We continue our countdown of the best Test batting performances on Australian soil since 2000
Top 20 in 2020: The best Test batting, 8-6
Re-live the countdown in full: 20-18 | 17-15 | 14-12 | 11-9 | 8-6 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1
There have been more than 250 scores of 100 of more in Tests in Australia so far this century, so narrowing it down to just 20 has been no easy task.
In judging the best performances, the cricket.com.au team considered the quality of the bowling attack, the difficulty of the conditions, strike rate, the length of the innings, the percentage of the team's total and the situation of the game.
A player's previous record and relative experience plus the impact their performance had on a match and a series also weighted heavily.
Before you get stuck into this countdown, you can re-live some other memorable batting performances by looking back on our 20 in 2020 Best Test Moments countdown from earlier this year.
8) Steve Smith, 141no
Australia v England, Brisbane, 2017
Image Id: B96F2AA403D94A0884C8679414FF6E6EBy Martin Smith
On paper, Australia’s 4-0 thumping of England in the 2017-18 Ashes series, including one 10-wicket victory and two by more than innings, reads like a no contest.
What the comprehensive series result fails to illustrate is just how the opening two-and-a-half days of the series threatened to swing the content in completely the other direction, and possibly would have done so if not for the intervention of one man – Steven Smith.
When England arrived at the Gabba on the third morning of the opening Test, they did so with a spring in their step. Australia were already four wickets down, still 137 runs in arrears and facing the prospect of batting last on the fifth day of the match.
And when the hosts lost three more wickets that morning just as England’s lead was whittled down to double figures, the prospect of a first Australian loss at the Gabba in almost three decades didn’t just loom as a possibility, it appeared the most likely outcome.
But Smith stood in England’s way.
Having patiently crept to 80 by the time the seventh wicket fell, he would triumphantly walk off the ground later that afternoon unconquered from more than eight hours of batting and with his side, inexplicably given the match situation that morning, holding a slender first-innings lead.
Smith had been England’s Ashes tormentor since his maidenTest hundred in 2013, so the tourists had implemented a different approach in the opening match of this campaign. They tried to starve Australia’s best player of scoring options, looking to frustrate him into playing a loose shot and instead focus their attacking energy on the batsman at the other end.
Up until lunch on that third morning, their plan had worked, but Smith simply refused to let them win.
Image Id: 0408CB15C2DE48DDA6884297732E8AD4Finding a capable ally in the form of Pat Cummins, Smith slowly and gradually began to flourish as England’s bowlers became more tired and more frustrated with every ball Australia’s skipper defended, nudged into a gap or simply let pass him by.
It was a war of attrition he was determined to win and when he brought up his 21st Test hundred, the slowest of his career by some margin, he stood tall, defiantly stared at his teammates in the stands and pounded his chest.
It was the definition of a captain’s knock, a still somewhat inexperienced Test skipper setting the example for his teammates to follow and reinforcing the message that giving in was simply not an option.
He flourished with the tail after reaching the milestone, finally breaking out of the defensive bubble he had been in for more than a day, to finish unbeaten on 141 and hand his side a slender 26-run lead before England lost two quick wickets before the close of play.
Image Id: B81D7C8A639640C78B612DE6CCFF0AF1Even the most experienced of observers at the Gabba that day knew they were witnessing greatness in the making.
"What we're seeing is potentially one of, if not the best batsman that the game has ever seen,” former skipper Ricky Ponting said, adding that his own Australian record of 41 Test hundreds was unlikely to stand for much longer.
"If he keeps going like he is, he's going to catch me in four or five years. It's well and truly in danger.”
7) Kumar Sangakkara, 57 & 192
Sri Lanka v Australia, Hobart, 2007
Image Id: 0F0E1D27C27448C3BEEF5DB9CEBF60A0By Adam Burnett
There were probably a dozen periods throughout his glorious career that it was said that Sri Lankan legend Kumar Sangakkara was 'in the form of his life'.
A delightful stroke-maker whose Test records stacks up against just about anyone, Sangakkara made runs against all opponents in all conditions.
And while the prospect of playing quality pace bowling in Australia proved the Achilles heel of many batsmen from the subcontinent, Sangakkara found a way to revel in it.
It was never more the case than in Hobart in November 2007, when the Sri Lankan master made his lone appearance in a two-Test series, making 57 in the first innings before compiling a jaw-dropping 192 in the second, and threatening a truly miraculous heist in the process.
Set 507 to win by the Australians, who led the series 1-0, Sangakkara teamed up with Marvan Atapattu (80) and then Sanath Jayasuriya (45) to ensure the tourists put in a respectable showing. In fact, at 3-265 early on the final day and the experienced pair well settled, the unthinkable was briefly being contemplated.
Cue a dramatic Sri Lankan collapse of 5-25 and suddenly any anticipation had been taken out of the contest.
But Sangakkara was playing a different game.
As he watched the procession of batsmen come and go at the other end, he ensured a piece of advice from Sri Lanka's Australian-born coach was front of mind.
"Trevor Bayliss was coaching and he said to me, 'Sanga, the most important thing in Australia is you've got to understand that, even though there's good bounce and carry, you've got to be right over the ball on the front foot, because if not, chances are you are hitting gully or third or fourth slip," Sangakkara recalls.
Image Id: 57070F66818B4C35A1F7887C5019D204"So I remember making a conscious decision to take that big step down the track. And one of the things I still remember was that I drove really well; I drove Brett (Lee) and Mitchell Johnson and Stuey Clark really well, with a good, positive stride in.
"I think Trevor's words to me really helped."
In one of the most memorable batting performances seen in Australia in the modern era, Sangakkara went at the hosts with gusto, as if deciding he alone would determine the outcome of the contest. His shot-making, based largely on the advice of Bayliss, was sublime.
"I always liked pace over spin throughout my career," he said. "And the Australian wickets, once you understand how good they are for batting, and what you have to do to find your rhythm and be in sync, you actually start to really enjoy the challenge.
"Yes, they are quick, bouncy tracks, but at the same time that allows you so much more freedom to bat, so much more opportunities in different ways to the subcontinent to score runs.
"It becomes a joy – and understanding that helped me a lot."
Sangakkara's innings was cruelly cut short on 192 when an incorrect umpiring decision adjudged him caught out when the ball had in fact come off his shoulder and helmet.
He was the second-last man to fall, with Sri Lanka still 93 short of their target, and viewers robbed of a potential grandstand finish.
6) Sachin Tendulkar, 241no & 60no
India v Australia, Sydney, 2004
Image Id: 35A71BE8EAEC4AABBFA1909698D568E5By Andrew Ramsey
While the Australian Test summer of 2003-04 played out largely as Steve Waugh’s farewell lap of a doting nation, its final act hosted a virtuoso performance from a star who some had prematurely assessed as also beyond his best.
Sachin Tendulkar had forged a reputation as perhaps the pre-eminent batter of the era that Waugh's team (and then that of his captaincy successor, Ricky Ponting) came to dominate, but when Sourav Ganguly led India to Australia in November 2003, the star's power seemed on the wane.
In the year prior to the opening skirmish at the Gabba, the Little Master had endured a trot as lean as any in the 14 years since he'd arrived as a teenaged Test player.
Only two scores in the 50s and five single-figure totals in his past eight innings meant an average of just over 21 heading into the four-match campaign against Waugh's team.
A third-ball duck in the opening Test was followed by an equally inauspicious 1 in the first innings of the next Test in Adelaide, where India's other batting luminaries sparkled to secure their team a 1-0 lead and the prospect of an historic first series win on Australia’s turf.
Then, before a large crowd packed into an MCG on Boxing Day, India’s batting deity went for his one and only golden Test duck against Australia, smartly snared from a too-fine leg glance by keeper Adam Gilchrist off Brett Lee.
So when Waugh’s caravan rolled into his home town, and the SCG bulged with fans waving souvenir red rags peddled by a local newspaper in deference to their hero, the chances of Tendulkar stealing the limelight appeared less likely than Waugh opening the bowling.
But among the qualities that carried Tendulkar to the peak of Test cricket’s individual batting benchmarks was a certainty that, while he might be occasionally quietened, he could never be fully quelled.
Image Id: B31A100B22F34E02BFD31C0FB94BF607Thus, the holidaying fans who flocked to the first three days at the SCG hoping to experience one final Waugh story instead bore witness to an extended showcase of Tendulkar's sublime talents.
For 10 hours and 13 minutes, across three days, the then 30-year-old harnessed a year's worth of frustration into an endless highlights reel of punched drives, crunching cuts, deft flicks, impregnable defence and even the occasional hook shot as Australia’s attack haplessly searched for mercy.
And, in an unmatched display of dogged determination, not a single drive through the covers, a shot the Little Master had decided was off limits as he looked to return to his best.
By the time India declared at 7-705 early on day three, Tendulkar had posted the highest score of his gilded Test career to that point and appeared likely to bat on until he ran out of able partners.
Or the scheduled five days elapsed.
Despite his deserved player of the match recognition, Tendulkar's achievement was effectively lost amid the post-game valediction for Waugh and recognition of India’s achievement - avoiding a series defeat in Australia for the first time in almost two decades.
However, his unbeaten 241 proudly stands as the highest individual Test score by an Indian batter on Australian soil and it provided the launch pad for a glorious final phase of a Test tenure that extended an extra decade and yielded 19 more centuries.
As well as longevity and productivity records that will likely never be toppled.
Top 20 in 2020: Best Test batting in Australia since 2000
20) Ricky Pontingv South Africa, Sydney, 2006
19) Virender Sehwagv Australia, Melbourne, 2003
18) David Warnerv New Zealand, Hobart, 2011
17) Virat Kohliv Australia, Adelaide, 2014
16) Alastair Cookv Australia, Brisbane, 2010
15) VVS Laxmanv Australia, Sydney, 2000
14) Steve Smithv England, Perth, 2017
13) Hashim Amlav Australia, Perth, 2012
12) Cheteshwar Pujarav Australia, Adelaide, 2018
11) AB de Villiersv Australia, Perth, 2008
10) Kevin Pietersenv Australia, Adelaide, 2010
9) Michael Clarkev South Africa, Adelaide, 2012
8) Steve Smithv England, Brisbane, 2017
7) Kumar Sangakkara v Australia, Hobart, 2007
6) Sachin Tendulkar v Australia, Sydney, 2004
5) Brian Larav Australia, Adelaide, 2005
4) JP Duminyv Australia, Melbourne, 2008
3) Rahul Dravidv Australia, Adelaide, 2003
2) Ricky Pontingv India, Melbourne, 2003
1) Faf du Plessisv Australia, Adelaide 2012