The jinx in India-Pakistan matches (updated in June 2019)

It is often said that India dominates Pakistan in ICC tournaments. Hence the “Mauka Mauka” ads which aired at the beginning of the 2015 and 2019 World Cups.

Let us see take a closer look at the history of these encounters. First, the World Cup:

Note the two matches at Manchester separated by 20 years. In 1999 the mini-war in Kargil was in progress.

India and Pakistan never met in the World Cups of 1975, 1979, 1983 and 1987. They were somehow always drawn in different groups so they could have met only in the semi-finals or finals.

It was not until 1992 that they met in the World Cup. In that tournament (as in 2019) all teams played each other in the round-robin knockout stage.

They met in the quarter-finals in 1996, Super Six in 1999, and a pool match in 2003. India won all these matches so the feeling of a jinx over Pakistan kept growing.

In 2007, both India and Pakistan were jinxed and failed to proceed beyond the pool stage, being displaced by Bangladesh and Ireland respectively.

In 2011, India won in the semi-final, repeated this in a pool match in 2015 and again in a round-robin match in 2019.

This makes it 7 out of 7.

If you want to see the scorecards, open this link and click on the blue square on the extreme right.

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=2;filter=advanced;opposition=7;orderby=start;team=6;template=results;trophy=12;type=team;view=results

Now we go to the T20 World Championship. We will come back to the Champions Trophy at the end.

The teams met twice in the inaugural championship in 2007. Though the match in the pool stage was a tie, India got the winner’s points as they won in the bowl-out which was then the method used to determine the winner of a tied match.

Then India won against Pakistan in the final. The teams did not meet in 2009 and 2010. India won the next three encounters in 2012, 2014 and 2016. All of these were in the group stages and not the semi-final or final. Thus India leads 5-0 (including the tie) in the World T20 Championship.

You can see the scorecards from this link:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=3;filter=advanced;opposition=7;orderby=start;team=6;template=results;trophy=89;type=team;view=results

For details of the bowl-out in the first match in 2007, see the commentary section rather than the scorecard.

But the story in the Champions Trophy is somewhat different:

India and Pakistan did not meet in 1998, 2000 or 2002 (when India shared the trophy with Sri Lanka). Pakistan won the first encounter in 2004 in the group stage. They did not meet in 2006. Pakistan won in 2009, also in the group stage. India finally won in 2013, in a group match on their way to the trophy.

In 2017, India won the group match but lost in the final.

So the jinx on Pakistan in ICC tournaments does not apply to Pakistan in the Champions Trophy, where they lead India 3-2.

See the scorecards here:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=2;filter=advanced;opposition=7;orderby=start;team=6;template=results;trophy=44;type=team;view=results

 

 

90s in T20I cricket

Having looked at 90s (mainly 99s) in Tests and ODIs, we turn to T20Is. Since there are very few 99s here, we look at 90s.

To begin with, here are the full list of 90s in T20I matches since their start in 2005:

There are only two 99s here: by AD Hales in 2012, and an unbeaten 99 by LJ Wright also in 2012. That was in the T20 World Championship.

CH Gayle is the only one to make two 90s in this format, in 2010 and 2015. On the first occasion he was captain, during the T20 world championship (not World Cup as it is often wrongly called).

90s on T20I debut:

Remember, that was the very first T20I match.

Now we look at

90s by captains in T20I:

Ponting’s 98* again, with Gayle and SPD Smith.

We take a closer look at unbeaten 90s:

The highest is 99* by LJ Wright, followed by 98* by RT Ponting, M Jayawardene and Ahmed Shehzad and 97* by HM Amla

Finally we look at unbeaten 90s in the second innings:

While Gibbs and Guptill made these scores in successful run chases, Root’s score was for a losing side.

The highest score by a captain in a successful run chase is 75* by CO Obuya for Kenya vs Netherlands in 2013. Among the Test nations, it is 73* by KS Williamson for New Zealand  vs Bangladesh earlier in 2017.

 

 

 

Overall T20WC records as on March 23

As we pause for breath after the last over against Bangladesh, here is a snapshot of major records in all T20WC matches from 2007 to March 23.

Most matches (25 and more):

Dilshan, Afridi and Dhoni look set to add a few more matches-though they probably will have retired by the next World Championship. Note that the previous record of 31 was shared by three Sri Lankans.

Most runs: (500 and more)

M. Jayawardene’s record is under threat from Gayle and Dilshan.

Of those who scored more than 500 runs, Kohli has by far the highest average (67.33). The next is Gayle with 45.35

The highest strike rate here is 153.31 by Afridi, followed by 148.33 by Pietersen.

Most wickets (20 and more):

Afridi (39) has taken over the record from Malinga. Next among current players is Shakib with 30.

The record of 6-8 by Ajantha Mendis has not come under threat this time as no one has taken more than 4 wickets in an innings.

From those listed above, Mendis has the best average of 15.02, Vettori the best economy at 5.83 and Mendis the best strike rate of 13.4

Fielding (12 or more dismissals):

De Villiers (31) has the most dismissals and is set to add to his record. Most of his catches were as a fielder. Dhoni (29) and Ramdin (26) have a chance of catching up.

Kamran Akmal has the most dismissals (30) among the “pure” keepers. Guptill and Warner with 15 lead among the pure non-keepers, although de Villiers has 22 catches as a fielder along with 7 catches as a keeper and 2 stumpings.

Finally,

Best all-round performance (Minimum 100 runs and 10 wickets):

Using this criterion, Kallis ranks the highest, followed by Shakib and Mathews from the current players.

As we can see, a few of these records may be broken before the end of the 2016 World Championship.

 

 

Summary statistics of T20 2016 World Championship

 

For 2016 alone:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=3;filter=advanced;orderby=matches;size=200;spanmin1=24+Feb+2016;spanval1=span;template=results;trophy=89;type=allround

For all matches in this World Championship since 2007:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=3;filter=advanced;orderby=matches;size=200;template=results;trophy=89;type=allround

Those who are familiar with Statsguru should be able to extract various parameters such as total runs, batting averages, strike rates etc. from the output of these links.

Summary of the 2016 Asia Cup

Though the Asia Cup is considered a small sideshow in the cricket calendar, it has been held sporadically since 1984. India won that first tournament in 1984 and now has a total of 6 titles, including 2016 which was held in the 20-over format for the first time. It is expected that it will be held in this format whenever it is held in the same year as the World T20 Championship.

For the full history see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Cup

The leading individual performances are given below:

Most Runs (80 and above)

Somewhat ironically the most runs were scored by a batsman from Hong Kong which played only in 3 matches in the first round. From the “main” teams Sabbir Rahman scored the most runs (176) and  was named the “Man of the Tournament”. Babar Hayat and LD Chandimal were the only ones to cross 50 twice.

Highest Individual Scores (50 and above)

RG Sharma made the highest score (83) among the main teams, followed by Sabbir Rahman with 80.

Bowling: 4 or more wickets overall

Among players from the main teams, the lesser-known Al-Amin Hossain took the most wickets (11) followed by Kulasekara, Mohammed Amir and Pandya with 7 apiece.

Best innings bowling: 3 or more wickets

Malinga’s 4-26 is the best performance for the main teams. Unfortuately for Sri Lanka that was the only match he played. The next best is 3-8 by Pandya. Al-Amin Hossain was consistent with three 3-wicket hauls.

Most dismissals (3 and above)

Not surprisingly, Dhoni topped this list along with SP Patil of the UAE. Nurul Hasan had the most stumpings (3). The most catches by non-keepers were 6 by Babar Hayat and Soumya Sarkar.

Overall all-round performance (at least 40 runs and 4 wickets):

Useful contributions by Mahmudullah and Shakib, besides the trio from the UAE.

All-round match performances (at least 20 runs and 2 wickets)

Rohan Mustafa had the best all-round match performance,while Mahmudullah had the best performance among the main teams.

It is interesting to see that India won the tournament without any spectacular performances (except RG Sharma’s 83). The whole performed better than the sum of the parts, which is supposed to be the hallmark of a good team.