Legendary Australia cricketer Adam Gilchrist is regarded as one of the best wicket-keepers ever to play the gentleman's game. When Gilchrist was on song, he used to bat the opposition out of the game and the same thing happened on this day, 16 years ago.
In the first Test of the 2002 series between South Africa and Australia in Johannesburg, the southpaw slammed the then-fastest double ton in the history of the longest format of the game, guiding the visitors to an innings and 360-run victory.
Batting first, Australia posted a mammoth score of 652/7d courtesy of centuries from Matthew Hayden and Damien Martyn and a record-breaking double ton from Gilchrist.
The southpaw came onto the crease when the Proteas had made sufficient inroads in the Aussie batting line-up and they were at struggling at 293/5. But Gilchrist and Martyn issued a remarkable fightback to completely change the complexion of the match. Martyn fell after completing his well-deserved ton, however, Gilchrist was far from done as he kept hitting boundaries for fun.
The Aussie superstar bettered Ian Botham's record of scoring the fastest double ton by eight deliveries as he got over the line off just 212 balls. Although, Gilchirst's record was broken by Nathan Astle few weeks later, when he slammed a double ton off just 153 deliveries against England in Christchurch, which still remains a record.
During the course of his unbeaten innings, he slammed 19 fours and 8 glorious sixes. This innings from Gilchrist laid the tone for the rest of the match, which the visitors wrapped up inside three days and inflicted the second heaviest defeat in Test history.
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