New Delhi: The two names that come to mind, when asked about the most consistent teams in the history of cricket are India and Australia.
Both these teams share a rich history of cricketing rivalry, causing numerous heartbreaks for each other in the 140 years of cricket.
Whether it’s the 2003 World Cup final triumph of Australia over India, or whether it’s the 2007 World Cup quarterfinal victory of India over the then reigning champions Australia, these two teams have always produced bangers after bangers whenever they shared the field.
Today, let’s take a look at the head-to-head records of the two cricketing giants against each other in World Cup history, to see who will have the psychological advantage before the all-important ICC World Cup 2023, finals on Sunday.
1983 World Cup (Ind 1-1 Aus)
India and Australia met for the first time at the World Cup stage in 1983, a World Cup edition that changed the course of Indian cricket, as the Kapil Dev-led team India won the entire thing by defeating the mighty West Indies in the finals at Lords.
In the first match, Australia, with the help of Trevor Chappell (110) and Graham Yallop (66) in batting and Ken MacLeay (6 wickets) in bowling, wreaks havoc on the Indian team and despite Kapil Dev’s (40 runs and 5 wickets) efforts emerged victorious with a massive 162 runs margin.
However, India soon returned the favour in the same World Cup edition as they defeated the Australian team by a huge margin of 118 runs thanks to Roger Binny’s 4 wickets and 21 runs all-round performance.
1987 World Cup (Ind 1-1 Aus)
The two teams once again came face to face with each other twice in the 1987 World Cup, but unlike last time, this time it was the Australian team who won the entire thing, while India had to face a defeat in the semifinals against England.
In the first match, Australia, with the help of Geoff Marsh (110), gave India a challenging target of 271 to win, but despite Kris Srikkanth (70) and Navjot Sidhu (73), trying their best, India fell short of just one run giving the Aussies their first win of the tournament.
Once again, India made a comeback in the second match Md. Azharuddin’s all-round performance of 54* with bat and 3 for 19 with the ball defeated the Aussies by 56 runs.
1992 World Cup (Ind 0-1 Aus)
The two teams faced each other only once in the 1992 World Cup, where, with the help of Dean Jones (90) and Tom Moody (3 wickets), they defeated India by one run, taking the overall tally to 3-2 in their favour.
1996 World Cup (Ind 0-1 Australia)
India once again faced a defeat against the Aussies in the only match played between the two sides in the 1996 World Cup, where Mark Waugh with 126 runs and Damien Fleming with 5 wickets broke the back of the Indian team, giving Australia 16 runs victory and taking the overall tally to 4-2 in their favour.
1999 World Cup (Ind 0-1 Australia)
The 1999 World Cup match between India and Australia will go down as one of the strangest matches in the history of cricket, where India, while chasing 283 runs despite Ajay Jadeja’s 100 runs and Robin Singh’s 75 runs, were all-out on 205, giving Australia a huge 77 runs victory.
2003 World Cup (Ind 0-2 Australia)
India continued their dominance over the Indian team by defeating them twice in the 2003 World Cup.
Australia won by a comfortable margin of 9 wickets during their group stage clash, but the biggest heartbreak for the Indian team came when the Aussies defended their World Cup trophy by defeating the Sourav Ganguly-led team India by 125 runs in the finals.
2011 World Cup (Ind 1-0 Aus)
India’s 24 years of wait to defeat Australia at the World Cup finally came to an end in 2011, when MS Dhoni-led team India defeated the Aussies by 5 wickets in the quarterfinals, bringing the 25 runs to win streak at the World Cup of the Aussies team at a halt.
India went on to win the tournament by defeating Sri Lanka in the finals.
2015 World Cup (Ind 0-1 Aus)
Aussies once again took charge of the rivalry between the two sides, defeating the MS Dhoni-led team India by 95 runs in the semifinals.
Australia went on to win their 5th World Cup title after beating New Zealand in the finals.
2019 World Cup (Ind 1-0 Aus)
India, in the 2019 World Cup, finished at the top of the points table, and to achieve that, they also defeated the Australian team by 36 runs during the group stages.
Both India and Australia lost in the semifinals, losing out to New Zealand and England, respectively.
2023 World Cup* (Ind 1-0 Aus)
India kicked off their campaign at the 2023 World Cup with a hard-fought 6-wicket victory over the Aussies and have not looked back since then and are now in the finals of the tournament undefeated.
The two teams now have an overall record of 5 to 8 in Australia’s favour, but despite that, it will be the host men in blue who will be taking the field as the fan favourites.
