Ind vs Eng: Know the Indian Lords at Lord's

New Delhi: The Indian cricket team had first visited the English shores way back in 1911 but it was in 1932 only that an “ All India” team visited England for the first time. A single Test match was played at Lord's Cricket Ground This was the first Test match ever played by India. The results were disappointing for the Indian cricket fans as England won by 158 runs after scoring 259 and 275-8 declared while India were bowled out for 189 and 187. The Indian cricket team since then has come a long way and made its marks felt on one of the most prestigious and historic grounds of cricket also known as Mecca of cricket. Lets take a look on some of the spectacular individual performance by Indian cricketers at the most historic ground.It was in 1952 that while team India toured England and had the prestigious Lord's stadium as their second venue, an Indian emerged as the hero of the match despite the team losing to England. It was Vinoo Mankad who displayed an allround effort and scored 71 and 184 and took 5 for 196 in 73 overs. He was the first Indian cricketer who really became the ‘Lord' at the Lord's cricket ground. The next time that an Indian cricketers performed exceptionally well at the Mecca of cricket was in 1979 tour. After losing at Edgbaston., India was looking for some thing extraordinary and it came from not one but two superb batting display by the Indian batsmen. The two batters were Dilip Vengsarkar who scored 103 runs and Gundappa Vishwanath another centurion who scored 113 runs to save the match for India at Lords. The next time team India toured England was in 1982 and the Indian team had to again face a test defeat at Lord's due to a superb bowling spell by Bob Wills and Ian Botham that helped England to achieve a seven wicket victory over India but once again it was the batsman from Maharashtra Dilip Vengsarkar who scored a briliiant 157 runs. The love affair between Dilip Vengsarkar and Lord's continued in 1986 also when India visited England . Vengsarkar hit his third consecutive century at Lord's. He became the first overseas batsman to register three centuries at Lord's cricket ground. Team India also registered a historic victory at the Mecca of cricket. It was at Lord's Chetan Sharma put in the performance of his life, taking five English wickets for 64 runs, including four top order scalps. England were bowled out for 294 in their first innings which had helped India take a lead of 47 runs. India went on to win this test match in which Kapil Dev took four wickets in the second inning. In 1996, Lord's and whole of the cricketing world witnessed for the first time the emergence of two individual Indian cricketers who were going to be in the centre of Indian cricket for the next decade. They were none other than Sourav Ganguly who was one of the few lucky cricketers to hit a century on debut at test and that too at Lord's. His compatriot Rahul Dravid who played a sublime cricket missed out on achieving the ton at the Mecca of cricket by just five runs. In 2002, Ajit Agarkar took home a Lord's hundred, many specialist batsman dream of in Test match cricket, and became a celebrity. By scoring a Test hundred, the ninth by an Indian on this famous piece of land, Agarkar must be enjoying a hearty laugh and delighted many of his admirers. Agarkar wrote his name where even the master blaster Sachin Tendulkar failed to write his name upon.In 2011, India had a disastrous tour to England where it was completely whitewashed by the English team.But there was something to cheer about . Rahul Dravid finally got a century at Lord's and was able to get his name on the list of cricketers who scored a century at Lord's. Apart from these performances Lord's remained a witness to one of the most historic and significant events of Indian cricket which changed the course of Indian cricket when India led by Kapil Dev defeated mighty West Indies to win the World Cup in 1983. This win popularized the game in a country like India immensely.