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]IND vs SA Test 2026: India Suffers Biggest Test Defeat as South Africa Clinches First Series Win in 25 Years
by K D Mishra
South Africa won their first Test series in India in 25 years after beating India by 408 runs in the second Test in Guwahati on Wednesday. This also became India’s biggest loss in Test cricket by runs.
India, chasing a huge total of 549, were all out for 140 in the second session on Day 5. Experienced off-spinner Simon Harmer took six wickets in the innings, finishing with nine wickets in the match and breaking India’s fight in both innings. The World Test champions won the series 2-0, showing their dominance from the very first day.
South Africa has won a Test series in India for the first time since 2000, when Hansie Cronje was the captain. On Wednesday, Temba Bavuma joined Cronje in achieving this rare win while still unbeaten as a Test captain.
The match turned in South Africa’s favor on Day 2, when Sen Muthusamy and Marco Jansen helped the team recover from 247/6 to 489 runs. Their partnership stopped India’s momentum and gave South Africa control of the game.
Jansen was very effective with the ball, using the red-soil pitch to get extra bounce and trouble the Indian batsmen in the first innings.
South Africa chose not to enforce the follow-on, which some criticized, as they batted a long time in the second innings to give Tristan Stubbs a chance to score a century. However, their declaration was enough. On Day 5, Harmer took control, dismissing KL Rahul late on Day 4 and taking five more wickets on the final day to finish the match.
This was the first time in 21 years that India had to chase over 500 runs in the fourth innings at home. The last time was in 2004, when Australia set 543 runs in Nagpur, and India lost that match by 342 runs, which was their biggest Test defeat at the time.
