The Nagpur pitch

India were 1–0 down to Australia with two Tests to play. The Nagpur track turned up green. Sourav Ganguly, the captain, missed the match with an injury; so did Harbhajan Singh. India lost by 342 runs, and Australia won a series in India for the first time in thirty-five years.

What the scorecard shows

Australia made 398, Damien Martyn scoring 114. India were bowled out for 185 — Jason Gillespie taking 5 for 56, Glenn McGrath 3 for 27 from 25 overs with 13 maidens. Australia declared their second innings at 329 for 5, Simon Katich making 99 and Martyn 97, and set India 543. India made 200.

Rahul Dravid captained. Neither Ganguly nor Harbhajan appears anywhere on the teamsheet. Australia had already led the series before the match and finished it 2–0 up with one to play.

Full scorecard: India v Australia, 3rd Test, Nagpur, 26–29 October 2004 →

Two stories

Curator Kishore Pradhan has said Ganguly asked him to shave the grass off the pitch and was refused, with the Vidarbha Cricket Association backing its curator against the India captain.

Matthew Hayden later wrote that the two Indians simply didn't fancy the conditions and found reasons not to play. Harbhajan called that a stunt to sell books.

Both accounts explain the same set of facts. Both are told by people with an interest in the version they are telling. There is no third source.

Why it never resolved

A pitch dispute between a national captain and a state association is exactly the kind of thing that should generate a paper trail — a curator's log, a match referee's note, a board communication. If any of that exists, it has never been produced.

Twenty-two years on, the most consequential home Test defeat of the era rests on two irreconcilable anecdotes, and the only document anybody can point to is the scorecard, which records the result and explains nothing.

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No. 8 in Mysteries, a series of 11.