Unbreakable Records in Cricket History : Highest partnership for any wicket (by Mahela and Sanga)

On July 29, 2006 history was created by two Sri Lankan champs with a 624-run stand against South Africa at the Sinhalese Sports Club in Colombo. This partnership remains the highest for any wicket in Test cricket.

Sanga and Mahela during the match

There are two main golden eras of Sri Lankan Cricket, the early nineties and from 2004-2015. The legends like Sanath Jayasuriya, Kaluwitharana, Arawinda de Silva, Arjuna Ranathunga, Muralidharan, Chaminda Vaas, Malinga, Rangana Herath, etc. always lifted the name high. But 2 gentlemen shine in and out of the field, then, now, and forever.

It's Mahela Jayawardana and Kumar Sangakkara.

After winning the 2014 T20 world cup

Their Records together

When they batted together it looks like they are made for each other. Great friends still. The left-right combination puts the pressure on the ballers as usual. The classic cover drives of Sanga and the glorious late cut of Mahela are too delicate to watch. The duo has played 120 innings together and shared 6554 runs having 56.50 with 19 partnerships of 100+ runs, and 27 half-century stands.

1st Test, Colombo, Jul 27 - Jul 31, 2006, South Africa tour of Sri Lanka

It was a 2- match series. After winning the toss South Africa opted to bat first. But Dilhara Fernando and Muttiah Muralitharan dominated their batting line-up to restrict South Africa for 169 on day 1.

Dale Steyn removed two Lankan openers, Upul Tharanga and Sanath Jayasuriya, within the first four overs for 14 runs on the board. Then the journey begins for Sanga and Mahela batting at No. 3 and No. 4.

On the third day, the duo held the new world record of the highest partnership in both Test and First-Class cricket. Earlier, 576-runs stand between Jayasuriya (340) and Roshan Mahanama (225) against India and 577 runs by Vijay Hazare and Gul Mohammad in 1946-’47 are the highest stand in Test cricket and first-class cricket respectively.

When Sankagakkara got out for 287 runs, their third-wicket epic had ended on 624 runs.

Wikipedia

Jayawardene scored 374 runs just 26 runs short of Brian Lara’s world record of 400 runs in an innings.

Hugging to celebrate the Mahela reaching 300

These two totally dominated the inning. The bowling attack lead by Makhaya Ntini, Dale Steyn faced huge trouble for more than two days.

Batting performance

Later, after the inning, Sangakkara stated for the guardian,

“We knew it was the record — both the Test and First-Class record — it’s a great feeling, to do something that nobody else has done before,”

Sri Lanka declared the inning for 756/5(185.1 overs). For the second inning, South Africa was managed only 434/10(157.2 overs) resulting in a win of an innings and 153 runs for Sri Lanka.

So, the dramatic inning is still going unbeaten. I still don't see a capable fair. And also now bowlers also are dominating Test cricket resulting in low scores. But the records are meant to be broken. Even though, this classic mining will be forever in everyone's heart.

Have a look at the highlights of the partnership!