India T20I Closest wins by wickets: Match Records
Written and checked by CricketTakenPublished Cricket in India9 min read
In two hundred and ninety-six men's T20 internationals India have never won one by a single wicket. The narrowest margin in the wickets column is two, and it has happened twice: against Australia at Visakhapatnam on 23 November 2023, with one ball left, and against England at Chepauk on 25 January 2025, with four. That is an unusual gap for a side that has chased as often as India have, and it is largely a matter of where the lower order tends to be batting when these games finish.
Eighty-five of India's 190 T20I wins have come batting second. Sixteen of those eighty-five were completed with five wickets or fewer in hand — under one chase in five. The rest were comfortable enough that the tail never had to be considered.
There is a second way to read "closest", and on some of these matches it gives a different answer. Four India chases have been settled off the very last ball of the innings, and none of the four was a two-wicket win. Both rankings are set out below because both are honest and they disagree.
Every India T20I chase won with five wickets or fewer standing
| Margin | Balls to spare | Target set | India's reply | Opponent | Venue | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 wickets | 1 | 208/3 (20.0) | 209/8 (19.5) | Australia | Visakhapatnam | 23 Nov 2023 |
| 2 wickets | 4 | 165/9 (20.0) | 166/8 (19.2) | England | Chennai | 25 Jan 2025 |
| 3 wickets | 4 | 171/4 (20.0) | 174/7 (19.2) | Sri Lanka | Colombo (RPS) | 10 Feb 2009 |
| 4 wickets | 0 | 166/8 (20.0) | 168/6 (20.0) | Bangladesh | Colombo (RPS) | 18 Mar 2018 |
| 4 wickets | 0 | 159/8 (20.0) | 160/6 (20.0) | Pakistan | Melbourne | 23 Oct 2022 |
| 4 wickets | 16 | 95/9 (20.0) | 98/6 (17.2) | West Indies | Lauderhill | 3 Aug 2019 |
| 5 wickets | 2 | 164/6 (20.0) | 166/5 (19.4) | New Zealand | Jaipur | 17 Nov 2021 |
| 5 wickets | 2 | 147 (19.5) | 148/5 (19.4) | Pakistan | Dubai (DICS) | 28 Aug 2022 |
| 5 wickets | 2 | 146 (19.1) | 150/5 (19.4) | Pakistan | Dubai (DICS) | 28 Sep 2025 |
| 5 wickets | 4 | 138/9 (20.0) | 142/5 (19.2) | Sri Lanka | Mirpur | 1 Mar 2016 |
| 5 wickets | 4 | 135/7 (20.0) | 139/5 (19.2) | Sri Lanka | Wankhede | 24 Dec 2017 |
| 5 wickets | 4 | 195/4 (20.0) | 199/5 (19.2) | West Indies | Eden Gardens | 1 Mar 2026 |
| 5 wickets | 9 | 186/6 (20.0) | 188/5 (18.3) | Australia | Hobart | 2 Nov 2025 |
| 5 wickets | 13 | 157/6 (20.0) | 158/5 (17.5) | England | Pune | 20 Dec 2012 |
| 5 wickets | 13 | 109/8 (20.0) | 110/5 (17.5) | West Indies | Eden Gardens | 4 Nov 2018 |
| 5 wickets | 27 | 83 (17.3) | 85/5 (15.3) | Pakistan | Mirpur | 27 Feb 2016 |
The Lauderhill match of August 2019 and the Mirpur match of February 2016 are on the list only because India lost cheap wickets in a very small chase. Neither was close in any sense that mattered on the night.
Visakhapatnam, November 2023: 209 with a ball to spare
Australia set 209 in the second match of the series that followed the 2023 World Cup, and India lost Ruturaj Gaikwad for nought in the first over. Suryakumar Yadav then made 80 from 42 balls with nine fours and four sixes, Ishan Kishan 58 from 39, and the two of them put the chase within reach before both fell.
What made it a two-wicket win rather than a five-wicket one was the collapse that followed: Axar Patel, Ravi Bishnoi and Arshdeep Singh all went without scoring. Rinku Singh, unbeaten on 22 from 14, hit the runs that finished it with a ball left and eight down. It remains the largest total India have chased down with two wickets standing.
Chepauk, January 2025: Tilak Varma carries it
England's 165 for 9 at Chennai should not have been difficult. India were 44 for 4 inside seven overs and then 79 for 5, with Abhishek Sharma, Sanju Samson, Suryakumar Yadav and Dhruv Jurel all back in the pavilion for single figures.
Tilak Varma made 72 not out from 55 balls and batted through, and Washington Sundar's 26 was the only other score above ten. Ravi Bishnoi was 9 not out at the other end when the winning runs came with four balls left. The rest of that series is on the India versus England T20I record page.
The two chases settled off the final ball
Neither of India's last-ball wins is in the top three of the table above, and both are better remembered than anything that is.
At the Premadasa on 18 March 2018, in the final of a tri-series also involving Sri Lanka, India needed 34 from twelve balls against Bangladesh. Dinesh Karthik came in at number seven with the equation at 34 from eight, hit 29 not out from 8 balls including three sixes, and finished it with a straight six off the last delivery. Rohit Sharma's 56 had set the chase up.
At the Melbourne Cricket Ground on 23 October 2022, in front of a crowd of more than ninety thousand, India were 31 for 4 chasing 160 against Pakistan. Virat Kohli's 82 not out from 53 balls and Hardik Pandya's 40 rebuilt it, a no-ball free hit off Mohammad Nawaz in the last over turned the arithmetic, and Ravichandran Ashwin lofted the final ball over the infield for the single that won it. That match is covered at greater length on the 2022 T20 World Cup page, and the rivalry's full T20I ledger on the India versus Pakistan T20I record page.
Ranked instead by balls remaining
| Balls to spare | Margin | Match |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 4 wickets | v Bangladesh, Colombo (RPS), 18 Mar 2018 |
| 0 | 4 wickets | v Pakistan, Melbourne, 23 Oct 2022 |
| 0 | 6 wickets | v West Indies, Chennai, 11 Nov 2018 |
| 0 | 7 wickets | v Australia, Sydney, 31 Jan 2016 |
| 1 | 2 wickets | v Australia, Visakhapatnam, 23 Nov 2023 |
| 1 | 6 wickets | v South Africa, Johannesburg, 1 Dec 2006 |
| 1 | 6 wickets | v Australia, Hyderabad, 25 Sep 2022 |
| 1 | 6 wickets | v New Zealand, Lucknow, 29 Jan 2023 |
| 2 | 5 wickets | v New Zealand, Jaipur, 17 Nov 2021 |
| 2 | 5 wickets | v Pakistan, Dubai (DICS), 28 Aug 2022 |
| 2 | 5 wickets | v Pakistan, Dubai (DICS), 28 Sep 2025 |
| 2 | 6 wickets | v Australia, Rajkot, 10 Oct 2013 |
| 2 | 6 wickets | v Australia, Sydney, 25 Nov 2018 |
| 2 | 6 wickets | v Australia, Sydney, 6 Dec 2020 |
| 2 | 7 wickets | v West Indies, Mirpur, 23 Mar 2014 |
| 2 | 8 wickets | v Australia, Melbourne, 3 Feb 2012 |
Australia appear seven times in sixteen, which is far more than any other side and more than their share of India's fixture list would suggest. India have a habit of winning matches against Australia in the last over with wickets in hand, and it is the single clearest pattern anywhere on this page. The full fixture record is on the India versus Australia T20I record page.
Dubai twice, seven years and three weeks apart
Two of the five-wicket, four-balls-left chases came against Pakistan at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium, and both were Asia Cup matches. In the group game of August 2022, Pakistan were bowled out for 147 and Hardik Pandya's 33 not out from 17 balls, with Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja making 35 apiece, took India home with two balls unused.
In the final of September 2025, Pakistan made 146 and India were 20 for 3 inside four overs. Tilak Varma's 69 not out from 53 balls, with Shivam Dube's 33 in support, ended the chase at 150 for 5 with the same two balls to spare. Two matches at the same ground, against the same opponent, with almost identical scorecards and no shared personnel in the decisive partnership. The Asia Cup has provided more of these than any tournament outside the World Cup.
The era pattern, and what changed
| Period | Chases won with 5 wickets or fewer | All chases won |
|---|---|---|
| 2006-2012 | 2 | 11 |
| 2013-2017 | 3 | 17 |
| 2018-2022 | 6 | 33 |
| 2023-2026 | 5 | 24 |
The rate hardly moves: between one chase in five and one in six throughout. What has changed is the size of the targets. The five entries dated before 2018 were chases of 172, 158, 139, 136 and 84; the five most recent were for 209, 196, 187, 166 and 147. India are now going deep into their batting to overhaul totals that would once have been out of range altogether.
Sanju Samson's 97 not out from 50 balls at Eden Gardens in March 2026, chasing 196 against West Indies, is the clearest example of the new shape: a top-order batter batting through while five partners come and go around him.
Three things the wickets column hides
India have lost only three T20Is by three wickets or fewer — to Australia at Visakhapatnam in February 2019, to West Indies at Providence in August 2023 and to South Africa at Gqeberha in November 2024. Against sixteen close chases won, that is a lopsided record in matches decided late, and it is the strongest argument for the depth of India's batting in this format.
Not one of the sixteen was a low-scoring grind in the traditional sense. The lowest target among them was 84, at Mirpur in 2016, and the only reason that one qualifies is a middle-order wobble against Mohammad Amir. Small targets do not generally produce narrow wickets margins; large ones do.
Finally, the absence of a one-wicket win says as much about the format as about India. A side that has lost nine wickets inside twenty overs has almost always lost the match as well, so the one-wicket finish that Test and one-day cricket produce regularly is rare everywhere in T20 internationals. The wide-margin version of the same table is on the biggest India T20I wins by wickets page, the tightest defences on the closest India T20I wins by runs page, and the format's development in Indian hands on the T20 international history page. The cricket in India hub gathers the rest.
Sources and method
Margins, balls remaining, targets and individual scores are drawn from the scorecards of India's men's T20 internationals, verified against ESPNcricinfo's Statsguru results list for India filtered to wins carrying a wickets margin. The five-wicket cut-off gives sixteen matches; a four-wicket cut-off would give six, which is too few to show a pattern.
Chases affected by Duckworth-Lewis-Stern revisions are included where the scorecard records a wickets margin, and the "target set" column then shows the opposition's actual innings rather than the revised figure. No such match appears in the top three of either table.
Descriptions of how individual chases finished rest on contemporary ball-by-ball records; where the text follows a sequence of deliveries it is narrative rather than computed. The claim that India have never won a men's T20I by one wicket is a check of the complete results list rather than an inference. Records are current to 19 August 2026.