Dhoni is the only one with 6 dismissals, followed by the forgotten S Viswanath and today’s Buttler. No fielder took 4 or more catches.
Dismissal rate (Minimum 20 innings, 0.600):
The current player Buttler is followed by Dhoni at a distance. Azharuddin has the highest rate as a fielder, followed by Dravid who was the keeper in some matches.
All-round performance:
Overall (Minimum 20 innings and 1000 balls bowled):
The current player Jadeja has left Kapil and Flintoff far behind,
Match performance (Minimum 40 and 4wi):
In this short list, Yuvraj’s performance would be followed by Pandya’s in this series.
India won this series 2-1, after winning the T20I series 3-0.
This summarises all ODIs played between these teams:
India lead England 57-44 in ODIs, although England lead 23-18 for ODIs played in England.
We now look at individual performances.
Batting:
Most runs (600 or more):
The most runs are 1546 by Dhoni and 1523 by Yuvraj, and the highest is 1163 by Bell.
Kohli (1340) has the most by current players.
The most centuries are 4 by Yuvraj, followed by 3 by Kohli and Root.
The most 50+ scores are 12 by Kohli, Raina and Tendulkar. The most for England is 9 by Pietersen.
Highest innings scores (115 and more):
The highest by a current player is 137* by RG Sharma, while the highest in this series is 125* by RR Pant. The highest for England is 158 by Strauss in the 2011 World Cup.
Batting averages (Minimum 20 innings and 30.00):
Led by Azharuddin by a large margin. Pietersen has the highest average for England, and Jadeja (!) the highest among current players.
Strike rates (Minimum 500 balls faced and 75.00):
The current pair of Bairstow and Stokes have the highest strike rates, followed by Sehwag and Yuvraj for India.
Now for
Bowling:
Most wickets (20 or more):
The highest are by Anderson and Jadeja. The latter has the highest for India and current players.
The most 5wis are 2 by Harbhajan, and the most 4wis are 2 by several players.
Best innings performances (including all 5wi):
The best performance here is Bumrah’s 6-19 which is the best for Ind vs Eng, surpassing Nehra’s 6-23 (in SA) and K Yadav’s 6-25 in England.
Similarly R Topley’s 6-24 is the best for Eng v Ind, surpassing RS Irani’s 5-26 in 2002
It is also the best for England in all ODIs, surpassing Collingwood’s 6-31 against BD in 2005.
Best bowling averages (Minimum 1000 balls bowled, all cases):
Srinath and current player Jadeja have the best averages. Flintoff has the best for England
The best economy rates are by Kapil and Harbhajan.
The series in 2021-22 resulted in a 2-1 win for South Africa, after India won the first Test. India has failed to win a Test series in SA, although they have won at least one series in all other countries. The best India has done there is an 1-1 draw in 2010-11. The 2021-22 series followed the pattern of 2006-07 where India won the first Test but lost the next two.
Here is an overall summary of Tests between these two countries:
SA leads India 17-15 overall. Both sides appear to have strong home advantages.
We now look at individual performances, starting with
Batting:
Most runs (500 or more):
Led by Tendulkar and Kallis.
These two have the most centuries (7)
Amla, Kallis and Tendulkar have the most 50+ scores (12).
From the above table, the best by current players is 1236 by Kohli, followed by Rahane, Pujara and Elgar with 800+. RG Sharma is further down.
Highest innings (125 or more):
The highest by current players are 254* by Kohli, followed by double centuries by MA Agarwal and RG Sharma. But no one crossed 125 in this series.
Highest batting averages (Minimum 20 innings, all instances):
Kallis has the highest average, followed by Kohli at some distance. Other current players here are Rahane, Elgar and Pujara.
Highest strike rates (Minimum 1000 balls faced, all instances):
Sehwag and Azharuddin lead here. Among current players there are RG Sharma (in 3rd place), Kohli and Rahane. Also note Dravid at the bottom of this list.
Bowling performances:
Most wickets (12 or more):
Led Kumble, followed by Steyn and Srinath at a distance. Ashwin (56) has the most by a current player, followed by Shami, Rabada and Jadeja. Also note M Jansen with 19 in his debut series.
The most 5-fors are 5 by Steyn and Ashwin. No one has taken more than one 10-for.
Best innings bowling (includes all 6wi and more):
The best performance was an 8-for by Klusener on his debut.
Current players here include SN Thakur, Ashwin and Ngidi.
Thakur’s 7-61 in this series is the best for India against SA, surpassing the earlier record of 7-66 by Ashwin (Nagpur, 2015) and 7-120 by Harbhajan (Cape Town, 2011) which was India’s best in SA.
Best match performances (includes all 8wm and more):
Led by Ashwin and Donald with 12-fors, and 10-fors by Steyn, Pollock and V Prasad.
Current players here include Ashwin, Jadeja and Ngidi.
Best bowling averages (Minimum 2000 balls bowled, all instances):
Headed by Donald and Jadeja (!) Current players here include Jadeja, Shami, Ashwin and Rabada.
We are generally aware of international cricketers who have been in Parliament. In recent years, there have been Kirti Azad, M Azharuddin, CPS Chauhan and now Gautam Gambhir. For non-international cricketers there are:
Ashwini Minna (FC player for Punjab), who was a potential Test player in the mid-70s and was tried out against various touring teams.
Ultimately he became a journalist, following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather who had fallen to assassin’s bullets:
He did play some role in the struggle against terrorism in Punjab. And later became a BJP MP from Karnal (Haryana) in 2014-19. He died earlier this year.
He became a TMC MLA in 2016 and is currently West Bengal’s Minister of state for youth services and sports: http://wbcmo.gov.in/ministers.aspx
(Look around the middle of the list of Ministers of State.)
The last example may be somewhat unexpected. See this clipping from a Hyderabad paper of around 1990:
Asad Owaisi took 6-79 against Bangalore U.
Look more closely at this clipping:
You can see that Venkatesh Prasad, opening bowler of the opposing team, did not do well in this match. Anyway he was to play for India later in the 90s.
Further details of Asad Owaisi’s cricket career are not readily available as he did not play in first-class and List A matches. Some details are mentioned here:
At the turn of the century, Indian batsmen held more than half the ODI partnership records. To be precise, the partnerships for the first five wickets plus the 9th wicket.
On 31 December, 1999, these were the partnership records for ODIs:
1st: SC Ganguly and SR Tendulkar, 252 vs SL, Colombo (Premadasa), 07/07/1998
2nd: SR Tendulkar and R Dravid, 331 vs NZ, Hyderabad (Deccan), 08/11/1999
3rd: R Dravid and SR Tendulkar, 237* v Ken, Bristol, 23/05/1999
4th: M Azharuddin and A Jadeja, 275* v Zim, Cuttack, 09/04/1998
5th: M Azharuddin and A Jadeja, 223 v SL, Colombo (Premadasa), 17/08/1997
The other record ODI partnerships on that date were:
6th: MO Odumbe and AV Vadher, 161, Ken v SL, Southampton, 30/05/1999
7th: TM Odoyo and AO Suji, Ken v Zim, 119, Nairobi (Aga), 16/10/1997
8th: PR Reiffel and SK Warne, 160, Aus v SA, Port Elizabeth, 04/04/1994
9th: Kapil Dev and SMH Kirmani, 126*, Ind v Zim, Tunbridge Wells, 18/06/1983
10th: IVA Richards and MA Holding, 106*, WI v Eng, Manchester, 31/05/1984
Note that the 4th and 10th wicket records mentioned above are still the world ODI records at the time of writing (29/10/2017).
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