5 Lesser known batting records held by Indians in first-class cricket

1. Batting for 1000 minutes in an innings

During the 1999-00 Ranji Trophy, Jammu and Kashmir toured Chamba to take on the Himachal Pradesh. The visitors were bowled out for 249 after electing to bat first on the very first day. The Himachal skipper Rajeev Nayyar walked out to bat in 2nd day’s morning session after his team lost their first wicket for 39 runs. Not many would have thought of Nayyar to be batting even around the final session on 4th day of the match which actually happened.

Rajeev scored an unbeaten 89 on day 2 while his team finished on 219/3. They got the first-innings lead on 3rd day morning and the lead went past 150 before the stumps. The Himachal skipper added 91 runs to his tally on day 3 while his team scored only 188 in 89 overs of the day’s play. Nayyar raised his maiden double century in first-class cricket but took a record 618 balls to get there. He eventually got out scoring 271 from 728 deliveries as Himachal were bowled out for 567.

Rajeev Nayyar’s innings lasted 1015 minutes which is the only instance of a player batting for more than 1000 minutes in a first-class inning. Rajeev broke the record held by Hanif Mohammad, who batted 970 minutes during his 337-run knock while following-on against West Indies in 1958. Nayyar’s effort is also the joint-longest time spent by any batsman in an FC match equaling Hanif’s 16 hours and 55 minutes stay at the crease across the two innings during the Test match against the Caribbean team.