More on Chinaman bowlers in Tests

This article: http://www.cricketcountry.com/news/chinaman-bowlers-kuldeep-yadav-lakshan-sandakan-tabraiz-shamsi-and-others-in-international-cricket-2-588700

gives a comprehensive history of all those who have bowled in the Chinaman style (left-hand wrist-spinner) at some point in their Test careers. I am going a little further in studying the performances of those who exclusively bowled in this style (even if they were not regular bowlers). A number of famous names including the alleged inventor Ellis Achong, Johnny Wardle, Gary Sobers and Bernard Julien bowled in various other styles.

So here are the “exclusively Chinaman” bowlers and their careers in brief. This is in chronological order:

Even the change bowlers have taken fivers and tenners.

The best innings bowling in this category is 7-75 by Lindsay Kline:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/62866.html

The best match bowling is 10-106 by Paul Adams:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/64028.html

There is also Michael Bevan’s tenner along with 85*, which makes him among the relatively few to score a fifty and take 10-wickets in a match:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63732.html

A few years before that Allan Border also scored 75 and took 11 wickets with his little-used left-arm spin against the West Indies:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63499.html

The full list of those who scored 50 and took 10 wickets in a match:

Sir Richard Hadlee is the only one to do this more than once, while “Sir” Ravindra Jadeja also makes an appearance.

It is interesting to see that these occasional bowlers achieved a ten-wicket haul which well-known bowlers such as Willis, Brett Lee, Kallis, Thomson and Sobers were not able to manage during their long careers:

Over 200 wickets with no 10-for:

Coming back to the Chinamen bowlers, here are the best innings and match bowling figures on debut:

The trio of PADLR Sandakan, LO Fleetwood Smith and Kuldeep Yadav have the best performances in innings as well as match bowling. Here is Sandakan’s debut:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/995451.html

We now look forward to competition between Sandakan and Yadav for being the best current Chinamen bowlers.

Footnote: Michael Bevan, who seems to have had some Indian ancestry, was soon dropped from the Test team as his batting was not good enough. He then became one of the mainstays of Australia’s ODI middle-order.

 

 

All-round fails in ODIs

Note: Data as on 25th March 2017:

Having covered batting, bowling and fielding fails in the three formats of cricket, we finally turn our attention to all-round fails in ODIs. (T20Is have already been covered.) For all-round performance we take the cases of (batting + bowling) as well as (batting + bowling + fielding).

No runs and no wickets in ODIs (2 or more matches):

There are, in fact, as many as 58 players who did not score a run or take a wicket in their ODI career. Here we have listed only the 13 who played 2 or more matches.

These include a few Test players such as T Bosch, RG Hart and KV Sharma.

No runs, no wickets and no dismissals in ODIs (complete list):

A few more Test players here, of whom the best known among current players may be PHT (Tharindu) Kaushal and Zafar Ansari. The most well-known may be the Australian pace bowler of the 60s Alan Connolly who played one ODI at the end of his career which included 29 Tests. We have already met Anwar Hussain Monir as one of the most unsuccessful Test bowlers. M Watkinson had scored 80+ in a Test against the West Indies.

Note something odd about the career of A Dananjaya? We will soon return to him.

No batting and bowling in ODIs (complete list):

Note the newcomer Zafar Ansari (3 Tests) and the forgotten Roger Tolchard (4 Tests against India in 1976-77; he was Alan Knott’s reserve but was considered a good enough batsman to displace a specialist batsman in Tests). Apart from our now familiar A Dananjaya, all of them did get to field (but not to bat or bowl).

No batting, bowling and fielding in ODIs (complete list):

We need to know more about him and his ODI career.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/srilanka/content/player/574178.html

He has a nice smile.

He has played 5 T20Is and even a side 50-over match against Bangladesh a few days ago, so he may yet play more ODIs.

This explains what happened in his one ODI so far:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/582191.html

In this rain-affected match, his team did bat and got to 123/8. He was the No 10 or 11 batsman and never got to bat. And he could not bowl or field as rain prevented New Zealand’s innings from starting. Let us hope he plays at least one more ODI so that he loses this record.

 

 

 

 

Kuldeep Yadav’s debut-innings figures

Kuldeep Yadav, classified as a slow left-arm Chinaman bowler, took 4-68 in his first Test innings. Let us see where this performance stands.

If you are not clear as to what type of bowling this is:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-arm_unorthodox_spin

More details of similar bowlers in Test history: http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/310734.html

There are a few others such as Roy Fredericks who rarely bowled-but he did take a few Test wickets including AD Gaekwad of India.

However, Statsguru’s database does not list Chinaman as a class of bowlers. We can only segregate left-arm spinners.

The following tables have data up to the evening of 25 March 2017.

Best innings bowling by Indian bowlers on debut:

Here Kuldeep Yadav is 15th on the list of those who took 4 or more wickets in an innings on debut. Hirwani’s twin 8-wicket hauls head the list. There does not seem to be any known Chinaman bowler here. In fact, there is only one other slow left-arm spinner here. Back to this later.

Now we look at

Best innings bowling by slow left-arm bowlers on debut:

Here Kuldeep Yadav is 22nd of the 29 who took at least 4 wickets in an innings.Note Abdur Rehman’s 4-105 in both innings which is the best case of the same bowling analysis in both innings on debut. And R Berry took 5wi and 4wi in the first of his two Tests; perhaps he was overshadowed by fellow debutants Ramadhin and Valentine.

LO Fleetwood-Smith and the current Sri Lankan player PADLR (Paddler?) Sandakan appear to be the only other bowlers classified as  Chinaman bowlers:

Finally we look at the best innings figures for Indian slow left-arm bowlers on debut:

And Dilip Doshi was an orthodox left-arm spinner. (He is also supposed to be the only Jain to have played Tests for India).

So it appears that Kuldeep Yadav’s innings bowling figures on debut may be among the best for those classified as Chinaman bowlers. Let us see how his match figures turn out.

 

 

All-round fails in T20Is

Note: Data as on 25th March 2017:

Having covered batting, bowling and fielding fails in the three formats of cricket, we finally turn our attention to all-round fails in T20Is. For all-round performance we take the cases of (batting + bowling) as well as (batting + bowling + fielding).

No runs or wickets in T20Is (2 or more matches):

Mostly lesser-known players here except for MS Sinclair, who was a prominent Test batsman who was at the end of his career when he turned to T20Is. Other Test players include current SL player Nuwan Pradeep and earlier player Ruchira Perera whose bowling action was generally under a cloud. The popular heavyweight Dwayne Leverock is also here.

As you can see, several of the players listed above took catches and stumpings. We now look at those who did not manage any fielding dismissals besides runs and wickets.

No runs or wickets or dismissals in T20Is (2 or more matches):

A shorter list, but still including a handful of Test players. At least they did get to field. Note that the Irish player GJ McCarter has the record to himself. Later we will see some who never got a chance to field in their T20I careers.

No batting or bowling in T20Is (complete list):

Several wicketkeepers here, including Ambrose, de Saram and Vilas who played several Tests for England, Sri Lanka and South Africa respectively. Note the special cases of Mol and Schoonheim, which are covered below:

No batting, bowling or fielding in T20Is (complete list):

These two players were scheduled to play in a T20I which was completely rained off. But the toss had taken place, and under ICC guidelines the match is included in player records. Not all statisticians will agree with this guideline, which has covered a few more matches (including one between India and Scotland at the first T20I world championship in 2007).

While Mol did play a few ODIs, Schoonheim did not represent his country on any other occasion.

The real Knights of cricket

We have grown accustomed to hearing jokes about Sir Ravindra Jadeja. Let us see who are the genuine Knights of cricket.

Firstly, the British sovereign proclaims someone a knight based on the recommendations of the government of the day. The gentleman concerned would be a citizen of the U.K. or one of the other countries which presently regard the British sovereign (presently Queen Elizabeth II) as their head of state. The countries of interest here are Australia, New Zealand and some (but not all) of the countries of the West Indies. Canada is also included, although it has not produced any famous cricketers yet. Those countries who do not regard the  Queen as the Head of State include many Commonwealth countries such as India and its neighbours, besides South Africa. This should make it clear:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_headed_by_Elizabeth_II

So here is a list of those who were knighted for their services to cricket, besides some cricketers who were knighted for other reasons:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cricketers_who_were_knighted

Another article on cricketing knights from the West Indies:

http://www.bbc.com/sport/cricket/26392726

Another general article which summarizes the topic:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/60096.html

 

Involved in all ten dismissals in an innings (updated in 2021)

If you are reading this, you would be aware that bowlers have taken all ten wickets in an innings on three occasions-Jim Laker in 1956, Anil Kumble in 1999 and Ajaz Patel in 2021.

You may have imagined that there must have been some other instances where someone took wickets and catches when added together totaled ten. This thought may have occurred to many in the Ind vs Eng Test at Chennai, when “Sir” Ravindra Jadeja took 7 wickets and 3 catches in the 3rd innings: http://www.espncricinfo.com/india-v-england-2016-17/engine/match/1034817.html

However, this was not so. Look at the scorecard of this innings carefully:

Jadeja took 7 wickets, missing out on Bairstow, Dawson and Rashid. He did catch Bairstow and Rashid but was NOT involved in the dismissal of Dawson. His third catch was the caught-and-bowled dismissal of Jennings. So he had a hand in 9 of the 10 dismissals.

To identify all these cases, we look at the instances of

10 wickets (no doubt)

9 wickets plus 1 or more catches

8 wickets plus 2 or more catches

7 wickets plus 3 or more catches (e.g. Sir Ravindra)

There are no instances of 6 wickets and 4 or more catches.

These cases are summarized below:

By the process used in Jadeja’s example we identify only FOUR (now FIVE)  such cases: Laker, Kumble, A. Patel, Hadlee and Tayfield where the bowler had a hand in all ten wickets. The match scorecards can be seen here:

Laker: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/62814.html

Kumble: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63829.html

Hadlee: http://www.espncricinfo.com/australia/engine/match/63415.html

Tayfield:http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/62823.html

The cases of Laker, Kumble and Patel need no explanation.

In Hadlee’s case, he caught Lawson off VR Brown’s bowling to add to his 9 wickets.

In Tayfield’s case, he caught Insole off Goddard’s bowling to add to his 9 wickets.  His second catch was of Cowdrey (caught and bowled).

And this list does include a genuine knight in Sir Richard Hadlee, unlike the unrecognized knight from Saurashtra.

Fielding fails in Tests

We have looked at those who failed to make a single fielding dismissal in their T20I and ODI careers. Today we conclude with Tests.

No fielding dismissals in Tests: 12 and more innings:

No fielding dismissals in Tests: 7 or more Tests:

The record for innings is shared by Fleetwood-Smith and the current Imran Khan with no dismissals in 18 innings, followed by Arshad Khan and Tony Lewis with 17. Imran had a few other statistical oddities tagged on, including not facing a ball for several Tests as well as seeing his side winning his first 5 Tests. Tony Lewis was appointed captain on his Test debut in 1972-73, the last such appointment by England.

For matches, Fleetwood-Smith again has the record of 10 Tests shared with Kuruvilla and Warnaweera. Also note the current player Steve O’Keefe creeping up the tables with 7 Tests and 12 innings without making a dismissal. Imran Khan is here too and near the top with 9 Tests.

However, until recently the record of most Tests and innings without a dismissal was held by Pakistan’s comeback kid Mohammad Amir who did not take a catch in his first 19 Tests and 37 innings. There was much celebration in his 20th Test and 38th innings when he caught Darren Bravo off Zulfiqar Babar at Sharjah in 2016-17. He also took 3-71 in that innings, though the West Indies went on to win their first Test against Pakistan on a neutral ground.

What about wicket-keepers who failed to make any dismissal? There are several who made their debut without a dismissal, but only one who had no dismissal in his career (which lasted for 1 Test):

Humayun Farhat at least did score 20+ in both innings. He is the brother of Imran Farhat.

Finally, is there anyone who never fielded in his Test career? Statsguru cannot find anyone:

You may be thinking of JCW MacBryan, who did not bat, bowl or take a catch in his one-Test career. But he did field for 66 overs. It would be interesting to know if he ever touched the ball. Anyway, he had a sufficiently distinguished first-class career including being one of the Wisden Five in 1925 besides an Olympic gold medal in hockey.

 

The first 100 Tests

With the conclusion of Bangladesh’s Test at the PSS ground at Colombo, all Test-playing countries have completed 100 Tests. It is interesting to see how the teams have fared during the first 100 Tests.

You might think that Australia did the best in its first 100 Tests? Wrong. And which team recorded the least wins in its first 100 Tests? Bangladesh? Wrong again.

There are various ways in which we can look at team performance. First we start with the raw data, in which the abandoned Tests with no play are not counted.

First we see this table with teams arranged in order of wins in their first 100 Tests:

England is a little ahead of Australia here. And Bangladesh won more Tests than New Zealand did. Zimbabwe is just ahead of India, which is in 8th place.

Then they can be arranged in order of Win/Loss Ratio:

England is still on top, while the West Indies is just ahead of Australia. Beyond Australia, there are wide gaps though it is interesting to see Zimbabwe ahead of New Zealand and Bangladesh. Older cricket literature (prior to the 1960s) is often quite dismissive of New Zealand’s Test teams. India is in 7th place here.

For Percentage Score, we consider a win earning one point and a draw earning half a point.

Hence Australia with 42 wins, 40 losses and 18 draws has a score (or percentage score for 100 Tests) of 42 + 0.5 * 18= 42 + 9 = 51.0

So here is the table in order of Percentage Score:

We consider Australia ahead of the West Indies as they had more wins (42 against 35).

After Australia and the West Indies there is a fairly wide spread, with Zimbabwe and Bangladesh at the bottom. India is in 6th place.

Looking back at the different tables we can see that South Africa, New Zealand and India did not win many Tests in their early years but were somewhat more successful in drawing matches when compared to Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. And Australian performances were not consistent until part of the 20th century had elapsed. On the whole, Pakistan and Sri Lanka picked up faster than India. In fact Pakistan has the most draws among the teams, followed by India.

 

 

 

A landmark win for Bangladesh

Bangladesh has now completed 100 Tests. They marked the 100th Test with their 9th Test victory. Here are the 9 Test victories in chronological order:

This can be summarized as:

Won 1-0 at home vs Zimbabwe in 2004-05

Won 2-0 away vs West Indies in 2009

Drew 1-1 away vs Zimbabwe in 2013

Won 3-0 at home vs Zimbabwe in 2014-15

Drew 1-1 at home vs England in 2016-17

Drew 1-1 away vs Sri Lanka in 2016-17

Today’s win was their first Test victory against Sri Lanka (and in Sri Lanka).

At this point we can review the performances of Bangladeshi players in these 9 Test victories.

Runs: 100 and above:

Tamim, Shakib and Mushfiqur played in 8 of the 9 wins. They only missed the one in 2004-05. Tamim scored 4 centuries and 2 fifties in these matches, as you can see in the table below.

Highest innings (90 and above):

Bowling (5 or more wickets):

Shakib far ahead of the others with Taijul as a surprise second, with newcomer Miraz rapidly moving up.

Best innings bowling (5wi and above):

The one-Test heroes Taijul and Enamul head the list. Otherwise there is mainly Shakib, but do not forget Mahmudullah’s fiver on debut as well as the emergence of MH Miraz.

Best match bowling (7 or more wickets):

Headed by Miraj and Shakib. Shakib scored a century in the same match.

Most fielding dismissals (5 and above):

Headed by Mushfiqur who kept in all but the 2005 match. Khaled Mashud was the keeper then. Mahmudullah and Mominul have the most catches as non-keepers.

Innings fielding dismissals (3 or more):

Mainly Mushfiqur, though Soumya Sarkar has the most (4) catches by a non-keeper.

Match fielding dismissals (4 or more):

As above, headed by Mushfiqur for keepers and Soumya for non-keepers.

All-round performance (minimum 250 runs and 5 wickets):

Shakib followed by Mahmudullah (who was dropped for the current match).

All-round performance in match (fifty and five-for):

Includes M. Rafique, the only all-rounder in the early Tests and two efforts by Shakib. This includes the century and ten wickets at Khulna, which puts him on the same level as Botham and Imran.

You can also see this piece written at the time of the victory over England a few months ago:

https://abn397.wordpress.com/2016/10/31/bangladeshs-greatest-test-win/

Quiz involving IR and cricket

This is a little-known place near Dhanbad:

Why is this place significant in the history of Indian cricket?

Hint: It is associated with a prominent Indian captain. (Although it is in Jharkhand, the answer is not MS Dhoni).

Answer: It is the venue of a ground which has hosted first-class cricket, in addition to List A and T20 matches:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/india/content/ground/58171.html

More details can be seen here:

As you can see, this stadium built by the Tata group has hosted recognized cricket matches from 1969 to 2009. Now take a look at this scorecard from 1983-84:

http://static.espncricinfo.com/db/ARCHIVE/1980S/1983-84/IND_LOCAL/DULEEP/SOUTH_CENTRAL_DULEEP_06-09JAN1984.html

A hitherto unknown batsman from Hyderabad scored a double century against Central Zone. Admittedly it was not a very good bowling line-up, but it was the first time that most cricket fans of that time had heard of Mohammad Azharuddin

Arunabha Sengupta was the first to get it right.

Fielding fails in ODIs

Data correct as on March 14, 2017

In the previous post on fielding fails in T20Is, we saw that the “leader” Amir Hamza had played in many more matches and innings than the second-placed Rangana Herath. We see the same trend here in the list of those who failed to make a fielding dismissal in their ODI career (10 or more innings):

We have here some fairly well-known Test players including New Zealand captain Bevan Congdon, Jermaine Lawson and Clayton Lambert (who added a few ODIs for the USA after he had finished with the West Indies). But the leader here is Ata-ur-Rehman who played 13 Tests for Pakistan in the mid-90s, supplementing the bowling of the two Ws. His career ended in disgrace after the match-fixing scandal earned him a life ban from cricket in 2000. The ban was lifted in 2006 although he could not do much afterwards. However, he does have this record of 30 ODIs and 30 innings fielded without a dismissal, which is considerably more than the second-placed HP Rinke of Zimbabwe, with a mere 18 ODIs and innings. Jermaine Lawson had a brief Test career but still holds the Test innings record of 6 wickets for 3 runs.

We now look at wicket-keepers who failed to make a dismissal:

This is a complete list of all such instances. Here there are a few Test players such as David Boon (who kept in one ODI without success), JA Maclean and XM Marshall. Like Boon, Xavier Marshall was not a regular keeper but failed in the one match where he kept.

There is the unfortunate FS Crockwell of Bermuda (who became a homicide victim in 2016) and JJ Dawood of Canada, who never got to field in the match where he was the designated keeper. He did field in one other ODI when he was not the keeper, but did not take a catch there either.

Finally, we look at those who never fielded in their ODI career:

A short list indeed. Akila Dananjaya did not get to bat in Sri Lanka’s innings which was ended by rain which also washed out the entire New Zealand innings. He did however play some T20Is in which he took one catch. If he had become better known, cricket writers would have had to become more familiar with his full name of MKPAD Perera:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/srilanka/content/player/574178.html

Fielding fails in T20Is

(Data correct as on 14 Mar 2017)

After looking at batting and bowling fails in all three formats, we turn our attention to those who failed to make any fielding dismissal in their careers.

Here we have these players arranged in order of innings fielded:

Amir Hamza of Afghanistan leads by a large margin over the better known Rangana Herath, currently the Sri Lankan Test captain and the only current Test player who made his debut in the 1990s.

Amir Hamza is an useful bowler but not much of a batsman either. But he is a regular for ODIs and T20Is at the moment.

A number of other somewhat well-known international players appear here, including some Test players.

You can see that the results would be virtually the same if you arrange them in order of matches played.

Now we look at wicket-keepers who have failed to dismiss anyone:

A number of Test and ODI players here, who have at least made some dismissals at those levels. The leader here is Regis Chakabva (9 Tests, 9 dismissals) followed by Carlton Baugh  (no less than 21 Tests, 43 catches and 5 stumpings). NV Ojha has played one Test and one ODI and has made dismissals in both.

Finally, we look at those who never fielded in their T20I career:

Nothing profound here. These two players from Netherlands were involved in a washed-out game against Ireland in 2008. As the toss was made, ICC rules state that this match counts in their career records. (Statisticians may disagree; as some disregard matches involving the ICC XI and their like, perhaps these matches should also be disregarded).

While Mol did play several ODIs, Schoonheim did not play for his country on any other occasion.