Splendid Friday! Indian sports bask in Australian summer

Indians have plenty to celebrate on Friday Down Under, after winning historic cricket series and Sania Mirza's Australian Open triumph in doubles.

New Delhi: Australian summer is a busy time for sports. This is a period when the best players in the world visit Down Under and return with life changing experiences, thanks to a culture which appreciate sports.

But, for Indian visitors, the experiences can be regarded as fleeting, with many defeats and heartbreaks. That was until today. For a change, Indians on Friday celebrated with a sense of pride when their cricket teams beat an otherwise indomitable Australians at their own backyard, which was sandwiched by Sania Mirza's Aus Open triumph in the doubles.

First, it was the women's cricket team which started the day by beating their Aussie counterparts by 10 wickets in a rain-affected second T20I in Melbourne. The win meant that Indian women, for the first time, have clinched their first ever series Down Under. The third and final match of the series will be played on January 31 in Sydney.

Then, tennis ace Mirza partnered with Swiss legend Martina Hingis to win their third successive Grand Slam doubles title. The top-seeded Indo-Swiss pair beat Czech duo of Andrea Hlavackova and Lucie Hradecka in straight sets to claim the Australian Open women's doubles crown. There was a bit of dampner though, as Mirza lost her mixed-doubles semi-final.

An eventful day ended with men's cricket team winning the three-match T20I series in the second outing itself at Melbourne Cricket Ground. Their 27-run win assured that Mahendra Singh Dhoni became the first Indian skipper to win least two International bilateral series in Australia.