August 2 down the years

England are Biffed

The Lord's Test of 2003 belonged to one Graeme Smith

Graeme Smith brought England to their knees at Lord's  •  Getty Images

Graeme Smith brought England to their knees at Lord's  •  Getty Images

2003
Graeme Smith proved a point or two when he led South Africa from the front with a blistering double-century in the second Test against England, at Lord's. England managed only 173 in the first innings, destroyed by Makhaya Ntini. Smith then pounded the English bowlers into submission with 259 and South Africa ended up winning the Test with ease.
1981
Australia needed only 151 to win at Edgbaston - but Ian Botham was lying in wait again. After his heroics with the bat at Headingley, he engineered another astonishing finish by taking five wickets for one run. England's narrow win put them 2-1 up in "Botham's Ashes".
1977
In Botham's Test debut and Geoff Boycott's comeback, England completed their first win over Australia at Trent Bridge since 1930. After a painstaking hundred in the first innings, Boycott was unbeaten on 80 when England took a 2-0 lead on their way to regaining the Ashes.
1985
Against Australia at Old Trafford, David Gower scored his 5000th run in Test cricket. Although the match was drawn, this was the blond man's golden summer. Captain of a team that regained the Ashes 3-1, he scored 732 runs at an average of 81.33.
2010
Death of Eric Tindill just over five months short of what would have been his 100th birthday. Tindill, who represented New Zealand in cricket and rugby, became the oldest Test cricketer on November 8, 2009, when he overtook Francis MacKinnon's record of 98 years and 324 days. Tindill played 69 first-class matches for Wellington and five Tests either side of the Second World War.
1970
West Indies' hair-raising opening batter Philo Wallace was born. In his one successful series, against England in 1997-98, he scored 61 and 92 (his only Test fifties) and shared some spectacular stands with Clayton Lambert.
1981
Birth of Ireland and Middlesex seamer Tim Murtagh, who took 5 for 13 on his home ground of Lord's to dismiss England for 85 in a one-off Test in 2019. Murtagh started out playing age-group cricket for England and qualified for Ireland (his grandparents were Irish) in 2012. He became the leader of Ireland's attack after Trent Johnston's retirement and Boyd Rankin's move to England, and went on to play the 2014 and 2016 T20 World Cups. His maiden ODI five-for, in Belfast in 2019, came in a series win over Zimbabwe. Murtagh was a county stalwart for 24 seasons, including 17 at Middlesex, with whom he won the County Championship in 2011 and 2016.
2000
Sri Lanka needed only 177 runs to take a winning 2-0 lead in Kandy. But South Africa took their last four wickets for eight runs to win the match by just seven. A draw in the third Test left the series level.
1966
Birth of MV Sridhar, known as "Doc" in Indian cricket circles, whose innings of 366 for Hyderabad v Andhra Pradesh in 1993-94 is the third-highest first-class score by an Indian.
1887
Top-class South African wicketkeeper Tommy Ward was born. In a 12-year Test career he made 32 dismissals, including 13 stumpings, and added some useful runs, including two fifties. Mind you, he didn't look much of a batter on his debut, in a Triangular Tournament match against Australia at Old Trafford in 1912. When Jimmy Matthews achieved the unique feat in Test cricket of taking a hat-trick in each innings, Ward was the third victim each time, making a golden pair on his Test debut.
1895
Birth of Matthew Henderson. In New Zealand's inaugural Test, against England in 1929-30, he took a wicket with his first ball: opener Eddie Dawson caught by New Zealand captain Tom Lowry. The wicket of the gifted Duleepsinhji was Henderson's second and last: he played in only this one Test.
1958
India's utility man Arshad Ayub was born. An offspinner who relied more on accuracy than turn, and a useful late-order batter, Ayub played against West Indies (against whom, in his first Test, he took four of the five wickets to fall in the second innings), New Zealand and Pakistan in a career that lasted a little over two years. His top moment in ODIs was bowling India to victory against Pakistan in the Asia Cup final in Dhaka in 1988 with a spell of 5 for 21.
1976
Birth of Mohammad Zahid, who became the first, and so far only, Pakistani to take ten wickets on Test debut when he took 11 against New Zealand in Rawalpindi in 1996. Four Tests later, he was out with a back injury he picked up in his second series, in Sri Lanka, and never played at the highest level again.
Other birthdays
1928 Malcolm Hilton (England)
1931 Eddie Fuller (South Africa)
1973 Danie Keulder (Namibia)
1975 Kate Lowe (England)
1979 Darren Pattinson (England)