Australian cricket team in India in 1979–80

The Australian cricket team toured India in the 1979-80 season to play a six-match Test series against India.

India won the series 2-0. It was the last series played by an Australian side before the compromise agreement between the Australian Cricket Board and World Series Cricket. It was the first time India had beaten Australia in a series.

Australia had just lost the Ashes to England 5-1 and drawn against Pakistan 1-1 during the 1978-79 summer. They had also finished a poor 1979 World Cup campaign.

The squad selected by Ray Lindwall, Sam Loxton and Phil Ridings were as follows:

The team was very inexperienced, with ten of the players never having toured before, and none having gone to India. Jeff Moss, Trevor Laughlin and Gary Cosier, who had been part of the 1979 World Cup squad, were not selected - they were replaced by Wood, Higgs, Sleep and Yardley. Peter Toohey, who had impressed with the bat in Australia's 3-2 victory over India in 1977-78, was also overlooked due to a poor 1978-79 test season. John Inverarity, the highly experienced Western Australian captain and former test player, appears never to have been considered for selection, despite a fine domestic season of cricket in 1978-79.

Although Graham Yallop had captained Australia during the 1978-79 summer, he was replaced by Kim Hughes when injured, and when Yallop returned to the side, the Australian Cricket Board decided to persist with Hughes. They also elected Hilditch as vice captain rather than Yallop. However Yallop was kept as a selector.

On-tour selection panel: Hughes, Hilditch, Yallop.

Alan Hurst suffered a back injury during the tour. On October 16 it was decided he would return home and Geoff Lawson was flown out as a replacement bowler during the tour.

Before the tour took place, establishment cricket had "made up" with World Series Cricket and the 1979-80 Australian summer season was to be the first in three years with all players in the one competition. However, World Series Cricket players were not selected on the India tour. The scheduling of the tour meant that the players chosen to go to India would miss out on the first round of Sheffield Shield games in Australia and only have two weeks to press their claims for selection before the first test in Australia.

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