India's biggest international wins by format
The Indian cricket team have had a very positive few years. A strong performance in the Champions Trophy, where they reached the final, showed the depth of their limited overs set up and they enjoyed successful home Test series against New Zealand, Australia, and England.
Their most recent assignment was the Nidahas Trophy, a tri-series with Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, which they won with a severely weakened squad. Along the way, they have notched up some sizeable wins. Indeed, their largest T20 victory came in the past year and India also managed to equal their biggest Test win. This article looks at India's largest ever wins across all three formats.
Test Cricket
Bangladesh vs India in May 2007: India won by an innings and 239 runs
India vs Sri Lanka in November 2017: India won by an innings and 239 runs.
India have a very solid track record in Test cricket. They have won seven Tests by a margin of ten wickets. Their largest Test win, when not winning by an innings, was when they beat South Africa by a huge margin of 337 runs in 2015 at Delhi.
Ajinkya Rahane scored hundreds in both innings of that Test, with Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja each bagging a five-for. This, however, is still not India's largest ever Test win.
Incredibly, India have won two Test matches by an innings and 239 runs. They beat Bangladesh by that margin in 2007, in a very one-sided match played at Dhaka. This was at a time, though, when the Bangladesh cricket team were struggling and were not that strong side that they are today.
Nevertheless, it is still India's joint largest Test victory of all time. The coincidences between India's two joint highest Test wins are incredible, not only did they win by the same margin, but India declared on both matches on 610.
However, against Bangladesh India batted first and it was a class batting display. Both openers, Dinesh Karthik and Wasim Jaffer, got hundreds as did Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar batting at No. 3 and No. 4.
Bangladesh struggled with the bat and were made to follow-on, after being bowled out for just 118 inside 38 overs. Indian seamer Zaheer Khan picked up a five-wicket haul and was supported by Anil Kumble who picked up three wickets.
The second innings was a similar story as the hosts only managed 253, with Zaheer picking up a wicket on the first ball of the innings. The wickets were shared among the Indian bowlers evenly, with Sachin Tendulkar even picking up a couple. This concluded what was at the time India's largest Test victory, but it was matched ten years later.
Sri Lanka won the toss in the Nagpur Test but only managed 205 in the first innings. Dinesh Chandimal top-scored with 57, while Ashwin picked up four wickets and Jadeja three. India only needed to bat once, courtesy of a vintage Virat Kohli double hundred, supported by centuries from Murali Vijay, Cheteshwar Pujara, and Rohit Sharma.
The Indian batsmen looked very comfortable on that surface and they eventually decided to declare after amassing a huge 610 for 6.
Sri Lanka struggled once again in their second innings, succumbing to a measly 166 all out. The visiting side had four ducks and their batting card made for grim reading, Chandimal the only batsman to cross fifty in that innings.
Ashwin picked four as rest of the wickets were fairly evenly shared between India's bowling attack and they wrapped up a huge win, which remains the joint highest Test win for their nation.