The

South African cricket team The South Africa national cricket team, also known as the Proteas, represents South Africa in men's international cricket and is administered by Cricket South Africa (CSA). South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council (I ...

toured India during the 1996–97 cricket season, playing three

Test matches Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to: * Test cricket * Test match (indoor cricket) * Test match (rugby union) * Test match (rugby league) * Test match (association football) ...

and one

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

(ODI). The tour was South Africa's second international cricket series in India, following a visit in 1991–92, and included their first Test appearances against India on the

subcontinent A continent is any of several large landmasses. Generally identified by convention rather than any strict criteria, up to seven geographical regions are commonly regarded as continents. Ordered from largest in area to smallest, these seven ...

. India had previously toured South Africa in 1992–93, losing the Test series 0–1. The tour began with the

Titan Cup The Titan Cup was a triangular One Day International cricket tournament held in India between 17 October and 6 November 1996 involving South Africa, Australia and India. Although South Africa had won all its round-robin matches, it lost in the ...

, a triangular ODI tournament which included

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

on 17 October 1996. South Africa won all its round-robin matches—three each against India and Australia—but lost to India in the final. India's

Sachin Tendulkar Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar (; ; born 24 April 1973) is an Indian former international cricketer who captained the Indian national team. He is regarded as one of the greatest batsmen in the history of cricket. He is the all time highest run-scor ...

was the leading run-scorer in the tournament with 320 runs. South Africa's

Allan Donald Allan Anthony Donald (born 20 October 1966) is a South African former cricketer who is also the current bowling coach of Bangladesh national cricket team. Often nicknamed 'White Lightning' due to his lightning quick bowling, he is considered ...

was the highest wicket-taker with 17 wickets and received the player of the series award. India won the Test series, winning the first and third match. Several players, including

Herschelle Gibbs Herschelle Herman Gibbs (born 23 February 1974) is a South African cricket coach and former cricketer, who played all formats of the game for fourteen years. A right-handed batsman, mostly opened the batting, Gibbs became the first player to hi ...

Lance Klusener Lance Klusener (born 4 September 1971) is an international cricket coach and former cricketer of South Africa. He was known for his aggressive batting and fast-medium swing bowling. Klusener was one of the best all-rounders in the world during ...

and

VVS Laxman Vangipurapu Venkata Sai Laxman (; born 1 November 1974) is a former Indian international cricketer and a former cricket commentator and pundit. A right-hand batsman known for his elegant stroke play, Laxman played as a middle-order batsman in T ...

, made their Test debuts. Laxman scored a fifty in the second innings of the first Test and Klusener picked up eight wickets for 64 runs in the second innings of the second Test at

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

. The figures remain the fourth best by any bowler on debut.

Mohammad Azharuddin Mohammad Azharuddin (born 8 February 1963) is an Indian politician and a former international cricketer and former captain of India national cricket team. He is the working president of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee and was the Memb ...

was named the Man of the Test series after scoring 388 runs at an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

of 77.60;

Javagal Srinath Javagal Srinath, (, born 31 August 1969) is a former Indian cricketer and currently an ICC match referee. He is considered among India's finest fast bowlers, and was the first Indian fast bowler to take more than 300 wickets in One Day Inter ...

was the most successful bowler collecting 17

wicket In cricket, the term wicket has several meanings: * It is one of the two sets of three stumps and two bails at either end of the pitch. The fielding team's players can hit the wicket with the ball in a number of ways to get a batsman out. ...

s at an

of 20.94. At the end of the tour, South Africa played India in a

benefit match A benefit is a match or season of activities granted by a sporting body to a loyal sportsman to boost their income before retirement. Often this is in the form of a match for which all the ticket proceeds are given to the player in question. Howeve ...

for

Mohinder Amarnath Mohinder Amarnath Bhardwaj (born 24 September 1950) is an Indian former cricketer,current cricket analyst and actor. He is the son of Lala Amarnath, (the first post-independence captain of India .) and Kailash Kumari. His brother Surinder Ama ...

at the Wankhede Stadium in

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

. India won the ODI by 74 runs; Tendulkar went on to score 114 and was selected the man of the match.

Tour matches

Three-day: Karnataka v South Africans

Three-day: Indian Board President's XI v South Africa

Three-day: India A v South Africans

Test series

First Test

Second Test

Third Test

One Day International Match

Only ODI

References

External links

South Africa tour of India 1996/97
at

ESPNcricinfo ESPN cricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a ...

Tour home
at

archive
Tour home
at test-cricket-tours.co.uk * {{DEFAULTSORT:South African cricket team in India in 1996-97 1996 in Indian cricket 1996 in South African cricket Indian cricket seasons from 1970–71 to 1999–2000 International cricket competitions from 1994–95 to 1997 1996-97