. They won their first Test series against England at home in 1961–62 and also won a home series against New Zealand. They managed to draw home series against Pakistan and Australia and another series against England. In this same period, India also won its first series outside the subcontinent, against New Zealand in 1967–68.The key to India's bowling in the 1970s were the Indian spin quartet – Bishan Singh Bedi, E. A. S. Prasanna, B. S. Chandrasekhar and Srinivasaraghavan Venkataraghavan. This period also saw the emergence of two of India's best ever batsmen, Sunil Gavaskar and Gundappa Viswanath. Indian pitches have had the tendency to support spin and the spin quartet exploited this to create collapses in opposing batting line-ups. These players were responsible for the back-to-back series wins in 1971 in the West Indies and in England, under the captaincy of Ajit Wadekar. Gavaskar scored 774 runs in the West Indian series while Dilip Sardesai's 112 played a big part in their one Test win.
One-day cricket and ICC Cricket World Cup success (1970–1985)
The advent of men's One Day International cricket in 1971 created a new dimension in the cricket world. However, India was not considered strong in ODIs at this point and batsmen such as the captain Gavaskar were known for their defensive approach to batting. India began as a weak team in ODIs and did not qualify for the knockout stage in the first two editions of the Cricket World Cup. Gavaskar infamously blocked his way to 36 not out of 174 balls against England in the inaugural 1975 Cricket World Cup; India scored just 132 for 3 and lost by 202 runs.In contrast, India fielded a strong team in Test matches and was particularly strong at home, where their combination of stylish batsmen and beguiling spinners were at their best. India set a then Test record in the third Test against the West Indies at Port-of-Spain in 1976, when they chased 403 to win, thanks to 112 from Viswanath. In November 1976, the team established another record by scoring 524 for 9 declared against New Zealand at Kanpur without any individual batsman scoring a century. There were six fifties, the highest being 70 by Mohinder Amarnath. This innings was only the eighth instance in Test cricket where all eleven batsmen reached double figures. India performed worse in the 1979 Cricket World Cup, failing to win a single match.
During the 1980s, India developed a more attack-minded batting line-up with stroke makers such as the wristy Mohammad Azharuddin, Krishnamachari Srikanth, Dilip Vengsarkar and all-rounders Kapil Dev and Ravi Shastri. On 25 June 1983, India won the 1983 Cricket World Cup, defeating the favourites and the two-time defending champions West Indies in the final at Lord's, owing to a strong bowling performance. Bowler Roger Binny was the leading wicket taker of the tournament with 18 scalps. In spite of this, the team performed poorly in the Test arena, including 28 consecutive Test matches without a victory. In 1984, India won the inaugural edition of the Asia Cup and in 1985, won the World Championship of Cricket in Australia.
Late 20th century (1985–1999)
Despite winning major tournaments in the first half of the 1980s, India remained a weak test team. India's Test series victory in 1986 against England remained the last Test series win by India outside the subcontinent for the next 19 years. The 1980s saw Gavaskar and Kapil Dev at the pinnacle of their careers. Gavaskar made a Test record 34 centuries as he became the first man to reach the 10,000 run mark. Kapil Dev later became the highest wicket-taker in Test cricket with 434 wickets. The period was also marked by an unstable leadership, with Gavaskar and Kapil exchanging the captaincy several times. India co-hosted the 1987 Cricket World Cup, the first instance when the tournament was hosted outside England. In the semi-finals, the India was defeated by England, after having defeated them on the same stage four years prior.The addition of Sachin Tendulkar and Anil Kumble to the national side in 1989 and 1990 further improved the team. The following year, Javagal Srinath, India's fastest bowler since Amar Singh made his debut. Under Azharuddin, India played in the 1992 Cricket World Cup, failing to make the knockout stage in the tournament for the first time since 1979. During the 1990s, India did not win any of its 33 Tests outside the subcontinent while it won 17 out of its 30 Tests at home. Notably, India won a hat-trick of Asia Cups in 1988, 1991 and 1995.
India was eliminated by neighbours Sri Lanka on home soil at the disastrous 1996 Cricket World Cup semi-final, where rioters burnt section of the stadium at Kolkata after India were set to face a crushing defeat. Tendulkar was the tournament's leading run scorer, with this the first time an Indian being one in the tournament; and Kumble leading the wicket-taking charts. Following the World Cup, the team underwent a year of change as Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, later to become captains of the team, made their debut in the same test at Lord's. Tendulkar replaced Azharuddin as captain in late 1996, but after a personal and team form slump, Tendulkar relinquished the captaincy and Azharuddin was reinstated at the beginning of 1998. India lost the final of the 1997 Asia Cup, losing the tournament for the first time in editions they had participated in. In order to play a bilateral ODI series against Pakistan, India split its squad into two and sent a weak squad to feature in the cricket tournament of the 1998 Commonwealth Games. As a result, India failed to progress from the group stage. In the inaugural edition of the Champions Trophy in 1998, India were knocked out in the semi-finals by West Indies.
The team had yet another disastrous World Cup in 1999. Despite Dravid being the tournament's leading run scorer, India failed to reach the knockouts. Following this, Tendulkar was again made captain, and had another poor run, losing 3–0 on a tour of Australia and then 2–0 at home to South Africa. Tendulkar resigned, vowing never to captain the team again.