On this day: Herschelle Gibbs masterminds South Africa’s epic 438 chase against Australia at Bullring

On this day, 15 year ago, arguably the ‘greatest one-day international cricket match of all time’, the fifth ODI between South Africa and Australia, took place. Both the teams scored over 430, and the match extended to the last wicket and the last over to present an exciting result. The 438 ODI was played on 12 March at Wanderers in Johannesburg during Australia’s tour of South Africa in 2006. The series was tied at 2-2 before the start of the deciding match. Australia went down to bat first and their skipper Ricky Ponting was in a dream form from the get-go. He was ferocious against every South African bowler and ended up scoring 164 runs off 105 balls, which was the highest run scored by the Aussies. Aided by Michael Hussey’s 81 runs, the visitors’ total reached 434 for the fall of four wickets at the end of the first innings. Interestingly, four hundred runs had never been breached before in ODIs before the game. Coming down to chase such a humongous score, captain Graeme Smith was brilliant with a 90-run haul and his partnership with the home team’s dark horse Herschelle Gibbs, who put up an unbelievable 175 off 111 balls, ended up making the difference.

ON THIS DAY IN 2006:
The Proteas pulled off the highest ever run chase in ODI history when they scored 438 against Australia at the Wanderers.#438gamepic.twitter.com/x4hV4ynNwO

— SuperSport 🏆 (@SuperSportTV) March 12, 2018

Gibbs went into the match in a hungover state with coach Mickey Arthur and captain Graeme Smith letting him play only because there was no other replacement batsman available to them. Gibbs also recalled drinking the whole night before the match and almost missing the team bus the next day in his biography. However, the player with a potential of taking things south ended up leading the Proteas closer to victory. South Africa were comfortably 299 for 3 in the 32nd over after which they lost Gibbs, Jacques Kallis and Justin Kemp in quick succession, bringing the chances to close again. Mark Boucher and Makhaya Ntini were there till the end. Boucher hit the winning runs as South Africa won the exciting match with one ball remaining. Ponting was named the player of the match.