Cumulative Test bowling records (World and India)

Here we look at how the record for the best innings bowling has progressed.

The very first Test in 1877 saw Australia’s TK Kendall taking 7-55 against England.

7-55, TK Kendall, A vs E, Melbourne, 15/03/1877

7-44, FR Spofforth, A vs E, Oval, 28/08/1882

7-28, W Bates, E vs A, Melbourne, 19/01/1883

8-35, GA Lohmann, E vs A, Sydney, 25/02/1887

8-11, J Briggs, E vs SA, Cape Town, 25/03/1889

9-28, GA Lohmann, E vs SA, Johannesburg, 02/03/1896

10-53, JC Laker, E vs A, Manchester, 26/07/1956

In the first 20 years the record changed hands frequently. Then GA Lohmann’s 9-28 became the record for over 60 years. JC Laker’s record has stood for over 66 years.

Next we look at the corresponding Indian records.

India’s first Test had M Nissar taking a 5-for at Lord’s.

5-93, M Nissar, vs E, Lord’s, 25/06/1932

5-90, M Nissar, vs E, Mumbai, 15/12/1933

7-86, L Amar Singh, vs E, Chennai, 10/02/1934

8-55, MH Mankad, vs E, Chennai, 06/02/1952

8-52, MH Mankad, vs P, Delhi, 10/10/1952

9-102, SP Gupte, vs WI, Kanpur, 12/12/1958

9-69, JM Patel, vs A, Kanpur, 19/12/1959

10-74, A Kumble, vs P, Delhi, 04/02/1999.

The current record by Kumble has stood for over 24 years. Before that, JM Patel’s record had stood for over 39 years.

Most and least draws in Test matches

also see

Most and least wins in Test matches

and

Most and least losses in Test matches

Now for the third phase where we look at players who saw the most and least draws in their Test careers, for those who played in at least 5 Tests. These are for all Tests up to 30 Sep 2022 (except the ICC XI v Aus Test of 2005). A total of 1888 players have played in 5 or more Tests apiece,

It is easy enough to see who have seen the most draws. That is given in the next table. Naturally, this depends on how many Tests the player got to play in.

Headed by Kapil Dev (76) and Tendulkar (72) who are among the most capped Indian players. The first 4 names are from India, until Javed Miandad (62) takes 5th place.

There are no contemporary players here, the most recent being S Chanderpaul (48) who retired from Tests in 2015.

As mentioned above, the most by an Indian player is 76 by Kapil Dev.

These are those who have seen draws in all of their Tests.

That is a rather short list:

2 players, Gadkari of India and Shafiq Ahmed of Pakistan were unfortunate to see draws in each of their 6 Tests. Next there are one New Zealander, one Zimbabwean and another Indian with draws in each of their 5 Tests. All of PH Punjabi’s Tests came in an India-Pakistan series in 1954-55. (Also he was not born in Punjab but from faraway Karachi).

The record of 18 no-draws in 18 Tests was held by the 19th-century English bowler GA Lohmann for a long time. He had 15 wins and 3 losses.

This is the table for the most Tests (10 or more) without seeing a draw. As many as 121 players with more than 5 Tests qualify here:

In case Markram encounters a drawn Test now, he loses his record which will go back to Lohmann with 18.

Note the presence of Alok Kapali (all losses in 17 Tests) and E Baptiste (all wins in 10).

A quick summary of this and other connected posts will appear shortly.

Review of Tests between England and South Africa-Sep 2022-Part 2

Hope you have read Part 1

Continuing with individual performances in

Bowling:

Most wickets (50 and above):

Anderson leads with 103, followed by SM Pollock with 91 and Broad with 89.

From the olden days, we have Barnes with 83 and Tayfield with 95.

Barnes has the most fivers (12) followed by Donald with 9.

Barnes also has the most tenners (6) followed by Blythe with 2. No one else has more than 1.

Best innings bowling (including all 8wi and above):

Best match bowling (including all 10wm and above):

The first few places are by SF Barnes and others from the earlier days. Rabada’s 13-144 is the best from recent times.

Best bowling average (Minimum 2000 balls, maximum 30.00):

Barnes and Blythe have the best bowling averages.

Verity and Goddard have the best economy rates.

Barnes and Rabada have the best strike rates.

Coming to Fielding:

Most dismissals (Minimum 25):

Boucher has the most dismissals and catches, although Evans has the most stumpings. B Mitchell and Kallis have the most catches by fielders.

Most innings dismissals (5 or more):

Stokes has the most catches (5) as a fielder.

Most match dismissals (7 or more):

Best dismissal rate (Minimum 20 innings, 0.65):

Boucher and Bairstow have the highest dismissal rates. Stokes has the highest dismissal rate among fielders.

All-round performance (overall):

See criteria in table:

Hammond and Kallis have the best differences here.

All-round performance (match):

Minimum 50 and 5wi:

Note the instances of century + 5wi (Sinclair and Faulkner): and 50/10wm (MM Ali, Jul 2017).

Australia-England series review-2

Hope you have seen the first part:

Australia-England series review-1

Continuing with individual performances in

Bowling:

Most wickets (90 or more):

Headed by Warne and Lillee. Current players are headed by Broad (131), Anderson (112) and Lyon (101).

Best innings bowling (including all 8wi or more):

Headed by Laker. SCJ Broad is in 4th place with 8-15 in 2015. No one else from recent times, unless you count McGrath’s 8-38 in 1997.

Best match bowling (including all 12wm or more):

Laker heads this table as well, with Massie’s freak debut in second place. From recent years the best is 12-246 by Warne in 2005.

Best bowling averages (Minimum 2000 balls, 25.00 or less):

Here we do have some current players such as PJ Cummins (20.75) and Hazlewood (24.45).

Lohmann has the best bowling average (13.01), Attewell the best economy rate (1.31) and Ferris the best strike rate (42.2)

Now we look at

Fielding:

Most dismissals (40 or more):

Headed by RW Marsh (148), though there are several current players such as Paine, SPD Smith and Bairstow. The specialist stumper Oldfield has 31 stumpings besides 59 catches. Among fielders, the highest is 61 by GS Chappell. Current players include SPD Smith (46).

Most dismissals in an innings (5 or more):

Several keepers have taken 6 in an innings. No fielder has more than 4. Oldfield has 4 stumpings.

In this series, Carey and Billings each took 5 catches on debut.

Most dismissals in a match (7 or more):

Several keepers have taken 9 in a match. Also note GS Chappell’s 7 as a fielder. He was the first Test player to achieve this, although several others have equaled this (and India’s Rahane has taken 8).

In this series AT Carey took 8 dismissals on debut. All 8 were catches, which is a record in all Tests. Others have taken 8 on debut but included one or more stumpings.

See https://abn397.wordpress.com/2021/12/11/alex-careys-records-in-the-brisbane-test/

Best dismissal rate (Minimum 20 innings, 0.75):

Headed by Gilchrist and Haddin, with Bairstow, Buttler and SPD Smith from current players. LC Braund has the best (0.973) among pure fielders.

All-round performances:

Career figures (see criteria in table):

KR Miller leads by a large margin. Stokes represents the current players.

Match performances (50 and 5wi):

A long list. The best would be those with 100/5wi (JM Gregory, Botham) and with 50/10wm (W Bates, Trumble and Woolley).

They never saw draws in Tests

As many as 118 Test players played in 5 or more matches and never saw a draw. These are the top few:

This list is headed by a current player Aiden Markram:

https://www.espncricinfo.com/player/aiden-markram-600498

Next is the 19th-century player GA Lohmann (18), England’s leading pace bowler of that time.

Then there is the near-current player KK Jennings (17) who has some chance of playing again, along with Alok Kapali with his record 17 losses. Baptiste with his 10 wins is further down.

From India there is a current player HH Pandya (11).

Other current players include SO Hetmyer (16), Hasan Ali (13), KM Jarvis (13) and TA Blundell (10).

Of course, Markram will lose his status once he plays in a drawn Test, which means that the record will go back to the venerable George Lohmann.

South Africa last had a draw in March 2017. This was followed by 34 Tests with results. Thus a number of junior Test players from there have 5 or more Tests without a draw. This applies to most of the current team.

Aiden Markram is back (Updated to Jan 15, 2022)

Refresh your memory here:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/southafrica/content/player/600498.html

As readers of this column know, Aiden Markram has the longest palindromic name among international cricketers, with the competition coming from Rangy Nanan and Arun Lal (besides Talat Ali and Naman Ojha).

https://abn397.wordpress.com/2017/09/30/palindromic-names-for-cricketers/

Apart from that, he had a good run at the start, with 97 on debut and centuries in his second and third Tests. (It helps if you are playing at home in South Africa against Bangladesh for two Tests followed by Zimbabwe).

Anyway, he was a sort of lucky charm for South Africa as they won in each of his first 5 Tests. India broke this spell when they won the 3rd Test of the 2017-18 series.

He had a bad tour of India in 2019, making a second-ball pair (or silver pair) in the second Test before being dropped for the third.

Anyway he holds another peculiar record in all Tests. He has played the most Tests (29) without ever seeing a draw, up to Jan 15, 2022. 18 of these matches were won by South Africa and 11 were lost.

The record was earlier held by England’s George Lohmann (18 Tests) of long ago, who saw 15 wins and 3 losses. Next is a recent player KK Jennings (Eng) with 17 (12 wins and 5 losses). Alok Kapali (BD) shares this tally of 17 (0 wins and 17 losses). Once Markram encounters a drawn Test, the record goes back to Lohmann.

I wonder if anyone has told Markram of this record. At least it sounds more impressive than being the 21st batsman to make a silver pair.

More about bowling averages

Ever wondered about the average of Test bowling averages?

If we take all Tests up to Oct 25, 2019 and disregarding the Test involving the ICC XI in 2005, and a cutoff of 2000 balls bowled:

There are 613 bowlers fitting this criteria. A full statement:

Bowling averages-final

The bowling averages range from GA Lohmann’s 10.75 to EAR de Silva’s 129.00, which is the only 3-figure bowling average.

The average or mean bowling average is 34.45, which corresponds to that of JE Taylor and KD Mackay.

Looking at other measures of central tendency:

First quartile: 28.24 (SP Jones, RJ Sidebottom, HC Griffith)

Median: 32.92 (BL Cairns, L Amarnath)

Third quartile: 38.59 (AMB Rowan).

We also have the Economy Rate, which ranges from 1.31 runs/over for W Attewell to 4.16 for Shahadat Hossain.

The average is 2.75 (DK Lillee, RM Hogg)

And the Strike Rate, which ranges from 34.10 balls/wicket by GA Lohmann to 291.00 by EAR de Silva. Remember that they have the best and worst bowling averages as well.

We may as well have a closer look at them:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/player/16337.html

http://www.espncricinfo.com/srilanka/content/player/48456.html

The average is 76.10 by Iqbal Qasim.

Next we will take up the difference between home and away bowling averages, as was done for batting averages in a recent post.