Cricket's Biggest Rivalries: The Ashes, India vs Pakistan, and the Border-Gavaskar Trophy
The history and significance of cricket's greatest rivalries — the Ashes between England and Australia (since 1882), India vs Pakistan (geopolitical intensity), and the Border-Gavaskar Trophy between India and Australia.
Cricket's rivalries are among the richest in world sport — combining sporting competition with historical, geopolitical, and cultural dimensions that no other sport quite replicates. The Ashes between England and Australia began in 1882 and has been contested continuously (with interruptions for the world wars) ever since; India vs Pakistan carries the weight of partition and a geopolitical conflict that means the two countries play each other only at ICC events; and the Border-Gavaskar Trophy between India and Australia has emerged in the 21st century as perhaps the most significant Test cricket contest played. Each rivalry illuminates something essential about the sport and its global meaning.
The Ashes: Cricket's Oldest Rivalry
The Ashes between England and Australia originated in a famous mock obituary published in the Sporting Times newspaper in August 1882, following Australia's first-ever victory on English soil at The Oval: 'In Affectionate Remembrance of English Cricket, which died at The Oval on 29th August 1882. The body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia.' England's subsequent tour of Australia won back 'the Ashes', and the urn — a tiny terracotta urn believed to contain the ashes of a cricket bail — has been the symbolic prize of the series ever since. The Ashes is contested every two years in an alternating home-and-away format (five-Test series). Notable moments in Ashes history include: the Bodyline series (1932-33, England's Douglas Jardine employed Harold Larwood's aggressive short-pitched bowling aimed at the body to neutralise Bradman, causing a diplomatic incident); Ian Botham's 1981 (three consecutive Test wins after following on); Shane Warne's 'Ball of the Century' (the 1993 Ashes, Warne's first delivery to Mike Gatting that turned from outside off stump to hit the off bail).
India vs Pakistan: The Geopolitical Rivalry
The cricket rivalry between India and Pakistan sits unlike any other in world sport at the intersection of a major geopolitical conflict. The two nations were partitioned from British India in 1947, have fought three full-scale wars (1947-48, 1965, 1971) and numerous smaller conflicts, and have maintained tense relations continuously. This political context means cricket matches between them carry a significance that transcends sport: for many fans on both sides, defeat in an India-Pakistan match is experienced as a national humiliation, and victory as a source of genuine collective pride. The cricket itself has frequently been outstanding — the 1999 World Cup match at Old Trafford (one of the most-watched cricket broadcasts until that point), the 2022 T20 World Cup match at the MCG (128,000 attendance), the 2023 World Cup match at Narendra Modi Stadium — and the two teams' technical styles (India's technically correct batting vs Pakistan's express pace and swing) have historically produced compelling contests.
The Border-Gavaskar Trophy: Test Cricket's Modern Centrepiece
The Border-Gavaskar Trophy, first played in 1996 and contested between India and Australia across four or five Tests in a home-and-away rotation, has become the most significant bilateral Test cricket contest of the 21st century. This reflects both the improved quality of India's Test cricket (from Sourav Ganguly's era onward) and the relative weakening of some traditional Ashes-period rivalries. India's series victories in Australia in 2018-19 and 2020-21 — the latter in which a depleted, injury-ravaged Indian squad won from 36 all out in Adelaide to produce one of the greatest Test comebacks in history — raised the trophy's significance to near-Ashes levels. The 2024-25 series in Australia saw a five-Test contest that was one of the most competitive Test series of the decade, decided in the final Test in Sydney. The trophy's competitive intensity reflects the fact that both nations have, for much of the 21st century, been the top two teams in Test cricket rankings.
Frequently asked questions
Will India vs Pakistan ever return to bilateral Test series, and what would it take for that to happen?
The prospect of India-Pakistan bilateral Test cricket returning is one of cricket's most discussed political questions, and the honest answer requires separating the cricketing desire from the political reality: bilateral India-Pakistan cricket requires a level of diplomatic normalisation between the two governments that, as of 2025, does not exist and shows no immediate sign of developing. Why bilateral cricket stopped: the last bilateral Test series between India and Pakistan was Pakistan's tour of India in 2007-08 (two Tests, India won 1-0). Subsequent attempts to resume tours — particularly Pakistan's tours of India that were scheduled but cancelled multiple times between 2009 and 2015 — were cancelled due to the political fallout from the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which the Indian government attributed to groups with links to the Pakistani state. The BCCI's position, effectively reflecting the Indian government's position, has been that bilateral cricket cannot proceed while the security and political situation remains unresolved. The ICC event window: India and Pakistan continue to meet at ICC events (World Cups, T20 World Cups, Champions Trophy) because ICC events are neutral-venue competitions where the political dimensions are managed differently — no Indian players travel to Pakistan, and Pakistan players coming to India for ICC events are managed under specific diplomatic arrangements. The 2025 Champions Trophy created significant diplomatic complexity around India's refusal to travel to Pakistan and Pakistan's refusal to play in a standalone Indian neutral venue, ultimately resolved through a hybrid model with India's matches at Dubai. What would resumption require: normalisation of diplomatic relations sufficient for the Indian government to permit Indian players to travel to Pakistan (or Pakistani players to tour India for a full series with all the commercial and logistical implications). Historical precedent — the brief periods of improved India-Pakistan relations in 2003-2007 — shows that bilateral cricket is possible when diplomacy permits. But cricket cannot lead geopolitics: no BCCI chair or ICC official can unilaterally create the political conditions. The most optimistic scenario for a returning bilateral series in the next decade requires a diplomatic thaw that has not yet begun.