Dalai Lama meets team New Zealand ahead of World Cup match
After Sunday’s match against India, the New Zealand cricket team and their families on Tuesday met His Holiness the Dalai Lama at his residence in McLeodganj
The fastest double-centurion in Test match cricket till date is former New Zealand batsman right-handed Nathan Astle. He achieved the feat in Christchurch’s MI Stadium against England. The match is well known not only for Astle’s record double hundred but also for the fact that New Zealand managed to get really close to the target in the fourth innings.
That Astle scored the double hundred in the fourth innings, chasing a mammoth 550 runs and against an opposition that boasted of a bowling line-up comprising of Matthew Hoggard, Andy Caddick and Ashely Giles made it all the more special for him.
However, Astle couldn’t help the Kiwis chase down the total in what would otherwise have been called one of the greatest comebacks wins, in the history of the game.
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Chasing down the huge total, the top-order batsmen departed early for the Kiwis and they were reduced 119/3 but then came in to bat Nathan Astle and changed the course of the match.
#OnThisDay in 2002, Nathan Astle struck the fastest-ever Test double hundred from just 1️⃣5️⃣3️⃣ balls 🔥 pic.twitter.com/Tqdt9Piq39
— ICC (@ICC) March 16, 2020
An innings studded with 11 sixes
Astle took the attack back to the opposition. He scored 28 boundaries and 11 sixes in this special knock and took only 153 deliveries to reach his double hundred. Despite the record effort, the Kiwi batsman ended up on the losing side.
Nonetheless, Astle’s innings is easily one of the best played in the fourth innings and because of various reasons often finds a mention in cricket discussions across the world. Nathan played a total of 81 Tests, 223 ODIs and 4 T20Is. He announced his retirement from international cricket in 2007.
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