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Charles Davis: Statistician of the Year (Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians)

 

 

Who are the Fastest-Scoring (and Most Tenacious) Batsmen in Test Cricket? Click Here.

 

 

Longer articles by Charles Davis Click Here

 

 

A list of “Unusual Dismissals” in Test matches

 

Unusual Records. For Cricket Records you will not see anywhere else, Click Here

 

 

 

 

 

  

 2023 and Earlier Entries

 

FOUND: a full score of the Madras Tied Test !

A Bonus Page:

some remarkable first-class innings, re-scored.

 

Link to Travels

 

The Davis Test Match Database Online.

 

Detailed scores for all Tests from 1877 to the 2010s have now been posted. Almost three-quarters of Tests include ball-by-ball coverage; virtually all others offer some degree of extended detail, beyond anything previously made available online. 

The starting page is here. An information page outlining this database is here.

Major Test Partnerships (200+) 1877 to 1970.          Major Test Partnerships (200+) 1971 to 1999. 

 

 

In the Test Match Database, quite a few discrepancies have been found in secondary stats (such as minutes batted) between the main scorecards on the one hand and the table of half-centuries on the other. Most of these problems have come from revisions to the main scorecards that I have neglected to transfer through to the 50+ files. For early Tests especially, these problems often derive from uncertainties and conflicts in the reports that match scorecards are based on.

 

I have now been through all the anomalies and I have corrected as many of the conflicts as possible. For example, in the very first Test, I have settled on 210 minutes for an innings of 63 by H Jupp, as per the main scorecard, previously given as 191 minutes in the 50+ file. Most corrections are smaller than this.

Broadly, perhaps three per cent of half centuries have seen corrections. A large majority of the corrections have been to the 50+ files rather than the main scorecards.

 

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My blog has now passed the 20-year mark. The first entry was on 6 November 2004. The early entries are mostly copies of the short columns I wrote for The Age newspaper at the time. I haven't changed the format of the blog much in 20 years, due to lack of computer skills. Now very old-fashioned. So be it.

 

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In the India A match in Melbourne the other day, the first four balls of Australia A second innings were faced by four different batsmen. It went

 

1,W,W,0

 

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29 November 2024

 

Nathan McSweeney, making his Test debut against India in the Perth Test, took a catch after just 13 balls were bowled in the match. Sounds rare, but it turns out to be a bit more common than I thought. Here are some other names for catches on Test debut in the first over of the match…

         

HJ Tayfield            0.2

RG Hart                 0.3

IM Chappell           0.3

PJP Burge              0.4

MRJ Veletta           0.4

IG Butler                0.5

         

While ball-by-ball data is incomplete for many Tests, I have reason to believe that the above list is complete.

 

I had a memory of Chris Sabburg, who never played first-class cricket, taking a catch (off Kevin Pietersen) on his first ball as fielding substitute at the ’Gabba in 2013. However, according to an interview with Sabburg on YouTube, he had been a sub for a couple of overs earlier in the day, so that disqualifies him; he came on a second time and took the catch second ball.

 

In innings two of a Test, Allen Lissette in 1955 and Pragyan Ojha in 2009 took a catch off their first ball when fielding on debut. Both had batted earlier in the match.

 

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Here is an example of the pitfalls of producing a table of records based on very incomplete information. When Marnus Labuschagne was out for 2 off 52 balls in Perth, the TV put up a supposed list of slowest Test innings by Australian batsmen…

 

 

Unfortunately this list is based on dodgy information. When I generated a list from my own database, using the same qualification of 50 balls minimum, I got the following…

 

R

BF

R/100b

ST Callaway

1

59

1.7

Aus v Eng (2), Sydney (SCG) 1891/92

WM Lawry

2

55

3.6

Aus v Ind (5), Chennai (Chepauk) 1969/70

M Labuschagne

2

52

3.8

Aus v Ind (1), Perth 2024-25

SNJ O'Keefe

4

98

4.1

Aus v SL (1), Pallekele 2016

AC Bannerman

4

87

4.6

Aus v Eng (1), Sydney (SCG) 1886/87

AC Bannerman

5

~90

5.6

Aus v Eng (2), The Oval 1888

MJ Bennett

3

53

5.7

Aus v WI (4), Melbourne (MCG) 1984/85

KD Mackay

3

51

5.9

Aus v WI (5), Melbourne (MCG) 1960/61

G Giffen

4

60

6.7

Aus v Eng (1), Adelaide Oval 1884/85

TM Chappell

5

69

7.2

Aus v Eng (2), Lord's 1981

G Coulthard

6

80

7.5

Aus v Eng (2), Sydney (SCG) 1881/82

PM Nevill

9

115

7.8

Aus v SL (1), Pallekele 2016

AIC Dodemaide

8

101

7.9

Aus v Pak (1), Karachi (National) 1988/89

 

So there are significant additions. There is also an error in the TV list – Peter Taylor never scored 4 off 66 balls. The online scorecards do show this for St John’s in 1991, but Taylor actually scored 4 off 41 balls, not 66.

 

One reason for this error is that slow-scoring records were often set long ago, and Cricinfo/Cricket Archive lack the needed detail for early Tests. By contrast, fast-scoring records are often quite recent so they do better with that category.

 

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It was a long wait, but the 100th score of 250 or more in Tests has finally arrived thanks to Joe Root. Root’s 262 came 106 Tests after the previous score of 250 (252 by Tom Latham at Christchurch in 2022). This was equal to the longest pause, in terms of Tests played, between 250s in history: there was also a gap of 106 Tests in the 1980s.

 

Root clocked up the 100th in Multan just half an hour in playing time – 9  overs – ahead of Harry Brook, who went on to 317, which I supposed was the shortest gap between 250s except that the case of Jayawardene and Sangakkara reaching 250 against South Africa in 2006 was extremely similar.

 

Prior to the 106-Test gap, there had been a 53-Test gap going back to Kane Williamson’s 251 in 2020. This represents quite a dearth of giant scores in this decade, maybe an effect of ‘Bazball’. Modern batsmen are so prone to hitting the ball in the air nowadays that it is perhaps not surprising that giant scores have become so rare. Having said that, it is interesting that Root and Brook hit only 3 sixes in their combined 579 runs.

There were 21 scores of 250+ in the 2010s, and 25 in the 2000s decade, but only five so far this decade, which is halfway through.

 

There were six 250s in the space of 25 Tests in 1957-58.

 

 

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At Chittagong in March, Prabath Jayasuriya was dropped by three Bangladeshi slips fielders off the same ball. Jayauriya was on 6 when he edged a ball off Khaled Ahmed; Shanto at 1st slip missed the chance but it then deflected to Dipu at  2nd and on to Zakir at 3rd, but none of them could hang on.

 

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4 November 2024

 

Why Eleven?

 

There was an interesting question on a ACS chat site a little while back: what is the origin of having eleven players in a cricket team?

 

In truth the answer is lost in the mists of time. The earliest surviving scorecards, from 1744, have teams of eleven, but earlier descriptions of the game generally lack the detail to help with the question of origins. The 1727 ‘Goodwood’ rules for a cricket match in Sussex describes teams of twelve, which complicates things, but it is understood (not sure how) that eleven was the standard.

 

Someone asked the much-vaunted AI, which came up with a completely useless answer.

 

The most satisfying answer offered was from Eric Parker’s History of Cricket, published around 1950. He pointed out how the numbers 11 and 22 crop up (so to speak) regularly in traditional farming practices in England. There are 22 yards in one chain, a common farm measurement; farms possessed a literal chain created for the purpose. Easy to measure out a cricket pitch. There were 10 chains to a furlong (a “long furrow” = 220 yards) and eight furlongs to a mile. An area one chain by one furlong was an acre, being the area that one worker could plough in one day with a team of oxen.

 

The original stumps (two of them in underarm days) were 22 inches high placed five and a half inches apart; the ball was five and a half ounces.

 

I like the connection with the number 22. Beyond that we don’t have a terribly clear idea when the idea of applying it to cricket matches arose.

 

 

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It appears that the protocol for measuring minutes batted has changed, at least as far as online scores go. Drinks breaks are no longer included in batting times. This represents a break with traditional practice. While the change has some logic, that break makes historical comparisons a little harder. Here is a comparison of a recent innings from Pakistan. The CA/CI (Cricket Archive/Cricinfo) times are on the left and exclude drinks breaks. Source BB is a score that includes drinks breaks, and Source C is similar.

 

CA/CI

BB

C

Abdullah Shafiq (102)

265

275

278

Saim Ayub (4)

14

12

Shan Masood (151)

260

272

Babar Azam (30)

100

105

Saud Shakil (82)

274

283

Naseem Shah (33)

98

103

Mohammad Rizwan (0)

13

15

Agha Salman (104)

168

170

Aamer Jamal (7)

15

16

Shaheen Shah Afridi (26)

70

71

Abrar Ahmed (3)

10

11

 

There is potential for confusion if the protocols get mixed, such as when one protocol is used for the whole innings but another for milestones (50s, 100s etc) from different source. The differences in the above data, while sometimes small,  appear to go beyond exclusion of drinks breaks.

 

 

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The Draw Drought

 

One effect of the escalation of big hitting and high strike rates in Tests has been the near-disappearance of drawn Tests. The trend has been particularly strong in the last year. In the last 50-odd Tests, there has been only one Test that was drawn after play on Day 5 (and one other where Day 5 was rained out). That Test, West Indies v South Africa at Port-of Spain in August, had four full sessions lost to bad weather, and other sessions shortened.

 

This was brought home when draws seemed to be a foregone conclusion in two recent Tests; there seemed to be no chance of results after Day 3 at Kanpur (India v Bangladesh, where almost 3 days were lost to weather) and Multan (Pakistan v England, with first innings of 566 and 823), yet both Tests were completed with time to spare.

 

The lack of dull draws is surely welcome, yet with that comes the disappearance of exciting draws. In the last 100 Tests, there has been only one that I would class as a draw with a close finish: at Karachi in 2023 Pakistan (449 & 277/5) v New Zealand (408 & 304/9). Close Tests haven’t disappeared entirely – there was New Zealand winning off the last ball at Christchurch in 2023 against Sri Lanka – but hopes for forcing a draw against the odds are rare now. Nevertheless the preponderance of result Tests means that such Tests that have close finishes still occur fairly regularly.

 

 

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Lawrie Colliver has provided a re-score of an ODI that Australia played in Pakistan in 1988, scored from a newly-discovered video. It was the only ODI that Australia played on that tour, the others being cancelled due to floods and rioting in the aftermath of the assassination of President Zia.

It was a curious match. It finished in a tie – 229

apiece – but  Pakistan was declared the winner on account of losing fewer wickets (7 to 8). As far as I know, it is one of only two tied ODIs decided by this method. It appeared especially odd because, with the scores tied, Pakistan made no attempt to score from the last five balls, bowled by Dodemaide . Presumably they knew that they were ‘ahead’, but it almost came unstuck when a wicket fell off the second last ball. Abdul Qadir faced the last ball and padded it away. A wicket here would have tied the game in wickets as well as runs. Lawrie’s notes describe it as “plumb” but it was given not out, and so Pakistan won.

 

 

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India had a remarkable win in the recent Kanpur Test, coming after more than two days were washed out. It was the first time that a team has started its first innings on the fourth day and won, with the peculiar exception of the Cronje 'Leather Jacket' Test.

 

The fourth day also featured the most wickets on a day with over 400 runs. 437 runs, 18 wickets (85 overs), previously 447/17 (91.4 overs) at The Oval 2013, and 414/17 at Lord's 1931.

It has been well-reported that India’s innings of 285 in 34.4 overs shattered all records for fastest team to 50, 100 and 200.

 

 

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October 2024

 

A Brief History of Rest Days

 

A recent Test in Sri Lanka had a ‘Rest’ day – actually a pause for a national election. Like the handful of Tests in this Century that had such pauses, there were special circumstance involved.

 

The ToSh group had a little discussion about this, and it got me looking into the history of Rest Days. I was surprised by some of the observations.

 

The insertion of days off into Test matches, specifically as rest days, dates only from the 1950s. Prior to that all ‘rest days’ were literal days of rest, i.e., Sundays, with the occasional pause also on Christmas Day. For a long time, playing cricket on a Sunday was severely frowned upon, or even illegal, in Christian countries. Some of the earliest written records of cricket in the 17th Century are court records of people fined for playing cricket on the Sabbath.

 

In England, there were no rest days of any kind prior to 1920. All Tests were three days, commencing early- or mid-week, aligned with County matches. In Australia, Tests were longer and often encompassed the weekend, but days off were always on a Sunday, even if the match started on a Saturday. There is one Test that shows that the idea of simply granting players a day off did not apply in those days: the first Test of 1897-98 at the SCG started on a Monday and went for five days without a break.

 

In 1921, some Tests in England started to straddle the weekend and the Sunday prohibition applied. It was similar in South Africa, where a Test in 1922-23 actually had two consecutive days off, a Sunday and Christmas Day on the Monday. The epic Durban Test of 1939 had two Sundays in addition to the ten scheduled days.

 

The first Tests with Sunday play occurred during England’s first tour of India in 1933-34. When West Indies toured India in 1948-49, there was play on Sundays and the five-day Tests had no rest days. The idea of regular rest days seems to have emerged in the 1951-52 England tour of India, where there was play on Sundays but a day off after Day 3 of each Test.

 

Rest days soon became the norm in the five-day and six-day Tests in Australia and England, but invariably these remained on a Sunday for many years. The West Indies had the same approach; there were also a couple of Tests which had two rest days because they occurred over Easter, pausing for Good Friday and Easter Sunday. The last of these was in 1965 (Georgetown).

 

One of the oddest cases was Karachi 1956. There was a rest after Day 3 (Sunday); then on Monday (Day 4) Pakistan dominated and were set 69 to win. Incredibly they scored only 63 for 1 in 46 overs before stumps, and so had to come back. The next day was another rest day (a day of mourning for a political figure) and so they waited till Wednesday to score the needed six runs.

 

Sunday play in Australia was finally introduced in 1968-69 (although not in all Tests). Those Tests with Sunday play had rest days after Day 2 or 3. England did not have Sunday play until 1981, and even then it was irregular with most rest days coinciding with Sunday.

 

After 1986-87, rest days in Australia fade from view, only occurring under special circumstances. New Zealand followed suit. (The special circumstances were sometimes very odd: the Brisbane Test of 1995-96 was paused for a day so that the broadcaster could show the Australian Grand Prix.) Rest days in England remained, when scheduled, on Sundays, before disappearing in the early 1990s. Rest days were dispensed with in South Africa when that country returned to Test cricket in 1992, but they continued to be regularly used in the hotter climes of the subcontinent and West Indies. In a unique occurrence, a Zimbabwe/New Zealand Test in November 1992 was paused for a day so that an ODI could be played. Not exactly a rest day!

 

The pressure of tighter schedules was making its mark, and the last series with normal rest days appears to be New Zealand in West Indies in 1996. There was a rest day in India’s first Test there the following year (on Good Friday), but the other two Tests of the series were so heavily rain-affected that the idea of rest days did not apply.

 

As said earlier, scheduled pauses in Tests since then have only occurred under special circumstances. A day was taken in a Test at Sharjah in 2014 following the shocking death of Philip Hughes, but extra play was added at the scheduled end of the match.

 

Frequency of rest days (Day Prior, Number of Tests)

   1      138

   2      269

   3      510

   4        34

   5         3

 

For the record, here are what can be described as Rest or Pause Days in Tests from the last 30 years.

 

Aus v Eng (2), Melbourne (MCG) 1994/95

Sun 25-Dec-1994

Christmas

Zim v Pak (1), Harare 1994/95

Fri 3-Feb-1995

Rest days scheduled for Fridays in this series?

Zim v Pak (3), Harare 1994/95

Fri 17-Feb-1995

Rest days scheduled for Fridays in this series?

WI v Aus (2), Antigua (St John's) 1995

Tue 11-Apr-1995

conventional rest day

WI v Aus (4), Kingston, Jamaica 1995

Tue 2-May-1995

conventional rest day

Aus v Pak (1), Brisbane ('Gabba') 1995/96

Sun 12-Nov-1995

televised Australian Grand Prix

WI v NZ (1), Bridgetown, Barbados 1996

Mon 22-Apr-1996

conventional rest day

WI v NZ (2), Antigua (St John's) 1996

Tue 30-Apr-1996

conventional rest day

Eng v Ind (3), Nottingham (Trent Bridge) 1996

Sun 7-Jul-1996

Wimbledon final

WI v Ind (3), Bridgetown, Barbados 1997

Fri 28-Mar-1997

Good Friday

SL v Zim (1), Colombo2 (SSC) 2001/02

Sun 30-Dec-2001

rest day for presidential election

Ban v SL (1), Dhaka (Mirpur) 2008/09

Mon 29-Dec-2008

rest day for presidential election

Pak v NZ (3), Sharjah 2014/15

Thu 27-Nov-2014

Death of PJ Hughes

Eng v SAf (3), The Oval 2022

Fri 9-Sep-2022

Death of Queen Elizabeth II

SL v NZ (1), Galle 2024/25

Sat 21-Sep-2024

rest day for presidential election

 

 

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Most Runs added after the fall of each wicket (Test innings)

 

Wkt

Runs added

FoW

Final score

1

913

39

Ind v SL (1), Colombo4 (RPS) 1997

952

2

751

7

Aus v WI (5), Kingston, Jamaica 1955

758

3

628

52

Ind v NZ (2), Wellington (Basin Reserve) 2013/14

680

4

593

87

Ind v NZ (2), Wellington (Basin Reserve) 2013/14

680

5

586

94

Ind v NZ (2), Wellington (Basin Reserve) 2013/14

680

6

450

111

NZ v Pak (2), Lahore (Jinnah) 1955/56

561

7

361

166

WI v Eng (5), The Oval 1966

527

8

245

332

Eng v Aus (1), Sydney (SCG) 1903/04

577

9

198

298

Ind v Eng (1), Nottingham (Trent Bridge) 2014

496

 

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Most runs added after a top-scorer was out…

 

At Kingston in 1955 top scorer Neil Harvey (204) was out at 373 and Australia made 758, so that is 385 runs added.

 

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Half of all Test series have been played in the 21st Century, even if one-off Tests are not considered. The proliferation of two- and three-Test series at the expense of fours- and fives- is part of the reason.

 

 

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The England v Australia T20 at Southampton, won by Australia 179 to 151, was the equal highest scoring T20 international where both teams were bowled out in less than their allotted 20 overs.( There was a match between Bangladesh and West Indies in 2018 that also produced 330 runs.)

 

In a 348-run match between Australia and Pakistan on 2 May 2010, both teams were bowled out, but they both played the full 20 overs.

 

 

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At Dhaka in 2004, Irfan Pathan bowled two hat-trick balls to Mohammad Ashraful in the same innings. The first came after Pathan had dismissed Rajin Saleh first ball and Ashraful came to the wicket. The second came when Pathan dismissed Mushfiqur Rahman first ball at the end of an over. Ashraful was still batting and faced Pathan when he started his next over, hitting him for 3.

 

Late in the innings there was another hat-trick ball, bowled by Kumble while Ashraful was still batting, but this time he was at the non-strikers end.

 

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15 September 2024

 

The Slowest Starters

 

In his sixth innings extending over almost 2 years, Mohammad Ali of Pakistan finally scored his first run in Test matches. The stroke for two came off his 52nd ball faced. I decided to make a list to see who had made a slower start…

 

Most balls faced before scoring first career run in Tests.

Batsman

Balls

G Giffen

~62

1881

HH Streak

54

2 innings

1993

Mohammad Ali

51

Multiple Tests

2024

MR Whitney

46

Multiple Tests

1981

SE Gregory

45

2 innings

1890

NC McGarrell

44

2 innings

2001

Subashis Roy

43

Multiple Tests

2017

HJH Marshall

37

2000

TG McIntosh

37

2008

WR Playle

36

1958

GI Allott

36

Multiple Tests

1997

Giffen’s number is uncertain because the analysis is based on (very detailed) newspaper reports. It should be reasonably accurate because most of it comprised maiden overs.

 

Zahir Khan of Afghanistan did not score until his eighth innings, but faced only 29 balls in doing so.

 

Most of the above is extracted from the ball-by-ball database, covering 80 per cent of Tests. Some of the figures are surprising, and probably could not be guessed from the whole innings data; Hamish Marshall is an example – his first Test innings was 40 off 121 balls, from which one would not expect 38 balls to get off the mark. So it is likely that there would be other cases not identified. One would be Sajeewa de Silva (KSC de Silva) in the 1990s, whose possible range is 38 to 52 balls, probably at the lower end of that range.

 

Terry Jarvis of New Zealand scored 9 in 123 minutes in his first Test innings in 1964-65, but no other detail is available.

 

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The Great LBW Drought

 

The 1970-71 series was a watershed in Ashes history, ending Australia’s hold over the urn in the 1960s and ushering in a more evenly contested decade. England won that six-Test series 2–0; apart from Bodyline (1932-33), it is the only time in the past century that England has regained the Ashes in Australia.

 

There were some statistical oddities. Chief among them: not one Australian batsman was given out lbw in the entire series. This remains a sore point among England fans with long memories, although there was also a low count of English victims, just five. There were mitigating factors.

 

Most important was an odd change in the lbw Law (as an “experimental rule”) that was tested out from the Australian domestic season in 1969-70, to 1971. The intent was to discourage pad play by making it easier to be given out doing playing “no genuine stroke”, but the specific wording of the rule had a strange side effect. It reverted ‘standard’ lbws (where a stroke was played) to the pre-1935 Law, making it mandatory for a ball to pitch in line with the stumps, so excluding balls pitching outside off stump. (By 1972, the wording had been modified to restore the pre-1969 criteria for standard lbws, while retaining the new no stroke provisions. This was permanently written into the Laws in 1980.)

 

There had been a dramatic effect, with the incidence of lbw in Australian domestic cricket dropping from 8-9 per cent of dismissals (1967 to 1969) to 4-5 per cent after the rule change, returning to 9 per cent in 1972-73. In the 70-71 Tests, it was only 2.7 per cent. Umpire Tom Brooks may have amplified the effect; he umpired five Tests (plus the abandoned Melbourne Test) but gave only two batsmen out lbw, both English. Incidentally, my father was a 1st Grade umpire in Sydney in those years and knew Brooks, and I remember Dad remarking that Brooks’ instructions were that lbw conditions were always extremely difficult to satisfy.

Lou Rowan was the other prominent umpire in this series (his last Tests). It is fair to say he was regarded as a hostile umpire by Illingworth and his men, and not just for the Jenner/Snow/walk-off incident in the final Test. He also gave just two lbws in five Tests.

 

In that climactic final Test of 70-71 at the SCG, Rowan gave Ray Illingworth out lbw to Dennis Lillee. Surviving video highlights show Illingworth playing no stroke – probably the first batsmen given out under the experimental rule. (Batsmen had been out lbw playing no stroke before often enough, but under standard rules.)

 

The other lbw in the series was given at the MCG, by Max O’Connell, who officiated in two Tests.

 

The table shows the fluctuations in lbws in Test matches brought on by the changes.

 

Incidence of LBWs in Test matches.

wickets

lbw

% lbw

1967

388

41

10.6%

1968

595

71

11.9%

1969

838

100

11.9%

1970

207

18

8.7%

1971

501

24

4.8%

1972

427

67

15.7%

1973

661

72

10.9%

1974

677

73

10.8%

All Test matches, calendar years. “1970” includes some matches before the experimental rule.

 

The experimental rule was followed in England in 1971, in Tests versus Pakistan and India. In six Tests, there were only five lbws, a similar tally to the 70-71 Ashes. Just two of them were against England batsmen. Only one of the five was a ‘no stroke’ lbw (Snow to Gavaskar). The only lbw in the three Pakistan Tests was very last wicket of the series.

 

When normality was restored in 1972, there were 27 lbws in five Ashes Tests in England. Curiously, none of them were of the ‘no stroke’ variety. Today about five per cent of lbws involve the batsman playing no stroke.

 

Incidence of LBW in Australian First-Class Cricket 1966-74

% lbw

1966-67

67

779

8.6%

1967-68

110

1164

9.5%

1968-69

80

1230

6.5%

1969-70

37

866

4.3%

1970-71

49

1068

4.6%

1971-72

78

1104

7.1%

1972-73

98

1061

9.2%

1973-74

85

1018

8.3%

 

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Understanding the Law Change

 

The 1971 L.B.W. Law is illustrated from Wisden of that year. It took me a while to understand it. The Section 39 in bold type is the Law as it had stood for over 35 years. It includes a provision for lbw to balls “pitched on the off-side of the striker’s wicket”. However, in 1971 this paragraph was no longer in force and had been completely superseded by the “experimental rule” in italics. Part (a) of the rule requires the ball to have pitched in line with the stumps, contrary to the provision of Law 39. Though not stated explicitly, it applies to standard lbws. Part (b) – and only Part (b) – allows for balls pitching outside off stump, but applies only to batsmen making no genuine effort to play the ball.

 

A close-up of a text

Description automatically generated

 

I cannot be certain that this reversion to the pre-1935 Law was the intention of the new wording, but it certainly was the effect. It is hard to understand how making standard lbws more restrictive could reduce the amount of pad play, if that was the goal.

 

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I have endeavoured to update my list of unusual dismissals in Test matches. If anyone can think of cases that I have missed that should be considered, particularly in recent years, let me know. Test matches only.

 

The list now includes the Bairstow brain fade at Lord’s last year.

 

 

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31 August 2024

 

Stroke or no stroke?

 

As a follow-up to my last post, here is some data on batsmen dismissed (bowled or lbw) without playing a stroke. Data is since Cricinfo began archiving text description in 1999. The data for 1999 to 2001 is probably rather patchy.

 

I have noted 247 cases of no stroke bowled dismissals since 1999 (4.2 % of all bowled dismissals) and 301 LBW (5.1 %)

 

Batsman

BWD

LBW

Sum

Inns*

SR Tendulkar

0

8

8

232

KP Pietersen

2

5

7

181

MG Johnson

3

3

6

109

Mushfiqur Rahim

3

3

6

164

Younis Khan

1

5

6

213

AJ Strauss

2

3

5

178

CH Gayle

2

3

5

182

HH Streak

1

4

5

66

JC Buttler

3

2

5

100

LRPL Taylor

3

2

5

196

M Vijay

2

3

5

105

MJ Clarke

4

1

5

198

S Chanderpaul

0

5

5

222

SP Fleming

2

3

5

120

 

*Innings after April 1999

 

TWM Latham has four no stroke BWDs but no LBW, and Brian Lara has four no stroke LBWs but no BWDs. Interesting that neither Lara nor Tendulkar are known to have been bowled this way, but they have 12 LBWs (note Chanderpaul also). However, there is no data for them before 1999. Tendulkar’s lbws include the controversial incident when he was hit on the arm/shoulder trying to duck a McGrath delivery that did not get up.

 

Most innings played without a ‘no stroke’ bowled or LBW: Angelo Mathews of Sri Lanka on 195 and Mark Boucher of South Africa on 183.
UPDATE The cutoff date for the no stroke analysis was July 2024. In his first innings in August, Mathews was out to a no stroke LBW for the first time in his career!

 

 

********

 

No shot lbw in both innings:

KD Mackay, Kanpur 1959-60 (pair of ducks)
MW Gatting, Lord’s 1984 (to Marshall)

BC Lara, Leeds 2000.

 

********

 

 

 

 

In the Wellington Test of 2023 (New Zealand v Sri Lanka) not a single batsman was out bowled or lbw. New Zealand won by an innings. Only one lbw decision was reviewed, the umpire’s not out decision being upheld.

 

********

 

In the Nottingham Test England reached 50 faster than any team before them, on the second ball of the fifth over. Even more notable was the fact that it was done on the first morning of the Test; most previous record-breaking 50s have happened in teams’ second innings when quick runs were required. The relevant section of the Unusual Records  has been updated.

 

********

 

 

 

5 August 2024

 

Clean Bowled or Played On?

 

For the last twenty years or more, I have periodically been going through descriptions of ‘BOWLED’ dismissals in Tests to distinguish between ‘clean bowled’ and ‘played on’ dismissals, with ‘no stroke’ dismissals thrown in for good measure. Here is a little statistical study of some of the data for recent years. This does rely on the Cricinfo commentators noticing edges – and this sometimes requires extensive replays – but the descriptions are now so detailed that I would expect that a great majority of cases are noticed.

 

I looked at 668 batsmen out bowled, in 115 Tests. [Bowled dismissals in total account for 18 per cent of all dismissals (more like 25 per cent for tailenders)]. Of the 668, I noted 155 cases of the ball hitting bat first, and a further 35 coming off the pad or other body part. That is 23 per cent off the bat and 5.2 per cent off the pad, giving a total of 28.4 per cent,

 

In another 34 cases (5.1 per cent), the batsmen was recorded as playing no stroke; nearly all of these were clean bowled. There were also a (very) few cases where no stroke was offered, but the ball hit the bat anyway and went onto the stumps.

 

Left-handed batsmen are more likely than right-handed to play on: 34 per cent to 26 percent (total edge or pad). It might be that the line required for a right-handed bowler to bowl a left-hander is more difficult than with a right-handed batsman.

 

There is less difference between left- and right-handed bowlers: 25 per cent (left) and 30 per cent (right).

 

Pace bowlers get 32 per cent of their bowled wickets via edge or pad, whereas spin bowlers get only 19 per cent. The incidence of ‘playing on’ varies between countries, and appears to be associated with the dominance of pace or spin bowling across various countries.

 

 

Played in

Tests

Bowled

edg+pad

% edg+pad

England

19

116

45

39%

New Zealand

11

58

22

38%

Australia

16

94

30

32%

West Indies

11

47

15

32%

South Africa

9

54

15

28%

India

14

106

27

25%

Sri Lanka

11

59

13

22%

Bangladesh

10

52

11

21%

 

 

 

 

 

 

Perhaps of more interest is a strong relationship between batting position and a propensity to play on. There is a major difference between top-order and bottom-order bats, presumably linked to much tighter techniques among better batsmen. It is quite hard to get a ball on the stumps through a top batsman’s defence without hitting something on the way.

 

Batting pos

Bowled

edg+pad

% edg+pad

1

72

28

39%

2

69

21

30%

3

74

26

35%

4

62

25

40%

5

61

18

30%

6

59

17

29%

7

64

22

34%

8

41

8

20%

9

66

16

24%

10

56

6

11%

11

42

3

7%

 

One interesting question that is hard to answer is: How many bowled dismissals occur to balls that are not directed at the stumps? The available descriptions often don’t distinguish between playing on with a fine edge (when the ball would probably have hit the stumps anyway) and playing on to a ball that would have missed the stumps. My impression is that the latter is in the majority, but beyond that I wouldn’t hazard a guess. Perhaps the massive CricViz database could offer some clues.

 

*******

 

 

 

 

 

11 July 2024

 

A Revised List

 

The “Hot 100”, the lists of fastest- and slowest-scoring Test batsmen has been updated, rather belatedly. I have made a few modifications. For the fast scorers, the bar has been raised to a 2,500 career run minimum (and averages over 20), to try to weed out secondary players, in a batting sense, with limited careers. But those guys have not been ignored; there is now a second table for those in the 500 to 2,500 run category, and this allows Gilbert Jessop to step into pride of place, after all these years.

 

https://www.sportstats.com.au/hotscore2024.html

 

I noticed that in the “Balls Between Dismissals” category (longest average innings length), Herbert Sutcliffe has edged ahead of Don Bradman in the latest calculation. I think this due to some improved calculations for the 1926 and other series. Sutcliffe is now on 163.9 balls per dismissal to Bradman’s 163.7. However, neither player’s data is complete, and various estimates have been used to fill the gaps. There is no way to distinguish these figures statistically; they are effectively tied.

 

 

********

 

Tit for Tat. Players who have dismissed each other for golden ducks in the same Test.

 

C Heseltine

GA Rowe

SAf v Eng (2), Johannesburg (Wanderers) 1895/96

N Kapil Dev

Azeem Hafeez

Ind v Pak (1), Bangalore 1983/84

CA Walsh

BA Reid

WI v Aus (4), Bridgetown, Barbados 1991

SCG MacGill

M Muralitharan

SL v Aus (1), Galle 2003/04

K Rabada

JM Anderson

SAf v Eng (4), Centurion (Centurion Park) 2015/16

J Holder

AAP Atkinson

Eng v WI (1), Lord’s 2024

 

********

 

 

 

Another data point for historical dropped chances.

 

Barry Valentine has very kindly provided me with another monumental ball-by-ball analysis of an Ashes series, this time the 1962-63 series in Australia. I have been through it looking for mention of dropped or missed chances and found about 48 (depending on definitions) to go with the 111 catches and stumpings. This implies a miss rate of just over 30 per cent.

This adds a data point to a slice of Test history (1950s- early 60s) where dropped catch data has been sparse. The 30 per cent miss rate is higher than modern rates of 23-25 per cent, but is consistent with the rates seen
my analysis for the late 60s and early 70s (27-34 per cent). It is also within the range of 29 to 32 per cent found for Ashes Test from the 1920s through to the 1940s.

 

It is hard to say whether the instances represent everything that could ever be found. However, I would say that Valentine’s analysis, which runs to 236 pages and is drawn from a wide variety of sources, is about as exhaustive as we will ever see.

 

********

 

When Maninder Singh was caught by Graham Gooch off Dilley at Lord’s in 1986, Gooch initially dropped the catch. It deflected to wicketkeeper French, who dropped it in turn, but managed to deflect the ball back toward Gooch. Gooch flicked the ball up with his boot and finally caught the ball.

 

 

********

 

A Nepal cricket anecdote, after their near miracle victory.

I spent almost a month in Nepal in 1984 including a 26-day trek in the Himalayas. Can't say I encountered much evidence of cricket. When we had a rest day in the trek in Muktinath the Australians and Poms in the group thought we would teach the Sherpas how to play cricket. Not a great success; at 3800 metres up, even the Sherpas were reluctant to run between wickets.

 

However, later I did encounter a guy in a remote village who came up to me and asked if I knew the score in the Test match. He must have been asking about a West Indies/Australia match. It was quite unusual to meet someone who spoke English; turned out he was from India.

 

I could not help him. We had no contact with the outside world for the whole 26 days, and none of the villages we went to had electricity. Nowadays I would suffer if I had to go without internet for 2 days.

 

An account of trekking 40 years ago is in my travel memoirs.

 

https://sportstats.com.au/Travel/1984TrekkinginNepal.pdf

 

 

16 June 2024

 

The Best Umpire, by DRS Data

 

A couple of curiosities that I noticed after updating my DRS (Decision Review System) file:

·      Most regular Test umpires have a DRS overturn rate between 24 and 27 per cent when reviews are called, but there is one current umpire who is way ahead of anyone. Michael Gough’s overturn rate is just 16.8 per cent; nearest to that is the retired Asad Rauf on 22.8 per cent (only part of Rauf’s career was during the DRS era), followed by still-active Kumar Dharmasena on 23.4. Gough has now umpired 34 Tests where DRS was used, and has been subject to 208 reviews, a fair number for assessment.

·      Joe Root has been the batsman in far more reviews than any other, 111 reviews in all. Jonny Bairstow and Steve Smith are next on 69 reviews each. 74 of Root’s reviews were from bowlers, with only 14 per cent successful. For all batsmen, 19 per cent of bowlers’ reviews are successful (umpire’s decision overturned). This suggests that Root is such a prized wicket that bowlers tend to waste speculative reviews in the hope of getting lucky.

 

An historical note: prior to the general adoption of DRS, there were at least two series where the system was trialled. I had been aware that it was tested in a Sri Lanka/India series in 2008, but I hadn’t known until recently that it was also used in a New Zealand/West Indies series a few months later.

 

********

 

Some stats concerning my Test match score collection.

 

My Test match score collection has been accumulating for more than 20 years now. Of the first 2500 Tests, about 1650 are now represented. Most are (copies of) handwritten scores as recorded by scorers at the matches. Some 79 of them are digital records from sources other than online sources. Ball by ball records from Cricinfo or other online sources are not included in these figures, but number an additional 472.

For about 130 of the 1650 Tests, I have multiple independent scores, making about 1780 scores in total.

 

Cricinfo began archiving Test match ball-by-ball texts in April 1999. Of 1441 Tests prior to this, I have ball-by-ball records for about 1100, thanks to the score collection. About 30 of these are incomplete, and 30 more (all early matches) were reconstructed from detailed press reports.

 

********

 

Ideas I like for improving T20 cricket (but we will probably never see)

 

Alas I find myself unmoved by these 400- and even 500-run slogfests in 40 overs. Most of the sixes I saw in the IPL were off three-quarter-strength strokes or mishits. Too easy. In spite of hundreds and hundreds of sixes, no hit went more than 110m in the IPL. Ten or fifteen years ago hits longer than 110m were regular occurrences. Some suggestions to give bowlers a fighting chance…

·      Forget about Power Plays. Allow five men on the boundary throughout.

·      To score six, a shot must land in the crowd, not just over the rope. A proper hit should be required.

·      To score four, the ball must cross the boundary – the only criterion. The position of the fielder is irrelevant.

·      A catch should count even if taken outside the boundary rope, as long as the fielder first touches the ball before setting foot outside the boundary. None of these silly juggling tricks.

·      Forget these pointless Impact Players. Why do teams need 12 players in a 40-over match?

·      If a batter ‘reverses’ his stance, the wide law should not apply, at all.

 

********

 

 

Back from holiday. I will add more series to my online scores soon.

After some enquiries, I have compiled lists of unusual scoring strokes in Tests: sevens, eights, all-run sixes etc. I have posted these in my
UNUSUAL RECORDS webpage.

 

 

********

 

Hitting a seven and a five in the same Test innings:

 

Andy Sandham hit a 7 and a 5 in his 325 at Kingston in 1930. WA Young did the same at Christchurch in 2021-22 (v Bangladesh), with the shots coming only a few balls apart. Young's 7 was signalled as an 8 by the umpires, but the scorers appear to have (correctly) decided that it was a 7. The poor bowler Ebadot; a catch was dropped, they ran 3, and the bowler had to chase the overthrow himself, unsuccessfully, to the boundary.

 

 

********

30 May 2024

 

‘Diverse’ Overs in Internationals.

 

Apparently in scoring there is a thing called a ‘smudger’, where every ball in an over has a different outcome in terms of runs scored. Ask Steven talks about this in a recent column: it has something to do with Mike J Smith (not MJK Smith), who did some scoring after his playing career and was known as “Smudger”. (According to the internet, “smudge” is a nickname sometimes attached to people named Smith – Steve Smith being one such.)

I have pieced together some examples of this from Tests and ODIs. Not all fit the definition exactly, mind you.

 

In an ODI on 1 Apr 1999 (India v Pakistan, Mohali), an over by Sehwag included a dot ball, three singles, a single off a no ball (=2), a '3 wides' delivery, a four, a four off a no ball (=5), and a six. Not in that order.

 

At Guwahati on 10 Jan 2023, the last over of the match went 2, 0, 1, 5, 4, 6. Sri Lanka batting against India (Mohammad Shami).

 

I haven't found any 6-delivery overs in Tests or ODIs that contained 012345 or 123456, but there are a few with 012346 (not in order).

 

The following 6-ball overs had shots off the bat for 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6 (in any order)

 

West Indies (535) v England Kingston 1935, 117th over. 046123

 

West Indies v England Antigua 1986, 37th over, during Viv Richards record century. 136240

 

England (400) v West Indies, Chester-le-Street 2007, 75th over. 263410

 

Australia (401) v England Brisbane 2013/14, 53rd over. 263401

 

Australia (369) v England Perth 2013/14, 83rd over. 6, 2, 0, 4, 5 wides, 1, 0.

 

Australia (370) v NZ, Christchurch 2016, 53rd over: 6, 3, 1, 2, 0, 4.

 

There are a couple of cases with 12346 (out of order) but no 0s (two singles).

 

Most remarkable was Mumbai 1951/52, when India hit 4, 0, 1, 2, 3, 8 in the 44th over, 1st innings.

 

 

********

 

 

 

10 April 2024

 

Dropped Catches in Tests: 2023

 

Compiling of dropped catch reports has continued into 2023. This dataset stretches back to 2001 for all Tests, and much further back for some selected Tests, particularly in England. The percentage of chances missed has been decreasing – i.e., catching is improving – gradually but slowly in this century. Does the 2023 data add anything new?

 

Overall, 22.3 per cent of chances (catches and stumpings) were missed in 2023, down from 24.4 per cent in 2022. This is the lowest annual miss rate recorded so far, the previous low being 22.8 per cent in 2018.

 

The most surprising thing to me is seeing Australia with the worst drop rate of any country. It’s the first year that this has happened. It seems strange, yet the impression during the 2023 Ashes was that Australia was dropping a lot of catches and England doing not much better.

 

Missed Chances (catches and stumpings) since 2010, by fielding team

2023

2022

2021

2016-2020

2010-2015

South Africa

19%

21%

18%

21.4%

21.7%

Australia

26%

31%

18%

22.6%

21.3%

New Zealand

16%

23%

15%

19.8%

20.9%

Sri Lanka

20%

29%

29%

24.6%

27.7%

India

23%

23%

21%

24.9%

28.0%

England

25%

18%

25%

23.1%

24.9%

Zimbabwe

 

25%

28.9%

32.4%

Pakistan

20%

33%

29%

21.4%

31.4%

West Indies

19%

20%

23%

23.8%

25.7%

Bangladesh

22%

31%

29%

32.6%

33.9%

 

All

22.3%

24.4%

23.3%

24.3%

25.4%

 

Among individuals, Alastair Cook retains his position as both the leading beneficiary of dropped catches (78) in the 21st Century and, as a fielder, the leading perpetrator (81). It must be noted that Cook spent a lot of time in his early career fielding at short leg, the position with the highest general drop rate.

 

There has been some movement in the stats of bowlers. Stuart Broad finished his career with more dropped catches than anyone else (144). He moved ahead of Jimmy Anderson, who had 135 at the cutoff date, and has probably registered a few more so far in 2024. Also still in full stride is Nathan Lyon, also on 135, and likely to pass Broad at some point. Lyon has seen 28 per cent of chances missed off his bowling, as against  26 per cent for Broad and 23 per cent for Anderson. For other countries, Ravi Ashwin on 102 (27%) is the only bowler with more than 100 chances missed.

Nathan Lyon and Pat Cummins had the most chances dropped off their bowling in 2023, with ten each. Steve Smith was the most sinful fielder, with eleven misses (Bairstow and Root next, with nine and seven respectively), although Smith also took the most (non-keeper) catches with 22. The luckiest batsman was Brad Stokes with nine misses, followed by Usman Khawaja on eight. Rohit Sharma took five catches in 2023 without registering a miss.

 

The usual caveats apply, regarding what and what does not constitute a dropped catch. On the other hand, the method for searching for instances has been consistent for more than 20 years.

 

A reminder of the paper I wrote on the longer history of dropped catches…

 

https://www.sportstats.com.au/articles/droppedcatcharticleACS.pdf

 

Garry Morgan assisted with the collection of recent data. “2023” Tests include New Year’s Tests in 2024, but exclude New Years Tests from 2023.

 

********

 

 

 

 

At Adelaide in 1968-69, Charlie Griffith (reportedly) had to run in to bowl 19 times to complete a single over, on the first day. In addition to the eight-ball over, there were seven calls of no ball, and four other run-ups where Griffith baulked and did not deliver the ball. This was reported in the Miller/Whitington tour book; however there is a problem with this report in that only three no balls were recorded in the day’s scorecard.

 

********

 

Australian players in the 1968-69 series were paid $190 per Test, equivalent to about $1,500 in 2024 dollars. Current (2024) payments for Australian male players are more like $20,000 per match; modern players also enjoy substantial contract retainers and other sources of income (sponsorships etc).

 

********

 

 

21 March 2024

 

Following an enquiry by a friend, I decided to dive into the Adelaide Test of 1968-69. This was one of the most remarkable Tests of its time, with Australia falling 21 runs short in a big run chase but holding on for a draw with 9 wickets down. At 1764 Runs, it is the second-highest-scoring time-limited Test in history, edged out only by the Rawalpindi Test in 2022 (1768 runs). Australia managed to score 872 runs in the match with only one century and no century stands. There were no fewer than 17 scores of more than 50 in the match.

 

That final run chase was marked by an extraordinary set of run outs, four in all. Three of them came in two overs, and this followed the “Mankad” of Ian Redpath by Charlie Griffith earlier in the innings.

Unfortunately, no original score is known for this match. As it happens, I have scores or ball-by-ball records for every Test in Australia played since then, bar one (Adelaide 1973-74). I have gathered together as much scoring information on the hectic final hour as possible, drawn from various newspapers, magazines and tour books.

 

I can remember this one, listening to it on the radio as a child. I could hardly stand the tension: I would walk away for a bit before rushing back to the radio. It should have been on TV but there had been a cut in transmission to Sydney after tea. I remember how it odd it was that the match continued so late (must have been 6:54 in Sydney) because of the new ‘15 overs in the last hour’ rule. I also remember Dad talking about the Mackay/Kline stand in 1961 but I had been too young to remember it.

 

Adelaide 1968-69: Final Hour Timeline

 

The scorecard is here.

 

West indies 1st innings 276

 

Australia 1st innings 533

 

West indies 2nd innings 616.

 

Australia was set a target of 360 in a minimum of 344 minutes on the final day. The match was one of the first to enforce a fixed minimum number of overs in the last hour (15 eight-ball overs). As such, the final session extended to 6:24 pm local.

Lunch score : Australia 106/1 (Lawry 37, Chappell 19)

Tea score 217/3 (Chappell 56, Walters 0) (3:40-4:00)

At 4:30, Australia was 250/3 (Chappell 75, Walters 14)

 

Timeline of the Last Hour (from 5:00)

 

The new ball had been available at 65 overs but not taken.

Over #

Bowler

69

Griffith

(old ball)

15 runs scored, Aus 298/3 (Chappell 95, Walters 38)

70

Gibbs 5:02

First of last 15 overs

71

Griffith

Chappell out

304/3. Sheahan in at 5:09.

72

Gibbs

73

Griffith

Walters (non-striker) run out 315/3 (5:20).

74

Gibbs

.[RO]....4[RO]

Freeman (non striker) (5:27) and Jarman (5:31) run out. 322/7

75

Griffith

3 runs?

76

Gibbs

maiden?

Aus 325/7 (?)

77

Griffith

1 run

78

Gibbs

2 runs

Aus 328/7. 32 needed off 6 overs

79

Griffith

5 runs

80

Gibbs

…W….

McKenzie out (5:58), batsmen cross. 333/8

81

Griffith

…..W..

Gleeson out (6:06). 333/9

82

Gibbs

maiden

Sheahan facing

83

Sobers, new ball

……24

Connolly 6 runs. Aus 339/9

84

Griffith

maiden

Sheahan facing. Match drawn 6:24.

Connolly six not out off 10 balls.

 

Australia still needed 21 runs with one wicket remaining.

 

The Timeline is drawn from a variety of reports. It is a ‘best available’ rendering: some reports are not completely consistent.

 

********

 

 

In the current Test between England and India at Dharamsala, England managed to lose three wickets AND burn through three reviews, all on the same score (175). In particular, Brad Stokes' effort, utterly plumb lbw for a duck, will go into highlight reels for the most blatantly ill-advised reviews. It was the third time in his career that Stokes has been out for a duck after calling for a review and failing. The only other recognised batsman with so many failures of this type is…Jonny Bairstow!

 

 

********

8 March 2024

 

In posting scores from the New Zealand/England series of 2007-08, I noticed how fast and furious the innings of 77 not out by Tim Southee was. Played at Napier, it was Southee’s first Test match. The 77, coming in 40 balls, included a sequence of 15 balls faced where Southee advanced his score from 6 to 57. I had a look for extremes of this type (most runs off 15 balls faced) and found it was rather dominated by New Zealanders playing at home…

 

Most Runs in the space of 15 balls faced in Tests

Runs

Score range

53

NJ Astle (222)

134 to 187

NZ v Eng (1), Christchurch 2001/02

51

CL Cairns (120)

59 to 110

NZ v Zim (2), Auckland 1995/96

51

TG Southee (77*)

6 to 57

NZ v Eng (3), Napier 2007/08

48

AC Gilchrist (102)

49 to 97

Aus v Eng (3), Perth (WACA) 2006/07

48

CH Gayle (80)

25 to 73

WI v NZ (2), Port-of-Spain, Trinidad 2014

47

IT Botham (118)

28 to 75

Eng v Aus (5), Manchester (Old Trafford) 1981

47

MJ Henry (72)

25 to 72

NZ v SL (1), Christchurch (Hagley) 2022/23

45

JH Sinclair (104)

55 to 100

SAf v Aus (3), Cape Town 1902/03

 

This list is from the ball-by-ball database, so it may not be complete, but I doubt if there would be many cases missed. It is a little surprising in the age of Bazball that all bar one of these instances are 10 or more years old.

 

Southee is now playing his 100th Test, but has never played another innings remotely like that debut.

UPDATE: I have found that Southee hit 48 runs in the space of 14 balls faced in the above innings, more runs than anyone else off 14 balls (or fewer). Astle and several others’ best was 47 (including Gilchrist in his famous Perth century). That means that the fastest sequence of 50 runs is 15 balls, as in the above table.

 

********

 

More on Chelmsford 1983

 

Recently (13 Feb) I wrote of the wildly wrong published Balls Faced figures for some early ODIs in the 70s and 80s. Perhaps the worst was the pivotal ODI between Australia and India at Chelmsford in the 1983 World Cup, where the total balls faced did not remotely resemble the total balls bowled. I thought that there could be little additional information to be found, but Lawrie Colliver has come up with a partial score for the Indian innings that he recorded off the radio broadcast. (Lawrie was a teenager at the time, but his score looks well-recorded.)

 

I have appended the figures from this score, which covers the first session only, to the figures found elsewhere. There are columns for 1) the ‘official’ BF originally published in Frindall 1997, 2) my own estimates based on the Over numbers of the dismissals, and 3) the exact figures from the newly found score.

 

Runs

"Official" BF

Corrected BF (Estimated)

Surviving Score BF

SM Gavaskar

9

10

20

21

K Srikkanth

24

22

40

34

M Amarnath

13

20

35

42

Yashpal Sharma

40

40

90

SM Patil

30

25

40

46

N Kapil Dev

28

32

29*

(29*)

K Azad

15

18

35

RMH Binny

21

32

27

S Madan Lal

12

15

21

SMH Kirmani

10

20

6

BS Sandhu

8

18

9

 

Sharma scored 21 off 45 balls before lunch in Colliver’s score.

* Kapil 29 balls is an exact number, from newspaper reports

 

The new figures suggest that my estimates, while not particularly accurate, were reasonably indicative of the real figures. While there is no precise figure for the whole innings of Yashpal Sharma, the pre-lunch record shows that the official figure must be way off. Sharma did not bat rapidly after lunch and was out after Kapil, contrary to the published record.

 

********

 

 

 

24 February 2024

 

On Historical Trends in Missed Chances in Tests

 

As a matter of interest, I have posted an article of mine recently published in The Statistician, on the subject of historical trends in dropped catches in Tests. The conclusion seems to be that catching standards have improved over generations, but probably not as much as many modern commentators frequently claim. There has been evolution not revolution.

 

https://www.sportstats.com.au/articles/droppedcatcharticleACS.pdf

 

I would like to think that this study breaks new ground.

 

********

 

Fewest Balls Bowled when an Opener Reached 100

Balls Bowled

118

DA Warner (180)

Aus v Ind (3), Perth (WACA) 2011/12

137

CH Gayle (116)

SAf v WI (3), Cape Town 2003/04

138

Majid Khan (112)

Pak v NZ (3), Karachi (National) 1976/77

142

CH Gayle (102)

Aus v WI (3), Perth (WACA) 2009/10

144

RC Fredericks (169)

Aus v WI (2), Perth (WACA) 1975/76

150

BB McCullum (202)

Pak v NZ (3), Sharjah 2014/15

153

V Sehwag (180)

WI v Ind (2), St Lucia (Beausejour) 2006

155

S Dhawan (107)

Ind v Afg (1), Bangalore 2018

155

BM Duckett (153)

Ind v Eng (3), Rajkot (Khandheri) 2023/24

158

DA Warner (184)

Aus v Pak (3), Sydney (SCG) 2016/17

160

S Dhawan (107)

Ind v Afg (1), Bangalore 2018

 

This lists the earliest in an innings that a batsman reached 100, not the balls faced by the batsman. Warner at Perth reached his century off the fourth ball of the 20th over. The list is dominated by modern Tests with ‘soft’ six-hitting. Data is missing for many early Tests, but there are no likely candidates among these. Joe Darling took about 32 overs to reach 100 at the SCG in 1897-98. Gavaskar took 35 overs at Delhi in 1983-84.

 

Wides and no balls are not included. Thanks to Shahzad for the data on Majid Khan.

 

I have added this list to the Unusual Records section.

 

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Thanks to reader Ben who alerted me to a problem with umpire names in my Test scorecards. Most Tests from mid-2006 to mid-2007 reported the wrong umpires, due to a compiling error. I believe that they have all been corrected now. Umpires’ names in the ball-by-ball files were correct.

 

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13 February 2024

 

More questions on old ODI stats

 

A contact (Michael) has pointed out the poor state of the scorecard of the important India v Australia ODI at Chelmsford on 20 June 1983 (ODI# 217 or 219). The 'official' balls faced could only be described as nonsense, to the extent that Cricket Archive has deleted this data from the scorecard and appended a note explaining why (total balls faced in either innings fall way short of the number of balls bowled). The data is still up on Cricinfo, however.

 

https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/prudential-world-cup-1983-60832/australia-vs-india-23rd-match-65086/full-scorecard

 

https://cricketarchive.com/Archive/Scorecards/43/43649.html

 

 

The match is especially important because if India had lost, there would have been no 1983 World Cup victory and subsequent Indian cricket history would have rather different!

 

I have uploaded a few notes on this match, and others, including my estimates of balls faced.

 

https://www.sportstats.com.au/articles/Unfortunately.pdf

 

(UPDATE: see 8 March)

 

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Jasprit Bumrah has now taken more than 150 Test wickets at an average of 20.28. He joins a select bunch who have recorded such a  combination.

 

Bowlers whose Test averages dropped below 20.30 mid-career (minimum 150 wickets)

Wkts

Bowl Av

Final Bowling average

Final Wkts

SF Barnes

189

16.43

16.43

189

RR Lindwall

154

19.88

23.03

228

AK Davidson

153

20.05

20.53

186

IT Botham

151

19.39

28.40

383

MD Marshall

286

20.29

20.95

376

Waqar Younis

180

18.78

23.56

373

SM Pollock

210

19.86

23.12

421

JJ Bumrah

152

20.28

21.21

140

 

 

The table shows bowlers who, at least one point of their career, had more than 150 wickets and a bowling average better than 20.30. None of these bowlers except Barnes finished their career with such an average. Waqar Younis held on to this average the longest: 11 matches and 45 wickets. Shaun Pollock averaged better than 20.3 at three points of his 150+ career. But perhaps the most impressive is Malcolm Marshall, who at one point had 286 wickets at 20.29.

 

 

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When one partnership outscored the entire opposition (in a completed Test)

 

Partners (wkt)

Partn.

Opponent

H Wood/R Abel (5)

105

47 & 43

Eng v SAf (2), Cape Town 1888/89

WA Brown/SG Barnes (2)

109

42 & 54

Aus v NZ (1), Wellington 1945/46

KF Barrington/JH Edrich (2)

369

193 & 166

Eng v NZ (3), Leeds (Headingley) 1965

Asif Iqbal/Mushtaq Mohammad (4)

350

156 & 185

Pak v NZ (2), Dunedin 1972/73

DR Martyn/AC Gilchrist (6)

317

159 & 133

Aus v SAf (1), Johannesburg (Wanderers) 2001/02

JA Rudolph/HH Dippenaar (3)

429

173 & 237

SAf v Ban (1), Chittagong (Aziz) 2002/03

KC Sangakkara/DPMD Jayawardene (3)

624

169 & 434

SL v SAf (1), Colombo2 (SSC) 2006

DPMD Jayawardene/KC Sangakkara (3)

311

131 & 176

SL v Ban (3), Kandy 2007

JH Kallis/HM Amla (3)

330

118 & 172

SAf v NZ (1), Johannesburg (Wanderers) 2007/08

GC Smith/ND McKenzie (1)

415

259 & 119

SAf v Ban (2), Chittagong 2007/08

SCJ Broad/IJL Trott (8)

332

74 & 147

Eng v Pak (4), Lord's 2010

M Vijay/CA Pujara (2)

370

237 & 131

Ind v Aus (2), Hyderabad (Uppal) 2012/13

SE Marsh/AC Voges (4)

449

223 & 148

Aus v WI (1), Hobart (Bellerive) 2015/16

M Labuschagne/TM Head (4)

297

214 & 77

Aus v WI (2), Adelaide Oval 2022/23

 

(Another qualification: everyone in the losing team batted.)

 

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There was quite the controversy at The Oval in the final Ashes Test in 2023 when a ball was changed after 36 overs, and the replacement ball had completely different bounce and swing properties to the old one. In fact, this ball was so helpful to bowlers that no new ball was taken after 80 overs. The innings lasted 94.4 overs without the fielding side requesting a new ball, the longest such innings in the last 200 Test matches (since Afghanistan took no new ball in 104.5 overs at Bangalore in 2018).

 

Nowadays almost all teams take a new ball within a couple of overs of it becoming available. There were only three cases of a second new ball taken later than 95 overs in 2023.

 

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The record-rich stats of the South Africa v India Test at Cape Town have been reported in detail at various websites. I was pleased to see, though, that Charles Bannerman’s 1877 records still hold, although given a good shake by Aiden Markram’s 106 out of 176 in South Africa’s second  innings. Next highest score was Dean Elgar’s 12. Markram's ratio of 8.83 (106/12) between top score and second-top score is second all-time to Bannerman's ratio of 9.17 (165/18).

 

I would add that the six wicket in eleven balls collapse by India was by far the fastest such collapse in Tests, as reported elsewhere. It was also reported that the previous record was six wickets in 27 balls, but this overlooked the six wickets in 23 balls way back in the original 1882 Ashes Test (England’s second innings).

 

 

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Shamar Joseph’s dismissal of Steve Smith with his first ball in Test cricket got me looking at the batsmen who have been dismissed in such circumstances. Nearly all such batsmen have made low scores – this because a bowler’s first ball will likely be early in an innings – with the highest being 26 by Marvan Atapattu when he was dismissed by Nilesh Kulkarni in 1997 (Sri Lanka went on to make 952 with Kulkarni finishing with 1 for 175.)

 

The batsman with the highest average on the list is Eddie Paynter on 59.2. He was dismissed by HD Smith’s first ball in 1933 in New Zealand. However, Paynter’s average was only 43 at the time. Steve Smith’s average of 58 at Adelaide is the highest ‘active’ average of batsmen falling in this way.

 

Note that Kumar Sangakkara is on the list; he was memorably dismissed by Nathan Lyon’s first ball. Sangakkara finished with an average of 57.5 and was averaging over 55 at the time. Steve Smith’s average is at some risk of dropping below Sangakkara’s 57.5 before long.

 

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22 January 2024

 

Warner bows out

 

David Warner it seems had two parallel careers in Tests, a brilliant career at home and a much inferior career elsewhere. His great home record, it seems, repeatedly came to the aid of Warner being selected for tour after tour where he underperformed. I don't know of any non-captain who was so coddled and protected by selectors for so long. His supporters in Australia are probably little aware of how bad his stats away from home have been.

 

In his last 12 Test tours from 2015, Warner scored exactly two centuries, and both of those were in Bangladesh more than six years ago. On those 12 tours he batted 74 times and averaged 28. After the Bangladesh centuries he averaged 22.7 with a highest score of 68 in 41 innings. In the 2019 Ashes he scored 95 runs in ten innings, but it was Usman Khawaja who was dropped. Warner’s 2019 stats are the worst ever by an opener in a five-Test series.

 

By contrast, Khawaja since his return in 2022 has scored four centuries and a couple of 90s on tour, and averaged 59, with nine scores higher than Warner's 68.

 

Here are the most extreme contrasts between home and away performance for batsmen with more than 5000 Test runs.

 

Test

HOME

AWAY

H/A

Matches

Runs

Av

Av

Av

Ratio

DA Warner

112

8786

44.6

57.9

32.5

1.78

DB Vengsarkar

116

6868

42.1

55.6

32.7

1.70

D Elgar

86

5347

37.9

47.0

27.9

1.69

DL Haynes

116

7487

42.3

56.1

33.5

1.67

DCS Compton

78

5807

50.1

60.0

36.9

1.63

Zaheer Abbas

78

5062

44.8

58.2

36.9

1.58

MJ Clarke

115

8643

49.1

62.1

39.5

1.57

BB McCullum

101

6453

38.6

47.9

31.1

1.54

M Azharuddin

99

6215

45.0

55.9

36.4

1.54

DPMD Jayawardene

149

11814

49.8

59.7

39.7

1.50

 

The bar of 5000 runs is quite high, but there are now more than 100 batsmen who qualify. Among other current batsmen, Rohit Sharma (3737 runs) has a ratio of 2.00, but he will have future opportunities to correct that imbalance.

 

 

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Where Chances are Missed; Comparing Formats

 

Here is some data comparing the distribution of dropped catches between formats. The raw data for this chart was supplied by a third party; I don’t record missed chances in ODIs or T20 myself.

 

The chart compares dropped chances by fielding position; not surprisingly, there are significant difference between Test and the shorter formats.

 

The percentages are relative to the total dropped catches in that format, so the bars in each colour will add up to 100 per cent.

 

Attacking fielding position like slips and short leg see a lot more misses in Test than limited overs, as one would expect. By contrast, the ‘permanent’ positions of bowler and keeper are quite similar across the formats.

 

It is curious to see far more chances going to third man and fine leg in T20 than in ODI; I suppose that ramp shots must be used much more in the former. The difference between misses at mid-on and midwicket in T20 is a bit of a mystery; it should be remembered that this data depends on the accuracy of ball-by-ball descriptions.

 

If I have calculated correctly, the percentage of chances dropped are similar in Tests and ODIs, about 23 per cent and 22 per cent respectively. The T20 data used in the above chart is rather patchy and I haven’t attempted to calculate an overall percentage for that format.

 

Shortly, I will be preparing a report of missed catches in Tests in 2023, from my own data.

 

 

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Sreeram reports that telecasts of three of the Tests of the India/Australia series in 1979-80 were prevented, fully or in part, by order of the Government. The rationale was that too many people watching the cricket would be bad for the economy. The Janata Party, “a bunch of bores”, were in power at the time.

 

 

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An unusual pseudo-double-hat-trick, in the Big Bash at Albury. Melbourne were six down with four balls to play, which went W, W, run out, W.

 

The run out means there was no official hat-trick, but the bowler Sams actually received a credit for the run out and so was responsible for all four wickets.

 

The #11 batsman, Haris Rauf, was, not surprisingly, caught unprepared, and went to the wicket for the last ball without pads on. Possibly fearful of being timed out! Thanks to the run out, he was at the non-strikers end.

 

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23 December 2023

 

ODI Score Curiosities

 

Online scores for ODIs (Cricinfo, Cricket Archive) contain a complete set of balls faced for all batsmen, going back to the beginning. I have often wondered how this was done, given that so many original scoresheets for early matches have been lost, and balls faced figures for many such matches were never published in any form (that I am aware of) when they were played. Some of the scoresheets that do survive do not list the balls faced anyway. How were the figures obtained?

 

Recently I was sent a set of ten ODI scoresheets from 1983 to 1986, that I had not previously seen, played in the subcontinent and West Indies. I endeavoured to re-score these into ball-by-ball form but there were problems. Some scores had missing pages and other pages were almost unreadable. Even so, I found scoring anomalies in the majority of the innings that I was able to study. Here is a quick review…

 

 

WI v Aus 19 Apr 1984, Match 3.

In the WI innings, only two bats had BF recorded in the scoresheet, Greenidge and Richardson. Their figures were reproduced exactly on re-scoring ball-by-ball. However, the online BF figures for the other batsmen (which were absent from the score) could not be reproduced even though the scores and the scoring stroke sequences for those batsmen were reproduced exactly. I got 121 balls faced for Haynes, quite different from the 142 balls online, and Logie faced 34 not 21 balls in his 52 minute innings. If they were not on the surviving score, where did those online figures come from?

 

 

WI v Aus 26 Apr 1984, Match 4.

Parts of this score were nearly unreadable. However, it is clear that online figures in the WI innings are problematic, because the total Balls Faced by the batsmen fall well short of the balls bowled (272 v 289). The problem appears to lie once again with Haynes’ innings. I get 119 balls faced as against 102 balls faced in online scores.

 

 

Ind v Aus, 9 Sep 1986, Match 2

Innings 1. Bowling figures in the scoresheet disagree with ‘official’ figures. Innings 2 bowling page not available.

 

 

Ind v Aus, 24 Sep 1986, Match 3

Innings 1. Balls faced figures are not given in the scoresheet, but the re-score produces significant BF differences with online figures, even though runs and scoring strokes are reproduced. Innings 2 not available.

 

 

Ind v Aus, 2 Oct 1986, Match 4

Innings 2: India total given as 241 and SP Davis runs conceded 26 – differing from online scores (242 and 28).

 

 

Ind v Aus, 7 Oct 1986, Match 6

Innings 1: bowling figures in score disagree with official figures. Innings 2 not available.

 

 

All this is from a set of just ten ODI scores received, four of which were incomplete. The ten also included two scores by Geoffrey Saulez (Sri Lanka v Australia in 1983). These two presented no problems at all when re-scoring. Saulez had a bit of a reputation for lack of neatness, but in general the quality of his scores is much superior to the scores from India and West Indies in this period.

 

 

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For many years, batsmen running the winnings run(s) have been limited to the minimum ruins required. If one is needed and two are run, only the first run counts. An exception applies to boundaries: all runs are counted unless the target is first reached by running.

 

However, in the past, there have been cases of batsmen running more than the runs needed to win the match, but it is rare:

·      In the second Test of 1876-77, two leg byes were run when only one was needed.

·      1878-79 Test, Bannerman hit a three when two runs were needed

·      Adelaide 1884-85, Shrewsbury hit two when one was needed. Strangely, the surviving score records the last over as " 2.. "

·      Lord's Test of 1890, a hit for two by JM Read when one was needed.

·      SCG 1928-29, JC White hit two when one was needed.

There are several other possible cases, but there is no scorebook and the information may not be certain. There are three in the 1800s, and three in Pakistan in the 1950s. There are no known cases anywhere since 1960.

 

There are a few Tests where I don't know what the winning hit was worth.

 

 

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Best first bowling by players who did not bowl on debut…

 

Ian Johnson did not bowl in his first two Tests but then took 6/42 and 2/92 at SCG in 1946-47.

 

Simon Katich took 0/25 and 6/56 in his second Test, having not bowled in his first.

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It appears that the attendance for the World Cup final of 92,413 at Ahmedabad fell just short of the 2015 (MCG) World Cup record of 93,015. (Another blow for Indian pride?)

 

 

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7 December 2023

 

Some curious new scores

 

A contact in Pakistan, Shahzad, has kindly provided copies of a few more Test scores along with a number of ODI scores that I did not have. One of the scores, Zimbabwe v Sri Lanka 1st Test in 1994-95, is interesting, albeit in a statistical sense only. It was left drawn after four days without completing the teams’ first innings, but it featured a mind-numbing partnership of 217 between Asanka Gurushinghe and Sanjeeva Ranatunga. On re-scoring, this stand amounted to 691 balls in 467 minutes. Among partnerships of 200 or more, the scoring rate is the fourth slowest all-time. In runs per hour, it is the second slowest, by a narrow margin, after a notorious stand by McGlew and Waite in 1957-58.

 

Slowest Double-Century Stands

Partn.

Deliv.

R/100b

R/hr

Batsmen (wkt)

231

894

25.8

27.4

DJ McGlew/JHB Waite (3)

SAf v Aus(3), Durban (Kingsmead) 1957/58

212

752

28.2

39.8

C Washbrook/RT Simpson (1)

Eng v WI(3), Nottingham (Trent Bridge) 1950

262

883

29.7

45.3

DR Jardine/WR Hammond (3)

Aus v Eng(4), Adelaide Oval 1928/29

217

691

32.3

27.9

S Ranatunga/AP Gurusinha (2)

Zim v SL(1), Harare 1994/95

214

649

33.0

30.0

M Azharuddin/RJ Shastri (5)

Ind v Eng(3), Kolkata 1984/85

 

The fastest 200 stand, as it happens, is the most recent (at the time of writing). Zac Crawley and Joe Root put on 206 off 186 deliveries at Old Trafford this year. At 115.7 runs/100 balls, it is faster than the 233 off 203 balls by Hayden and Gilchrist against Zimbabwe in 2003-04. Crawley and Root faced 183 deliveries for the first 200, but Hayden and Gilchrist reached 200 off 170. No balls and wides are included in the delivery counts.

 

 

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The other two scores that Shahzad sent had curious endings...

 

Karachi 1978-79: Pakistan target 164 against India. The next day multiple  published reports had them scoring 165-2. However it was realised that the winning shot had been for 2 runs, so only the first run counted. The corrected score of 164-2 is in Wisden and later reports.

 

Karachi 1985-86: Pakistan target was 98 v Sri Lanka. The surviving score has Pakistan reaching 98 on the first ball of the 17th over but then continue batting for three balls ending in a single. These three balls are circled and apparently crossed out.

 

Note that this is not an 'official' score, but was made by a scorer for Pakistan TV and other journalists.

 

But it is complicated. Mudassar scored 56* in the score but is given 57* in published scores and Wijesuriya concedes 8 runs in the score but 9 in published scorecards. Did someone delete the superfluous single from the team but not delete the run from batsman and bowler?

 

The published scorecard has been balanced by having one, not two, no balls. I think that the simplest resolution would involve this issue. If there really were two no balls but one was missed by the official scorers, then Mudassar’s score would be 56 and the last three balls would be deleted. If one of the no balls did not occur, but was mistakenly recorded in the surviving score, then the extra three balls would stand and Mudassar has 57. I would tend to favour the former, since it is easier to miss a no ball call than to insert a false one, and there are seven deliveries recorded in both the overs with the no balls.

 

I have attached a screenshot of this innings. If anyone can suggest a resolution let me know.

 

 

 

 

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Sreeram has found reports of ‘singular’ Man of the Match Awards being made in the 1974-75 India v West Indies series. A very good find. I am disappointed that I overlooked this, as it is mentioned in places in my collection of reports. I consulted my collection and came up with a full list from that series…

 

Bangalore CH Lloyd

Delhi (FSK) IVA Richards

Kolkata GR Viswanath

Chennai (Chepauk) GR Viswanath

Mumbai (Wankhede) CH Lloyd

 

The awards were decided by a panel of three judges. There is mention of Lloyd being "player of the series" after Mumbai but it is unclear whether this was the just the journalist's opinion or an actual award.

 

This predates the regular MoM awards made in the 1975-76 Australia v West Indies series, previously thought to be earliest.

 

I do have a note in my MoM file that there were awards in India of some kind from 1969-72. In 1966-67 there were separate awards for batsmen and bowlers; at Kolkata, Sobers won both, so technically he was a singular MoM. All the match awards that I have seen in England in the 1960s were separated (batsmen/bowler, teams), although John Edrich won a single Player of the Series in 1968.

 

 

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In the two-Test series between Sri Lanka and South Africa in 2006, famous for its 624-run partnership between Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene at the Colombo SSC, Jayawardene won the Player of the Match awards in both Tests. It seems very strange, then, that the Player of the Series went to Muttiah Muralitharan.

 

 

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27 November 2023

 

Disrupted Careers of the 1970s

 

In the 1970s, there were a couple of major disruptions to international cricket. The first was the exclusion of South Africa from Test cricket from 1970; the second was the World Series Cricket tournaments from 1977 to 1979, which took a large number of players out of Test cricket until late 1979.

 

This curtailed the careers of quite a number of important players. But as it happens, some substitute matches were played; there were two five-match series involving a ‘World XI’, in 1970 and 1971-72, and of course the Packer World Series matches. There were 16 five-day Packer ‘Supertests’ played, eleven in Australia and five in the West Indies.

 

I have gathered the scores of these matches, combined them with players’ Test records and produced the following combined averages…

 

 

Some Careers Incorporating ‘World XI’ and WSC Matches (batting)

Tests

Other Internationals

Combined Matches

Test av

Other Int. Av.

Combined Av

Test 100s

Combined 100s

GS Sobers

93

10

103

57.8

61.9

58.2

26

29

RG Pollock

23

8

31

61.0

35.3

54.3

7

9

IM Chappell

75

19

94

42.4

46.3

43.2

14

19

CH Lloyd

110

20

130

46.7

40.5

45.7

19

22

RC Fredericks

59

10

69

42.5

34.5

41.3

8

8

BA Richards

4

10

14

72.6

57.9

62.8

2

4

GS Chappell

87

17

104

53.9

63.4

55.6

24

31

AW Greig

58

12

70

40.4

20.4

37.2

8

8

CG Greenidge

108

13

121

44.7

35.9

43.7

19

20

IVA Richards

121

14

135

50.2

55.4

50.9

24

28

DW Hookes

23

12

35

34.4

36.7

35.2

1

2

BM Laird

21

13

34

35.3

25.2

31.3

0

3

 

There are some whose batting averages improved when these matches are incorporated, including Sobers, Ian Chappell and Viv Richards. The most striking is Greg Chappell, who made seven centuries in his 17 ‘other’ Internationals, lifting his average to 55.6 in 104 matches. Among players who have played more than 100 Tests, only Kumar Sangakkara and Steve Smith have higher averages. In terms of average, Chappell has a clear advantage over any of his contemporaries with the exception of Sobers.

 

Another point of interest is the performances of Barry Richards and Graeme Pollock. Pollock’s performances in the additional matches were somewhat moderate, and this takes his average from 61 in 23 Tests down to 54 in 31 matches. This is a case of ‘regression to the mean’, experienced by nearly every batsman who had an average over 60 after 20 Tests. Richards performed very well in the additional matches, keeping his average above 60, but his total of 14 matches is still too small for reasonable statistical interpretation.

 

I haven’t prepared a table of bowlers, but two cases are particularly interesting. Dennis Lillee took no fewer than 91 wickets in 18 additional matches, including a famed spell of 6 for 0 at the WACA. This takes him to 446 wickets at 24.2 at this level, which would vault him above Kapil Dev and Richard Hadlee in the wickets list. Lillee’s average of 5.07 wickets per match surpasses any other pace bowler with more than 200 Test wickets.

 

There is also the case of Mike Procter, who played in seven additional matches and took 41 wickets at 15. This is even better than his 29 wickets at 20 in his 9 Tests. The total comes to 70 wickets at 17.1 in 16 matches; this is still not enough for statistical rigour, but it certainly highlights what a loss to international cricket he was. Procter took 1417 wickets at 19.5 in first-class cricket.

 

 

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I might add a little table concerning regression to the mean. Among those who played 50 Tests of more, there are ten batsmen whose batting averages exceeded 60 after 20 Tests. Every one experienced a fall in average by the time they played 50 Tests…

 

20-Test average

50-Test average

DG Bradman

111.9

99.9

MEK Hussey

84.8

52.2

H Sutcliffe

68.8

61.7

JC Adams

68.7

45.2

KD Walters

67.5

50.9

Javed Miandad

67.3

57.6

FMM Worrell

64.7

50.0

IJL Trott

64.2

45.4

DCS Compton

64.2

50.9

WR Hammond

61.9

56.0

 

Although they lost a little of their early pace, Bradman and Sutcliffe held onto their very high averages quite well, while others lost a lot of ground.

 

Jack Hobbs had a 20-Test average of 57.1, the highest by anyone who increased his average in his next 30 Tests (to 61.3 after 50 Tests). Viv Richards also increased his average, from 55.6 after 20 Tests to 57.7 after 50.

 

 

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During the World Series (Packer) season in 1977-78, Dennis Amiss became the first batsman to don a helmet in a senior cricket match. I had thought that this had happened in the aftermath of a serious injury to David Hookes in a match against the West Indies XI on 16 Dec 1977. However, Amiss had already been using his helmet (a modified motorcycle helmet) in warm-up games, starting with a match against West Indies on 24 Nov 1977. On the first day of that 4-day match, Amiss scored 81.


After the injury to Hookes, the helmets became much more popular in WSC. Barry Richards, Tony Greig, and others including Hookes,  used them regularly later in the season.

 

The first use of a helmet in a Test match was by Graham Yallop  at Bridgetown on 17 Mar 1978. Yallop scored 47.

 

That first use by Amiss had been in a match at Football Park, Adelaide; apparently the match was not televised. There is a video online of Amiss, wearing an early helmet, facing Andy Roberts; perhaps that was in a later game.

 

 

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24 October 2023

 

A Brief History of the New Ball

 

More than a decade ago I wrote a review of new ball use in Tests. I am repeating it here, but with a few updates/corrections…

 

The very early Tests seem to have used a single ball for each innings regardless of length. New balls could be called for if the condition of the ball deteriorated severely: this happened after 207 overs in the Adelaide Sydney Test of 1891-92. During the epic Australian innings at The Oval in 1884 of 311 four-ball overs, the ball was replaced after 225 overs, reportedly “a very rare occurrence”. Brodribb in Next Man In (1952) records that in Australia the idea of taking a new ball when 200 runs had been scored was introduced in 1901. However, there is also evidence that a new ball at 200 runs was applied in 1894-95, including the first Test, but was not used in all Tests.

 

England followed in 1907. The 200-run trigger appears to have been kept in use until 1945.

 

It wasn’t entirely satisfactory. Sometimes, to avoid a new ball, teams reduced scoring before 200 runs were up. In 1946 the MCC introduced an over limit. Strangely, they settled on 55 overs, an extremely low number that favoured pace bowlers. In Australia, the 200-run limit remained in place in 1946/47, but was switched to 40 (eight-ball) overs in 1947/48. This was of no help to the touring Indian side facing Lindwall and Miller.

 

In 1949 some common sense returned and the trigger was lifted to 65 six-ball overs or 50 eight-ball overs for the next few years. By 1954/55 this had been abandoned in Australia and the 200-run trigger returned. All the recorded new balls of the 1954 and 1955 series in England were taken over 200 runs, but an over limit seems to have been reintroduced soon after; 75 in combination with 200 runs, whichever came first. By 1962 new balls in England were being taken at 200 runs or 85 overs.

 

There is also some uncertainty about this period in other countries. In the West Indies, 75 overs seems to have been used when the MCC toured in 1960, but 200 runs when India toured in 1962. The known record for use of an old ball is 185 overs at Bridgetown in 1962, but since India scored only 187 runs in that innings, the use of the old ball was not a matter of choice. Some other Tests may have used a combination of runs or overs, whichever came first. In the Australian tour of West Indies in 1965, some new balls came at 200 runs and others at 75 overs, but when England toured in 1968 no new balls were taken before 75 overs, even when the score was over 200.

 

In India, new balls up to 1965 were generally after 200 runs. There were some exceptions in India and Pakistan when matting wickets were used, with mention of new balls at 150 or 165 runs. The switch to 75 overs was probably in 1965.

 

In 1965, the runs scored standard in England and Australia fades away and the MCC established a standard in England of 85 overs, or 65 eight-ball overs in Australia (and other countries). This remained in use for many years in these countries, but again other countries had local variations. New Zealand and South Africa followed the MCC standard, but 75 overs seems to have been the norm in the West Indies and the subcontinent.

 

Finally in 1995, all countries lined up with the same standard, with the new ball available after 80 overs; this remains in place.

 

 

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Bowlers taking 2 wickets in an over most times (Tests).

 

M Muralitharan

44

A Kumble

35

GD McGrath

35

NM Lyon

32

SK Warne

32

Wasim Akram