The Arun Jaitley Cricket Stadium, situated on the Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi, was established in 1883 and is one of the oldest international cricket stadiums in India. From international to domestic cricket, it has hosted thousands of matches and witnessed many historic moments. This ground has a special place in the hearts of cricket fans and for them, we will be exploring its history and statistics here in this article.
Overview
Currently, the Arun Jaitley Stadium is operated by the Delhi & District Cricket Association. It has a decent capacity of 35,000 people. Here you can see the overview of the ground:
| Former names | Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium |
| Owner | Delhi & District Cricket Association |
| Capacity | 35,000 |
| Established | 1883 |
| Surface | Grass (Oval) |
| Location | Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, Delhi |
In a 2017 ceremony, four stands of the stadium were named after four Indian cricketers: former captain Bishan Singh Bedi, former Indian all-rounder Mohinder Amarnath, and former Indian opener Gautam Gambhir. The same year, India played a T20I match for the first time on this ground. It took place on 1 November 2017 in which India faced New Zealand, it was also the last international match for Ashish Nehra. To make his farewell memorable, the DDCA renamed one end of the Ground as “Ashish Nehra End” for one day. Nehra became the second bowler in cricket history who bowled from an end named after him.
History
It was established 141 years ago and was originally named Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium after the nearby Kotla Fort. Recently in 2019, it was renamed to Arun Jaitley Stadium in honor of the former Indian Politician and the President of the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA), the organization that owns and operates this ground.
The first-ever international match that India played here was the test match against Pakistan on 10-14 November 1948. Since then a lot of games have been played here and many records have been made that still stand. One such milestone was set in 1952 when Hemu Adhikari and Ghulam Ahmed scored 111 runs for the tenth wicket partnership. One of the most memorable moments here was the 35th century of Sachin Tendulkar against Sri Lanka in 2005, after this match he broke the record of Sunil Gavaskar for most test centuries.
India vs Sri Lanka on 15 September 1982 was the first ODI match in this stadium. Many ODI matches have been organized on this ground but one of the matches that are often talked about was played on 27 December 2009 in which the previous two teams met to face each other once again. But the referee declared that the pitch was unable to host the match and thus it was called off. The International Cricket Council (ICC) banned this stadium for one year. It started hosting international matches once again from the 2011 Cricket World Cup.
The first International T20 match was held here on 23 March 2016 in which Afghanistan collided with England in the 2016 ICC World T20. However, T20 matches of one of the biggest franchise cricket tournaments, the Indian Premier League, have been hosted here since its inaugural season in 2008. In IPL, Arun Jaitley Stadium is the home ground of Delhi Capitals.
Records
The highest test score on this ground was made by the West Indies (644–8) in 1959. India’s highest here is 613–7 which they scored in 2008. Sunil Gavaskar with 668 runs is the most successful batsman while Anil Kumble with 58 wickets is the most successful bowler on this ground. The highest total of 428/5 in an ODI match was scored by South Africa against Sri Lanka in the 2023 Cricket World Cup.
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