Heartbreaking moments for top teams in the 21st Century

#1 India's eight overseas Test losses at the hands of England and Australia in 2011-12

Glum faces after a 0-4 whitewash against Australia.

For an Indian cricket fan who has grown-up overseeing the Indian team under Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, eclipse new highs especially overseas in the first decade of 21st century. Indians have always been belittled over their abysmal overseas record especially in the 90s where the team went through the entire decade without an elusive win. With Sourav Ganguly at the helm at the turn of century, things changed for the better.

It is in this retrospect that India's capitulation in England (0-4) and then in Australia (0-4) remains one of the most painful moments for Indian cricket this century. The seeds were sown pretty early when an 'under-cooked' Indian team turned up against England at Lords. The series which was billed as a contest between the two best Test sides in the world was virtually over when Zaheer Khan hobbled his way back to the dressing room in the first morning of the Test match. Zaheer would take no further part in four-match series and India's over-dependence on him was embarrassingly exposed as the English batsmen made merry and piled on a mountain of runs.

Indian batsmen barring Rahul Dravid, who scored three hundred on the tour, got buried under the mountain thanks to the duo of Anderson and Broad, who played a key role in handing India a 0-4 whitewash and subsequently relieving them of their No.1 status. If the loss in England was shocking, it amplified to catastrophic effects a few months later, when India toured Australia in the winter of 2011. The fact that India's core that has dominated World cricket for a period of time has crossed its sell-by date was epitomized to the hilt when Dravid, India's most successful batsman in England saw his stump get knocked over seven times out of eight innings. The pressure of achieving the 100th hundred was telling in the Master Blaster as after an encouraging start at the MCG, his form fizzled out and so did India's chances as Australia completed a 0-4 whitewash on the visitors.

The ardent Indian fans expected India's win and Tendulkar's 100th hundred prior to the series, they got neither, yet what they did get was a glimpse into India's batting future with Virat Kohli stamping his authority as a Test player with a pristine 75 in Perth and a maiden hundred in the fourth Test at Adelaide.