The Spin | Ramen, rain and realpolitik: the inside story of Japan’s historic cricket clash with India

<p>World No 41 side faced political lobbying and mopping up after Typhoon Dujuan before taking on illustrious visitors</p><p>The relief was writ large on the face of Axar Patel when his final delivery of the match went for a dot ball. India’s raucous fans celebrated, but they knew that Japanese batter Alexander Shirai-Patmore and his teammates had just come perilously close to inflicting one of the biggest upsets in cricket history.</p><p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/japan">Japan</a>, ranked 41st in the world, had taken the T20 world champions to the final ball in a brief but incident-packed meeting last week between the sport’s minnows and giants that hours earlier had looked like falling victim to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/sep/21/weather-tracker-japan-typhoon-dujuan">Typhoon Dujuan</a>.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/sep/30/inside-story-japan-historic-cricket-clash-with-india">Continue reading...</a>