Sandeep Patil is a former Indian cricketer known for his elegant style of play. His role in the team was primarily an aggressive right-handed batter who could also bowl medium pace. He gained the spotlight through his performance in the test match against Australia in 1981 where he scored 174 runs after being hit on his head by Len Pascoe in the preceding inning. Sandeep Patil in action.At the starting of his career, he was more of a wrong foot medium-fast bowler. The first major tournament he played was the Rohinton Baria Trophy for Bombay University. In 1975-76, he made his Ranji Trophy debut for the Bombay team. For three years, he was the irregular member of the side. However, in 1979, he scored 145 runs in the Ranji Trophy semi-finals. Bombay already lost their first four wickets for 72 runs. Sandip came at number six and played aggressively taking Bombay to the finals. The significance of his inning can be estimated from the fact that the next highest score after his score was less than 25. His inning includes 18 fours and a six. Sandeep then represented Edmonton in the Middlesex league in 1979 and 1980, and Somerset B in the succeeding year.India then played a home series against Australia and Pakistan in 1979-80. Sandeep played tour matches against both teams representing West Zone. He scored 44 and 23 against Australia, and 68 and 71 against Pakistan. These innings helped him to earn his place in the last two test matches against Pakistan.Two weeks before this match, he made his highest first-class score against Saurashtra at the Wankhede Stadium. On the second day when he came out to bat, he was 45 runs not out before lunch. Carrying forward that inning, he reached his hundred in 139 balls and ended up with the score of 210 runs off 205 balls including seven sixes and nineteen fours. His last six cleared the stadium and landed on the hockey stadium nearby.In the second test match at Eden Gardens, Calcutta (now Kolkata), he made 62 runs. He also appeared in the Golden Jubilee Test against England later following that season.He was then selected for the tour of Australia in 1980-81. Before the test match, he scored 116 runs against South Australia; a team comprising of players like Rodney Hogg. He then scored 60 and 97 against Queensland which had a player like Jeff Thomson. In his debut ODI match, he scored 64 against Australia and earned the Player of the Match award.Following that, a test series was held where Patil after reaching 65 runs just before the tea break, was hit on the throat by Hogg. He continued to play after that, but later was he was hit on the right ear by Len Pascoe. After which, he got retired hurt. However, in the second inning, he batted with an injured head on the insistence of the teams captain Sunil Gavaskar which India lost by an inning margin. Sandeep lying on the ground after Len Pascoe bouncer on 2 January 1981 in a match against Australia at Sydney.After two weeks, he scored his highest test score in the second test match against Australia at Adelaide in January 1981. His score of 174 runs came at the time when India lost their first four wickets on 130 runs. At that time, it was the highest score by an Indian in Australia which included twenty-two-fours and one-six of Bruce Yardley over mid-wicket. In the next series, he opened the bowling alongside Kapil Dev against New Zealand in Auckland in March 1981.He was then dropped from the side after the home series against England in 1981-82 but was picked immediately after. In a match at Manchester, he scored his second test hundred. India was in danger of an inning defeat when he added 96 runs along with Kapil Dev. When England took the second new ball, Patil hit Ian Botham for four and three in the last two balls of his over. In the next over, he hit Bob Willis for six fours and took the score from 73 to 104 runs in nine balls. He remained not out on 129 runs till the end of the play before rain interrupted the match.His next hundred came against Sri Lanka in September 1982 at Chennai. However, he was dropped from the team in the middle of the season. Again while India was on a tour of the West Indies, Patil hit 121 runs not out in a Ranji final against Karnataka. Interestingly, all those runs came in the single session when Bombay was targetting a declaration on the final day.