India-Australia combined Test XI: 21st century
The India-Australia rivalry has been one of the fiercest battles fought on the cricket field over the years. There have been several memorable encounters between these two sides in the 21st century.
India and Australia, since the start of the 21st century, have faced each other in 10 series, with India winning five and Australia four, and one series ending in a draw.
The combined XI in this write-up consists of some of the best players who have played for these two countries. Also, they have made some valuable contributions to their respective sides against each other.
Let us have a look at the strongest combined India-Australia XI of the 21st century in Test cricket.
Openers
Matthew Hayden
Matthew Hayden is one of the most dominating openers in the history of Test cricket. Once settled, he used to look unstoppable and went on to score big hundreds for Australia.
He alongside Justin Langer formed one of the most formidable opening pairs in the world. Being a tall left-handed batsman, Hayden was powerful both on the off-side as well as the leg-side. He was also one of those rare Australian batsmen who could play spin quite well on typical sub-continent tracks.
In 53 matches, Hayden scored 8625 Test runs at a brilliant average of 50.73. Overall in Test cricket, he received the Player of the Match award ten times and was adjudged the Player of the Series four times.
#2 Virender Sehwag
Virender Sehwag was one of the most destructive batsmen in Test cricket. He would make even the world's best bowlers fret in the opening overs of a Test match due to his ability to strike the ball all over the park on the word go.
He was a fearless cricketer who had minimal feet movement but batted with full strength and strong hand-eye coordination. Sehwag's ability to score hundreds even in overseas conditions gave rich dividends to the Indian team.
In 104 matches, Sehwag scored 8586 runs in red-ball cricket at an average of 49.34 which included 23 hundreds and 32 fifties. He is also the only Indian batsman to score two triple hundreds in Test cricket.