Review of Pakistan-England Tests (Dec 2022)-Part 1

England inflicted a rare 3-0 victory in an away series when they defeated Pakistan in this series.

This was the only time Pakistan has lost a home series by 3-0 or more. Only Australia and India have avoided clean sweeps at home by 3-0 or more.

Looking at the overall records of Tests between England and Pakistan:

Total Tests 89, England lead 29-21 with 39 draws

In England: 56 Tests, England lead 24-12 with 20 draws

In Pakistan: 27 Tests, England lead 5-4 with 18 draws

Neutral venues: 6 Tests, England trail 0-5 with 1 draw

Looking at individual performances, starting with

Batting:

Most runs, minimum 800:

Led by Cook and Inzamam. Root and Azhar Ali are there from this series, which marked the latter’s retirement from Tests. The most centuries are 6 by M Yousuf, followed by Cook and Inzamam with 5. The most 50+ scores are 15 by Inzamam.

Highest innings, minimum 175:

Nothing in the past few years except Crawley’s 267 in 2020.

Highest batting averages (Minimum 20 innings and 40.00):

Headed by M Yousuf and Saleem Malik, with AJ Stewart having the best average for England. Root represents current players.

Best batting strike rates (Minimum 1000 balls faced, SR above 50):

Headed by Pietersen, Root and Inzamam. Root represents current players.

To be continued:

Centuries in the third innings of Tests

Hope you have seen the previous post: https://abn397.wordpress.com/2021/11/24/centuries-in-the-second-innings-of-tests/

We now look at the third innings:

The most centuries in the third innings is 13 by AN Cook. He reached this record in his last Test in 2018.

Next are Sangakkara (12), followed by Tendulkar, Kallis and Hayden with 10.

Current players : the highest is 7 by Warner, followed by Root and Azhar Ali with 5.

Indian players: the highest is 10 by Tendulkar, followed by Gavaskar (7) and M Amarnath (6).

Those who loved the third innings:

R Subba Row (Eng) made all 3 of his centuries in the 3rd innings.

ADR Campbell (Zim), GC White (SA) and JDB Robertson (Eng) each made their only 2 centuries in the 3rd innings.

Those who hated the third innings:

SC Ganguly (Ind) made 16 centuries, but none in the 3rd innings.

Next are M Vijay (Ind) (12), AG Prince (SA) and TW Graveney (Eng) with 11

Analyzing Test captaincies – 6

Finally we look at captains with the most wins, most losses and most draws.

Most wins (14 and more):

Here, and in the rest of the post, we will see that the toppers will generally be those who captained in the most Tests. GC Smith with 53 wins had captained in the most Tests (108). RT Ponting is next with 47 wins.

Among current players, V Kohli has the most wins (33). That is also the most by an Indian captain.

Most losses (12 and more):

Unsurprisingly, it is also headed by GC Smith with 28 losses. Next is SP Fleming with 27.

Among current captains, JO Holder has the most losses (19). For India, MAK Pataudi leads with 19.

Most draws (12 and more):

For a change, this is headed by another captain AR Border with 39 draws (including 1 tie). Next is SM Gavaskar with 30. He was well known for his defensive captaincy. Like Border, he had a weak Test team most of the time. GC Smith is third with 27.

Among recent captains, AN Cook leads with 13 draws.

Review of England-West Indies Tests-2020-I

England won the series 2-1, leading to this points table for the WTC:

England gained 80 points and WI 40 points in this series.

The record for Tests between these countries:

England extended its lead for matches at home, although WI still lead overall.

We now look at Batting records:

Most runs-1200 and above:

The most centuries (10) are by Sobers, followed Richards and Headley  with 8.

The most scores above 50 are 23 by Richards and Sobers, followed by Chanderpaul with 21.

Note the absence of any current players in this list. The most recent is Cook.

Highest innings (200 or more):

Here the only score by a current player is at the bottom (202* by Holder). Note the 1-2 by Lara, both world records at the time.

Highest batting averages (Minimum 20 innings, 40.00):

Hutton and Headley are far ahead of the others. Stokes and Cook are the only ones here from the past few years.

Highest strike rates (Minimum 1000 balls, 55.00):

While No 2 is predictable, No 1 is not. He had scored a century on debut against WI.

Blackwood and Stokes represent the current players.

Continued in https://abn397.wordpress.com/2020/07/31/review-of-england-west-indies-tests-2020-ii/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alastair Cook’s career-1

In the next few days, much will be written about Alastair Cook’s career and records. Here, we look back at his Test debut which was against India in 2006:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/14681/scorecard/239025/india-vs-england-1st-test-england-tour-of-india-2005-06

Other debutants included Monty Panesar and S. Sreesanth, who remained in the headlines one way or another for a period almost as long as Cook’s career.

Cook is one of a handful of players to have scored two fifties on Test debut. This is somewhat rarer than scoring a century on debut.

While some on this list are counted among the all-time greats, others did not have much of a career and are completely forgotten.

Test batting performances of 2017

Here we look at individual batting performances for the calendar year 2017.

Most runs (750 and above):

SPD Smith and five others crossed 1000. Smith had the most centuries (6) followed by Elgar and Kohli with 5.

Smith also had 9 scores of 50-plus, which was attained by several others. But it is his Ashes counterpart Root who has 10 such scores. KL Rahul (who scored less than 750 runs and does not appear above) had 9 scores of 50+ with a top score of 90. You can also see Dickwella who failed to convert any of his 6 fifties.

Also Elgar has the most 4s (43) and Warner and Mushfiqur the most 6s (7) in the above table. A closer look shows that de Grandhomme (15) actually had the most 6s though he scored only 293 runs.

Highest individual innings (150 and above):

The highest score was 244* by AN Cook practically at the end of the year, while he and Kohli also made 243. Cook’s 244* is the first Test score at that number (though Bradman was once dismissed on 244). This 244* is also the highest score by anyone carrying his bat through an innings, surpassing GM Turner’s 223* in 1972.

Kohli has three double centuries while Elgar joined the somewhat exclusive 199 club.

Highest batting averages (Minimum 20 innings, all instances):

Although Pujara and Kohli scored over 1000 runs they batted in less than 20 innings, so they do not appear here. So we have SPD Smith heading this table with Elgar a distant second.

Highest strike rates (Minimum 1000 balls faced, 50.00 and above):

Here we have Kohli closely followed by Dickwella, with Smith considerably behind.

Two centuries in a match:

Only one instance. They were Hope’s maiden centuries, and enabled the West Indies to win a Test in England for the first time since 2000.

Next we will take up bowling.

Alistair Cook’s record score.

As you can see from here, Alistair Cook’s 244* at Melbourne is not his highest Test score.

That is 294.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/player/11728.html

However, it set a number of records. He became the first Test player to make 244*, while Bradman is the only one to be dismissed on 244 (vs England, who else?) in 1934.

Cook’s 244* is also the highest score by anyone carrying his bat through a Test:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283149.html

The previous record was 223* by GM Turner vs WI in 1971-72; this series had all 5 Tests drawn and is the only such series not involving India.

The previous record for England was 202* by L Hutton vs WI in 1950-this was not enough to prevent an innings defeat against Ramadhin, Valentine and Goddard.

And the previous record in Australia was 169* by MA Taylor vs SA at Adelaide in 1998.

There was also a near-miss in 1974 when DL Amiss made 262* against WI in a total of 432/9.

 

More about the honors boards at Lord’s-2

We now look at the honors boards in England’s dressing room.

A total of 129 centuries were made for England:

The most centuries by an English batsman are 6 each by Gooch and Vaughan.

Centuries in both innings were made by Gooch (333 and 123 v Ind in 1990) and Vaughan (103 and 101* v WI in 2004). Gooch’s 333 is also the only Test triple century at Lord’s. This was also the first instance of a triple century and century in a first-class match. Some years later Sangakkara repeated this in a Test against Bangladesh.

The next highest score for England here is 240 by Hammond v Aus in 1938.

Those who scored a century on debut were Hampshire (107 v WI, 1969), Strauss (112 v NZ, 2004) and Prior (126* v WI, 2007).

Next we look at the 95 five-fors by England:

The most five-fors are 8 by Botham followed by 5 each by Anderson and Trueman. Anderson may yet add to this.

The best performance here is 8-34 by Botham vs Pakistan in 1978, and he also scored a century in that match. Eight-wicket hauls have been made on 4 occasions by Botham (twice), Verity and Underwood.

There are numerous cases of five-fors in both innings. The most recent instance was by Woakes vs Pak in 2016.

It seems to be easier for debutants to take a five-for than to score a century at Lord’s. Here are those who took a five-for on debut:

Cork has the best figures here. No one has taken five-fors in each innings on debut.

And finally, we look at the rather shorter list of the 17 who took 10wm for England:

Underwood is the only one to do so twice.

Verity’s 15-wicket haul is the best here.

Bedser is the only one to do so on debut.

And MM Ali is the only English player to score a fifty and take a ten-for in a Test at Lord’s. He finished the match with a hat-trick.

There are some who have scored both a century and a five-for at Lord’s (though not always in the same Test):

Botham (108 and 8-34 v Pak in 1978) is the only one to do so in the same Test.

Those who scored both a century and ten-for at Lord’s:

None of them scored a century and took 10 wickets in a match (in fact, this has happened only 3 times in all Tests, Botham being the first to do so.) Oddly enough, Allen and Broad scored their only Test centuries at Lord’s.

Finally, in the third part, we will look at the boards for visiting teams.