Also or formerly known as Fateh Maidan
Named after Lal Bahadur Shastri, Prime Minister of India (1964-1966)
Floodlights Yes
End names Pavilion End, Hill Fort End
Home team(s) Hyderabad (India)
Current local time 05:17, Mon May 12, 2008 (UTC +0530)
External links Weather
Formerly the Fateh Maidan, the Lal Bahadur Shastri Stadium hosted a Test match as far back as 1955-56 without ever becoming one of India's frontline venues. New Zealand were the opponents in all three Tests staged there - the last of which was a generation ago - and also had a part to play in one of the great World Cup matches, when David Houghton's magnificent 142 fell just short of lifting Zimbabwe to an epic victory in 1987. As a domestic venue, it played host to some of the titans of the Indian game, home turf for the likes of Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, ML Jaisimha, Mohammad Azharuddin and VVS Laxman. A slow and low batsman-friendly pitch was usually to the liking of slow bowlers as well, with another hometown hero, Arshad Ayub, nursing fond memories of India's only Test win there. As a one-day arena, it also witnessed a record-shattering 331-run partnership between Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid in 1999-2000, with New Zealand again at the receiving end. But with a new state-of-the-art venue having come up across town, the days of bat smacking ball in an international game may soon become a distant memory for this storied stadium.
(Dileep Premachandran)
