Afghanistan has now played 6 Tests, neatly divided into 3 losses and 3 wins.
Here we compare the performances in the first 5 Tests for all teams (except Ireland who have played only 3 Tests).
(1 point for a win, 0.5 for a draw)
We see that Australia and England have the best performance in their first 5 Tests, followed by Afghanistan, New Zealand and Pakistan.
Australia is the only team to win their first Test, and Zimbabwe the only one to draw their first Test. Zimbabwe in fact drew their first 2 Tests.
Bangladesh and South Africa lost their first 5 Tests in a row.
We now look at individual performances by Afghan players in the 6 Tests played so far.
Most runs (100 and more):
Note the consistency of Asghar Afghan and Rahmat Shah who each made four 50+ scores.
Highest scores (75 and above):
While H Shahidi has the only double century here, others have been more consistent.
Bowling (5 or more wickets overall):
Rashid Khan has more than twice the next (Amir Hamza)
Innings bowling (4 or more wickets):
Note the dominance of Rashid Khan here. He and Amir Hamza are the only ones to have taken 4wi. Hamza’s 5-74 against WI was on debut.
Match bowling (5 or more wickets):
The top three places are by Rashid Khan, and the next two by Amir Hamza. He took 6-79 on debut.
Most dismissals (4 or more):
While wicketkeeper A Zazai has 10 dismissals, I Zadran has the most (6) by a non-keeper.
All-round overall:
Rashid Khan is the only one who can be called an all-rounder.
All-round match (fifty and 5wi):
Here, too, the only standout performer is Rashid Khan. He was captaining his side, and scored a fifty and took over 10 wickets. The only other Test captains who did this are Imran Khan (v Ind 1982-83) and AR Border (v WI 1988-89).
abn397 