This is one of the obscure records which cannot be found through Statsguru. It is however listed in the statistics section of Cricinfo. This is how it stands on the evening of Feb 7, the 4th day of the Zim-WI Test at Bulawayo:
Now KC Brathwaite and T Chanderpaul have batted on all 4 days so far, and will resume batting on the 5th morning. So they will also be added to this list. This will be the first occasion when two batsmen have batted together on all 5 days of a test.
India is well represented here by Jaisimha, Shastri and Pujara.
Other notes: Gary Ballance scored a century on debut for Zimbabwe. He had earlier scored 4 centuries for England. He joins Kepler Wessels in scoring centuries for two countries.
Here is a summary of all Tests between these teams:
Note the exact symmetry: WI leads BD 7-2 with one draw both at home and away. In 2009 Bangladesh won because of the absence of many WI players. These were the first two Tests won by Bangladesh away from home. They also won 2-0 under normal circumstances in 2018.
Looking at individual performances, starting with
Batting:
Most runs (350 and more):
Brathwaite, Tamim and Shakib are bunched together at the top.
Chanderpaul has the most centuries (4), while Shakib has the most 50+ scores (10, but with no centuries). Bratwaite has 8 including 3 centuries.
Highest innings scores (120 and more):
Sarwan and Samuels are far ahead of the others. Mayers scored 210* on debut in a 4th-innings chase which his team won. The highest for Bangladesh is 136 by Mahmudullah.
Highest batting averages (Minimum 20 innings, all instances):
Led by Brathwaite, but Shakib is close behind.
Highest strike rates (Minimum 1000 balls faced, all instances):
Headed by Shakib by a large margin over second-placed Tamim. DM Bravo has the best for WI.
Now for Bowling:
Most wickets (12 and more):
Led by Shakib, Roach and Miraz.
Roach has the most 5-fors (4) while only Miraz and Holder have taken a 10-for.
Best innings bowling (includes 6wi and more):
Miraz is the only one on either side to take a 7-for. Lawson’s 6-3 is the best for WI, and the best 6-for in any Test.
Best match bowling (includes 8wm and more):
Headed by Miraz and Holder. Lawson appears at the bottom of this list.
Bowling averages (Minimum 2000 balls, all instances):
Shakib is the only one who has bowled enough.
Now for Fielding:
Most dismissals (8 and more):
Headed by Mushfiqur and Ramdin. The most by a fielder is 13 by DJG Sammy.
J Da Silva has the most dismissals (16) among current players.
Most innings dismissals (4 and more):
While several WI players have taken 5 in an innings, Khaled Mashud is the only one from BD to take 4. DM Bravo is the only fielder with 5 catches.
Most match dismissals (5 and more):
Led by three WI players with 7 in a match. The best for BD is 5 by Nurul Hasan twice. DM Bravo has the most by a fielder (6).
Best dismissal rate (Minimum 20 innings, all cases):
Headed by Mushfiqur, while Brathwaite has the best by a fielder. Apart from Mushfiqur, no keeper has fielded for 20 innings.
All-round performance:
Overall (see criteria in table):
Shakib is the only one to have batted and bowled enough.
Match (50+ and 5wi):
Only three instances, all by Shakib. His best performance was in 2009, where he narrowly missed a century and 5wi.
After looking at those who scored the highest lone century, we look at those who took only one five-for and see who did the best.
This includes all 7wi and better.
The highest here is by Lance Klusener, who was making his debut. He never scored a five-for in Tests again, but did do so in ODIs. Second is SJ Snooke who had a shorter career. But he did take a ten-for, unlike Klusener. Then there is JJ Krejza who took 12 wickets on debut (which his team lost) and played only one more Test
There are many who do better on debut than in their later matches. Here we have Klusener, Krejza, Kendall (in the very first Test), Zahid, de Lange, Ashley (only one innings in his career).
Among current players there is only KC Brathwaite who bowled occasionally until his “breakthrough”.
From India, there are Agarkar (6/41), Ramchand (6/49), Abid Ali (6/55 on debut) and Shinde (6/91).
Now we consider the best innings figures by those who took only one four-for.
The first few names also appear in the first list: Emmett, de Lange, Hornibrook, Ashley and Brathwaite.
Debutants include Ashley (only test and innings), Kirtley and Coldwell.
Current players include Brathwaite and ML Cummings (not Pat !).
From India there are Agarkar, Ramchand and Shinde.
Agarkar’s only score above 50 was a century, along with his only 4+wi was a 6-for.
16 instances here. Bacher and Lord Hawke had the best stretches of 4 wins out of 4. In the former case all 4 wins came in a single series against Australia. In the latter case they were part of 5 wins out of 5 in his Test career, although he was a specialist (?) batsman with a single-figure batting average.
Those with 2 wins out of 2 are mainly stand-ins (Rahane and Jacobs) in recent times. Similarly for those who won their only Tests as captain (eg Shastri, Harvey, WA Brown).
Rahane is the most recent player here.
Only losses(2 or more):
Headed by the Bangladeshi duo of Khaled Mashud (12) and Khaled Mahmud (9) in their team’s early years.
However, there is also KC Brathwaite (5) from WI in recent years along with Porterfield who has led Ireland in all 3 of its Tests. DK Gaekwad, now India’s oldest living player, has 4 losses. (In that series Pankaj Roy captained for 1 Test, which was also lost).
Some other well-known players found here are AJ Lamb, AR Morris, JE Emburey and RS Madugalle.
And FL Reifer, captaining the WI third XI against Bangladesh at home. When he talked of winning the series, local journalists asked “Are you smoking something # which sounds like your name?”
# Reefer, a term for marijuana or ganja
Only draws(complete list):
The list of 21 is headed by Srikkanth (all 4 in a single series against Pakistan in Pakistan). Majid and Saeed also drew all 3 Tests in a single series.
There is no one here since BA Murphy (1 Test in 2001). Well-known players not mentioned so far include DL Murray, G Kirsten, GA Headley, MA Butcher, RR Lindwall and TW Graveney. Practically all of the 1 or 2-Test captains were stand-ins.
Srikkanth and Adhikari are the only ones from India. This did not help Srikkanth much as he was promptly replaced by Azharuddin. And Adhikari stopped a sequence of 3 heavy losses with a draw where his team narrowly escaped defeat.
Here we look at captains with no wins, no losses and no draws.
No Wins:
These are captains in 4 or more Tests with no wins.
Headed by M Ashraful of Bangladesh with 13 (12 losses and 1 draw). The next (IT Botham) is more surprising. Another Bangladeshi Khaled Mashud also has 12.
In recent years there are AG Cremer (8) and KC Brathwaite (5).
From India there are MH Mankad (6), S Venkataraghavan (5) and others with 4.
No losses:
These are captains in 2 or more Tests with no losses.
WW Armstrong with 10 heads this list, with 8 wins and 2 draws.
Next are DB Close and FG Mann with 7.
In recent years there is only AM Rahane with 2; both of these wins were when he was standing in for Kohli.
From India we also have Srikkanth with 4 (all draws).
No draws:
These are captains in 3 or more Tests with no draws.
Headed by Waqar Younis (17, 10 wins and 7 losses). The next is Shakib with 14 (3 wins and 11 losses).
Others from recent times (other than Shakib) include R Herath, KC Brathwaite and RAS Lakmal with 5.
Brathwaite has 5 losses out of 5.
From India there is DK Gaekwad with 4 (all losses). He is presently India’s oldest living Test player.
In the excitement over the West Indies finally winning a Test against a “respected” opponent, an unique record was overlooked. KC Brathwaite became the only opener to remain unbeaten in both innings of a Test.
You would expect that this would have happened before, but it hasn’t.
The nearest equivalent I could think of was Desmond Haynes who opened and was last out in both innings in this test-though he had the mortifying experience of seeing his side lose the Test (and series) by one wicket: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63259.html
Other points of interest: Kraigg is one of the few who have scored over 200 runs in a Test in two unbeaten innings:
He is also one of 28 to have scored unbeaten 50-plus scores in each innings-which Chanderpaul was fond of doing. GC Grant and Azhar Mahmood achieved this on debut. Aravinda de Silva remains the only one to make two unbeaten centuries in a Test. Other surprising entries in this list include Wriddhiman Saha:
Probably Kraigg deserves a little calypso in his honour.
(Thanks to Abhishek Risbud for suggesting this potential record).
abn397 