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Smith equals Hansie's record
06/04/2008 14:17 - (SA)
Johannesburg - South Africa's crushing victory over India by an innings and 90 runs to go 1-0 up in the three-match Future Cup series was Graeme Smith's 27th as winning captain of South Africa.
This equals the record of Hansie Cronje who was the winning captain in 27 of his 53 matches as captain.
Smith has now captained South Africa on 56 occasions for 27 wins, 15 losses and 14 draws.
South Africa have now also achieved the remarkable feat of winning more tests in India (4) than they have lost (3).
Saturday's victory was also their biggest winning margin against India, beating the innings and 71 runs that Cronje's team achieved at Bangalore in 2000. That was Cronje's last match as captain and completed a 2-0 series win. That was also the last occasion that India lost a home Test match by an innings.
South Africa have played 11 Test matches so far this summer for a consolidated record of 8 wins, 2 draws and 1 defeat.
National coach Mickey Arthur has now completed 28 matches in charge of the Proteas and has been on the winning side in 14 of them - exactly half - which is an outstanding achievement.
The team has collectively also been responsible for a number of individual landmarks this season.
They include: Two world records: first wicket record partnership of 415 between Smith and Neil McKenzie against Bangladesh at Chittagong; and the record number of dismissals by a wicketkeeper by Mark Boucher.
The fifth wicket partnership of 256 between Jacques Kallis and AB de Villiers at Ahmedabad is the highest by South Africa for any wicket against India while the team total of 540 at Chennai is the highest against India in India.
Seventeen individual centuries: Jacques Kallis (6), Graeme Smith (3), Hashim Amla (3), Neil McKenzie (2), AB de Villiers (2) and Ashwell Prince (1 plus a run out 98) Three of these have been double centuries: Smith (232), McKenzie (226) and De Villiers (217 not out) Tenhauls of five wickets in an innings: Dale Steyn (6), Morne Morkel, Jacques Kallis, Paul Harris and Robin Peterson
Two hauls of 10 wickets in a match: both by Dale Steyn.
Steyn has now taken 75 wickets in 11 Tests this summer. He has taken 40 of these in five Tests in South Africa and the other 35 in six Tests on the sub-continent.
- SAPA
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