For sportstats home page,
and info in Test Cricket in Australia 1877-2002, click here
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Z-score’s 2023Archive The
longest-running cricket stats blog on the Web
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Charles Davis: Statistician of the Year (Association of Cricket Statisticians
and Historians)
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Who are the
Fastest-Scoring (and Most Tenacious) Batsmen in Test Cricket? Click Here. |
Longer articles by Charles Davis Click Here |
A list of “Unusual Dismissals”
in Test matches |
Unusual Records.
For Cricket Records you will not see anywhere else, Click Here |
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FOUND: a full score of the Madras Tied Test ! some remarkable first-class innings, re-scored. |
The
Davis Test Match Database Online. Detailed scores
for all Tests from 1877 to the 2000s have now been posted. Almost
three-quarters of Tests include ball-by-ball coverage; virtually all others
offer some degree of extended detail, beyond anything previously made
available online. The starting page is here. An information page outlining this database is here. Major Test Partnerships (200+) 1877 to 1970. Major Test Partnerships (200+) 1971 to 1999. |
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Sreeram reports that telecasts of three of the
Tests of the India/Australia series in 1979-80 were prevented, fully or in
part, by order of the Government. The rationale was that too many people
watching the cricket would be bad for the economy. The Janata Party, “a bunch
of bores”, were in power at the time. ******** An unusual pseudo-double-hat-trick, in the Big
Bash at Albury. Melbourne were six down with four balls to play, which went
W, W, run out, W. The run out means there was no official
hat-trick, but the bowler Sams actually received a credit for the run out and
so was responsible for all four wickets. The #11 batsman, Haris Rauf, was, not
surprisingly, caught unprepared, and went to the wicket for the last ball
without pads on. Possibly fearful of being timed out! Thanks to the run out,
he was at the non-strikers end. ******** |
23 December 2023 ODI Score Curiosities Online scores for ODIs (Cricinfo, Cricket Archive)
contain a complete set of balls faced for all batsmen, going back to the
beginning. I have often wondered how this was done, given that so many
original scoresheets for early matches have been lost, and balls faced
figures for many such matches were never published in any form (that I am
aware of) when they were played. Some of the scoresheets that do survive do
not list the balls faced anyway. How were the figures obtained? Recently I was sent a set of ten ODI scoresheets
from 1983 to 1986, that I had not previously seen, played in the subcontinent
and West Indies. I endeavoured to re-score these into ball-by-ball form but
there were problems. Some scores had missing pages and other pages were
almost unreadable. Even so, I found scoring anomalies in the majority of the
innings that I was able to study. Here is a quick review… WI v Aus 19 Apr 1984, Match 3. In the WI innings, only two bats had BF recorded in
the scoresheet, Greenidge and Richardson. Their figures were reproduced
exactly on re-scoring ball-by-ball. However, the online BF figures for the
other batsmen (which were absent from the score) could not be reproduced even
though the scores and the scoring stroke sequences for those batsmen were
reproduced exactly. I got 121 balls faced for Haynes, quite different from
the 142 balls online, and Logie faced 34 not 21 balls in his 52 minute
innings. If they were not on the surviving score, where did those online
figures come from? WI v Aus 26 Apr 1984, Match 4. Parts of this score were nearly unreadable. However,
it is clear that online figures in the WI innings are problematic, because
the total Balls Faced by the batsmen fall well short of the balls bowled (272
v 289). The problem appears to lie once again with Haynes’ innings. I get 119
balls faced as against 102 balls faced in online scores. Ind v Aus, 9 Sep 1986, Match 2 Innings 1. Bowling figures in the scoresheet
disagree with ‘official’ figures. Innings 2 bowling page not available. Ind v Aus, 24 Sep 1986, Match 3 Innings 1. Balls faced figures are not given in the
scoresheet, but the re-score produces significant BF differences with online
figures, even though runs and scoring strokes are reproduced. Innings 2 not
available. Ind v Aus, 2 Oct 1986, Match 4 Innings 2: India total given as 241 and SP Davis
runs conceded 26 – differing from online scores (242 and 28). Ind v Aus, 7 Oct 1986, Match 6 Innings 1: bowling figures in score disagree with
official figures. Innings 2 not available. All this is from a set of just ten ODI scores
received, four of which were incomplete. The ten also included two scores by
Geoffrey Saulez (Sri Lanka v Australia in 1983).
These two presented no problems at all when re-scoring. Saulez
had a bit of a reputation for lack of neatness, but in general the quality of
his scores is much superior to the scores from India and West Indies in this
period. ******** |
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For many years, batsmen running the winnings
run(s) have been limited to the minimum ruins required. If one is needed and
two are run, only the first run counts. An exception applies to boundaries:
all runs are counted unless the target is first reached by running. However, in the past, there have been cases of
batsmen running more than the runs needed to win the match, but it is rare: ·
In the second
Test of 1876-77, two leg byes were run when only one was needed. ·
1878-79 Test,
Bannerman hit a three when two runs were needed ·
Adelaide
1884-85, Shrewsbury hit two when one was needed. Strangely, the surviving
score records the last over as " 2.. " ·
Lord's Test
of 1890, a hit for two by JM Read when one was needed. ·
SCG 1928-29,
JC White hit two when one was needed. There are several other possible cases, but there
is no scorebook and the information may not be certain. There are three in
the 1800s, and three in Pakistan in the 1950s. There are no known cases
anywhere since 1960. There are a few Tests where I don't know what the
winning hit was worth. ******** Best first bowling by players who did not bowl on
debut… Ian Johnson did not bowl in his first two Tests
but then took 6/42 and 2/92 at SCG in 1946-47. Simon Katich took 0/25 and 6/56 in his second
Test, having not bowled in his first.
******** |
7 December 2023 Some curious new scores A contact in Pakistan, Shahzad, has kindly provided
copies of a few more Test scores along with a number of ODI scores that I did
not have. One of the scores, Zimbabwe v Sri Lanka 1st Test in
1994-95, is interesting, albeit in a statistical sense only. It was left
drawn after four days without completing the teams’ first innings, but it
featured a mind-numbing partnership of 217 between Asanka Gurushinghe
and Sanjeeva Ranatunga. On re-scoring, this stand amounted to 691 balls in
467 minutes. Among partnerships of 200 or more, the scoring rate is the
fourth slowest all-time. In runs per hour, it is the second slowest, by a
narrow margin, after a notorious stand by McGlew and Waite in 1957-58. Slowest Double-Century Stands
The fastest 200 stand, as it happens, is the most
recent (at the time of writing). Zac Crawley and Joe Root put on 206 off 186
deliveries at Old Trafford this year. At 115.7 runs/100 balls, it is faster
than the 233 off 203 balls by Hayden and Gilchrist against Zimbabwe in
2003-04. Crawley and Root faced 183 deliveries for the first 200, but Hayden
and Gilchrist reached 200 off 170. No balls and wides are included in the
delivery counts. ******** The other two scores that Shahzad sent had curious
endings... Karachi 1978-79: Pakistan target 164 against India. The next day
multiple published reports had them
scoring 165-2. However it was realised that the winning shot had been for 2
runs, so only the first run counted. The corrected score of 164-2 is in Wisden
and later reports. Karachi 1985-86: Pakistan target was 98 v Sri Lanka. The surviving
score has Pakistan reaching 98 on the first ball of the 17th over but then
continue batting for three balls ending in a single. These three balls are
circled and apparently crossed out. Note that this is not an 'official' score, but was
made by a scorer for Pakistan TV and other journalists. But it is complicated. Mudassar scored 56* in the
score but is given 57* in published scores and Wijesuriya concedes 8 runs in
the score but 9 in published scorecards. Did someone delete the superfluous
single from the team but not delete the run from batsman and bowler? The published scorecard has been balanced by having
one, not two, no balls. I think that the simplest resolution would involve
this issue. If there really were two no balls but one was missed by the
official scorers, then Mudassar’s score would be 56 and the last three balls
would be deleted. If one of the no balls did not occur, but was mistakenly
recorded in the surviving score, then the extra three balls would stand and
Mudassar has 57. I would tend to favour the former, since it is easier to
miss a no ball call than to insert a false one, and there are seven
deliveries recorded in both the overs with the no balls. I have attached a screenshot of this innings. If
anyone can suggest a resolution let me know.
******** Sreeram has found reports of ‘singular’ Man of the
Match Awards being made in the 1974-75 India v West Indies series. A very
good find. I am disappointed that I overlooked this, as it is mentioned in
places in my collection of reports. I consulted my collection and came up
with a full list from that series… Bangalore CH Lloyd Delhi (FSK) IVA Richards Kolkata GR Viswanath Chennai (Chepauk) GR
Viswanath Mumbai (Wankhede) CH Lloyd The awards were decided by a panel of three judges.
There is mention of Lloyd being "player of the series" after Mumbai
but it is unclear whether this was the just the journalist's opinion or an
actual award. This predates the regular MoM awards made in the
1975-76 Australia v West Indies series, previously thought to be earliest. I do have a note in my MoM file that there were
awards in India of some kind from 1969-72. In 1966-67 there were separate
awards for batsmen and bowlers; at Kolkata, Sobers won both, so technically
he was a singular MoM. All the match awards that I have seen in England in
the 1960s were separated (batsmen/bowler, teams), although John Edrich won a
single Player of the Series in 1968. ******** |
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In the two-Test series between Sri Lanka and
South Africa in 2006, famous for its 624-run partnership between Kumar
Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene at the Colombo SSC, Jayawardene won the
Player of the Match awards in both Tests. It seems very strange, then, that
the Player of the Series went to Muttiah Muralitharan. ******** |
27 November 2023 Disrupted Careers of the 1970s In the 1970s, there were a couple of major
disruptions to international cricket. The first was the exclusion of South
Africa from Test cricket from 1970; the second was the World Series Cricket
tournaments from 1977 to 1979, which took a large number of players out of
Test cricket until late 1979. This curtailed the careers of quite a number of
important players. But as it happens, some substitute matches were played;
there were two five-match series involving a ‘World XI’, in 1970 and 1971-72,
and of course the Packer World Series matches. There were 16 five-day Packer
‘Supertests’ played, eleven in Australia and five
in the West Indies. I have gathered the scores of these matches,
combined them with players’ Test records and produced the following combined
averages… Some Careers Incorporating ‘World XI’
and WSC Matches (batting)
There are some whose batting averages improved when
these matches are incorporated, including Sobers, Ian Chappell and Viv
Richards. The most striking is Greg Chappell, who made seven centuries in his
17 ‘other’ Internationals, lifting his average to 55.6 in 104 matches. Among
players who have played more than 100 Tests, only Kumar Sangakkara and Steve
Smith have higher averages. In terms of average, Chappell has a clear
advantage over any of his contemporaries with the exception of Sobers. Another point of interest is the performances of
Barry Richards and Graeme Pollock. Pollock’s performances in the additional
matches were somewhat moderate, and this takes his average from 61 in 23
Tests down to 54 in 31 matches. This is a case of ‘regression to the mean’,
experienced by nearly every batsman who had an average over 60 after 20
Tests. Richards performed very well in the additional matches, keeping his
average above 60, but his total of 14 matches is still too small for
reasonable statistical interpretation. I haven’t prepared a table of bowlers, but two cases
are particularly interesting. Dennis Lillee took no fewer than 91 wickets in
18 additional matches, including a famed spell of 6 for 0 at the WACA. This
takes him to 446 wickets at 24.2 at this level, which would vault him above
Kapil Dev and Richard Hadlee in the wickets list. Lillee’s average of 5.07
wickets per match surpasses any other pace bowler with more than 200 Test
wickets. There is also the case of Mike Procter, who played
in seven additional matches and took 41 wickets at 15. This is even better
than his 29 wickets at 20 in his 9 Tests. The total comes to 70 wickets at
17.1 in 16 matches; this is still not enough for statistical rigour, but it
certainly highlights what a loss to international cricket he was. Procter
took 1417 wickets at 19.5 in first-class cricket. ******** I might add a little table concerning regression to
the mean. Among those who played 50 Tests of more, there are ten batsmen
whose batting averages exceeded 60 after 20 Tests. Every one experienced a
fall in average by the time they played 50 Tests…
Although they lost a little of their early pace,
Bradman and Sutcliffe held onto their very high averages quite well, while
others lost a lot of ground. Jack Hobbs had a 20-Test average of 57.1, the
highest by anyone who increased his average in his next 30 Tests (to 61.3
after 50 Tests). Viv Richards also increased his average, from 55.6 after 20
Tests to 57.7 after 50. ******** |
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During the World Series (Packer) season in
1977-78, Dennis Amiss became the first batsman to don a helmet in a senior
cricket match. I had thought that this had happened in the aftermath of a
serious injury to David Hookes in a match against
the West Indies XI on 16 Dec 1977. However, Amiss had already been using his
helmet (a modified motorcycle helmet) in warm-up games, starting with a match
against West Indies on 24 Nov 1977. On the first day of that 4-day match,
Amiss scored 81.
The first use of a helmet in a Test match was by
Graham Yallop
at Bridgetown on 17 Mar 1978. Yallop scored
47. That first use by Amiss had been in a match at
Football Park, Adelaide; apparently the match was not televised. There is a
video online of Amiss, wearing an early helmet, facing Andy Roberts; perhaps
that was in a later game. ******** |
24 October 2023 A Brief History of the New Ball More than a decade ago I wrote a review of new ball
use in Tests. I am repeating it here, but with a few updates/corrections… The very early Tests seem to have used a single ball
for each innings regardless of length. New balls could be called for if the
condition of the ball deteriorated severely: this happened after 207 overs in
the England followed in 1907. The 200-run trigger
appears to have been kept in use until 1945. It wasn’t entirely satisfactory. Sometimes, to avoid
a new ball, teams reduced scoring before 200 runs were up. In 1946 the MCC
introduced an over limit. Strangely, they settled on 55 overs, an extremely
low number that favoured pace bowlers. In Australia, the 200-run limit
remained in place in 1946/47, but was switched to 40 (eight-ball) overs in
1947/48. This was of no help to the touring Indian side facing Lindwall and
Miller. In 1949 some common sense returned and the trigger
was lifted to 65 six-ball overs or 50 eight-ball overs for the next few
years. By 1954/55 this had been abandoned in Australia and the 200-run
trigger returned. All the recorded new balls of the 1954 and 1955 series in
England were taken over 200 runs, but an over limit seems to have been
reintroduced soon after; 75 in combination with 200 runs, whichever came
first. By 1962 new balls in England were being taken at 200 runs or 85 overs.
There is also some uncertainty about this period in
other countries. In the West Indies, 75 overs seems to have been used when
the MCC toured in 1960, but 200 runs when India toured in 1962. The known
record for use of an old ball is 185 overs at Bridgetown in 1962, but since
India scored only 187 runs in that innings, the use of the old ball was not a
matter of choice. Some other Tests may have used a combination of runs or
overs, whichever came first. In the Australian tour of West Indies in 1965,
some new balls came at 200 runs and others at 75 overs, but when England
toured in 1968 no new balls were taken before 75 overs, even when the score
was over 200. In India, new balls up to 1965 were generally after
200 runs. There were some exceptions in India and Pakistan when matting
wickets were used, with mention of new balls at 150 or 165 runs. The switch
to 75 overs was probably in 1965. In 1965, the runs scored standard in England and
Australia fades away and the MCC established a standard in England of 85
overs, or 65 eight-ball overs in Australia (and other countries). This
remained in use for many years in these countries, but again other countries
had local variations. New Zealand and South Africa followed the MCC standard,
but 75 overs seems to have been the norm in the West Indies and the
subcontinent. Finally in 1995, all countries lined up with the
same standard, with the new ball available after 80 overs; this remains in
place. ******** Bowlers taking 2 wickets in an over most
times (Tests).
There is some uncertain data before 1999, but I
think I have covered just about all cases for bowlers like Wasim Akram. The
prominence of spin bowlers reflects the fact that spinners are more likely to
harvest tailend wickets than pace bowlers. ******** |
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Best
bowling average of career coming in their last Test… Perhaps surprising, but there are more than 150
such bowlers who have played multiple Tests, including RGCE Wijesuriya, who
finished with a bowling average of 294.0 (he took his only wicket in his last
Test). Among those who played 20 or more Tests and took
10 or more wickets there is only FS Jackson (24 wickets @ 33.3) RF Surti (42 wickets @ 46.7) EJ Barlow (40 wickets @34.1) Bhuvneshwar Kumar (63 wickets at 26.1) Not including players whose careers are
continuing. ******* |
Finally, a Complete Picture of the
Madras Tied Test Gulu Ezekiel in India has now sent to me
high-quality scans of a complete score of the Tied Test in Madras/Chennai in
1986: a score previously missing, as I have mentioned often enough over the
years. Gulu obtained the scans through S. Giridhar and V.J. Raghunath, the authors
of From Mumbai to Durban (2016). The original score resides in the
office of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association. I have completed the re-scoring of the score into
ball-by-ball form. (Previously this was available only for the final innings,
and much of that was based on an inferior copy.) The re-score mostly went
well – but only mostly. A summary of the findings follow. Note, this is an
analysis of the score, not a match review. [The short version – the re-score
agrees with the final result, but not with absolute certainty.] The score format is one innings per page, containing
conventional recording of batting strokes, bowling analyses and Falls of
Wicket. There is also a table giving the score at the end of each over (this
is very useful but, frustratingly, sometimes inaccurate). In the bowling
section, ends of bowling spells are marked (again, not 100% accurately) and
byes and leg byes are not marked, so their location has to be inferred. Overs
are not numbered, so when a bowling spell ends, identifying the next bowler
often requires trial and error, guided by the over-by-over score and upcoming
strokes in the batting section. The handwriting changes between the pages; there
appear to be two different hands. The scorers are named as G. Ganesh and
Chittibabu. The latter is named only for the teams’ second innings. K.S. Mani
is also believed to have scored the Test, but his name is absent; perhaps he
was making another score. The pages list the batsmen’s Balls Faced (mostly but
not always accurately, and they vary from the Australian published data). BF
data cannot be easily gleaned from a conventional score. A linear score is
needed; this suggests that the score may be based on additional material of
this type. The implication is that the score may be a re-copy from a linear
original, or maybe the scorer was writing both types of score, or maybe one
scorer was using a linear method while the other made a traditional score. The score also allows full identification of session
scores (lunch and tea). Some of this data was previously unknown; the
reporting style at the time, even when quite detailed, tended to dispense
with such niceties. Some comments on the re-scoring each innings… Innings 1, Australia 574-7 decl. A long innings that eventually yielded a sensible
re-score. The only final sticking point was just before tea on the first day,
when Boon and Jones were batting. A single by Boon off Yadav does not fit
unless moved slightly, and is preceded and followed by leg byes. This
preserves the batsmen’s scoring strokes; either that, or the single was
credited to the wrong batsman, and Boon actually scored 121 and Jones 211.
Some small areas of the page were obscured or indistinct. UPDATE: Sreeram has suggested a better resolution of
this problem that avoids moving strokes around. It does presume errors for a
few overs in the over-by-over score section of the scoresheet, but it also
produces balls faced figures in the re-score that are more consistent with
the scoresheet. Innings 2, India 397. The score of 397 was preserved, but there were
problems. After tea on the third day, two overs by Bright, his 13th
and 14th, are marked as ending a spell. As written, these overs do
not fit with the batsmen’s scoring strokes and throw the innings ‘out of
kilter’. Eventually, I found that if the next over by Bright, his 15th
and ostensibly from his next spell, was inserted before his 13th over, then the innings clicked back
together neatly (it felt like suddenly solving a Rubik’s Cube). Here is a
screenshot of the overs in question. Bright is the fourth bowler.
To make the re-score work, Bright’s Over 15, it
appears, should be placed before Over 13. Curiously, Over 15 is written using
a different pen to all of Bright’s other overs. A second problem is seen in Kapil Dev’s innings of
119. While the score does indeed say 119, Kapil’s scoring strokes actually
add up to 121 !
The re-score of the bowling also produces 119 runs
for Kapil; there are two extra singles in the batting scoring strokes that
cannot be found in the bowling, including the last single. In the above
screen shot, Kapil’s intermediate scores of
50, 67 and 93 are correct; the problem occurs toward the end of the
innings, which should read 2111221 not 211112211. There are no missing singles from the other batsmen.
Re-scoring preserves both Kapil’s 119 and the total of 397, which is
important in such a supremely close Test match. However, the existence of
errors like this is unsettling. Innings 3, Australia 170/4 decl. This innings is written less neatly than the
others. While the given score can be reproduced, a few overs suffer from
readability problems and require a certain amount of ‘interpretation’ to
preserve this. In the score, Greg Matthews is given 49 balls faced. This is
impossible: the actual number from the re-score is 25. Once again, an
unsettling error. (The Australian report gives Matthews 25 BF.) Innings 4, India 347. With the improved-quality scan now available, a
couple of minor problems with the earlier re-score can be resolved. These
occurred in the first few overs, and the innings now hangs together pretty
well. The final session is based on Lawrie Colliver’s analysis of the
surviving video. A couple of minor observations with this innings: The scoresheet gives the fall of the 2nd
wicket as 159, not 158. The re-score agrees with the ‘official’ 158. The
scoresheet has balls faced figures that differ from the Australian version
(this is true of all four innings). Contrary to what I wrote last year, Greg
Matthews did not bowl his 39.5 overs unchanged. His marathon spell was
interrupted by one over, the last before lunch, bowled by Steve Waugh.
Strangely, the score gives a total innings time of 342 minutes, but this is
not possible. A time of 409 minutes, in published reports, is much closer to
the mark. Finally, a comparison of balls faced figures from
the final innings: the Australian source, the score and the re-score. Only
the re-score adds up correctly to the number of balls bowled (523). Madras Tied Test: Final innings balls
faced, by source
A link to the revised series
page in the Database is here. ******** |
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A bowler called Shehan Mudushanka
(DSM Kumara) of Sri Lanka took a hat-trick with his last three balls in his
only ODI, at Mirpur on 27 Jan 2018. ******** The term ‘Chinaman’, referring to an unusual
left-arm googly, is said to refer to Ellis Achong, who played for West Indies
in the 1930s, the first Test cricketer of known Chinese descent. However, the term predates Achong, and was
used in England and Australia in the 1920s, including by Cardus in 1926.
Historian Roland Bowen wrote the following: "This ball, by the way, was not named after
the West Indian Chinese bowler, E. Achong, who used it; the term arose much
more crudely in the more arrogant days of the past when it was the custom to
make snide remarks about foreigners and Asiatics
and orientals. 'Chinamen' as they were called, were
thought to be 'wrong 'uns' and this delivery is the
left-hander's 'wrong 'un' in cricket parlance, and hence the term.". I have seen the term mentioned in relation to Roy
Kilner, a left-arm orthodox spinner for Yorkshire in the 1920s. He sometimes
bowled wrist-spin. ******** A note in Bill Frindall’s score of the Lord’s
Test of 1995: “Female streaker – vaulted both sets of stumps – 2 bouncers”.
(West Indies 2nd innings, 99th over: the wicket of PJ
Martin fell next ball) |
9 September 2023 The Luck of Labuschagne One thing said about the career of Marnus
Labuschagne has related to good fortune: he seems to benefit from dropped
catches more than most. I have taken a closer look at this, and come up with
some odd results. I have updated my dropped Test catch data to include
the recent Ashes (this data now goes back more than 20 years). So how does
Marnus look? We I can confirm that for much of his career his rate of catches
and stumpings missed off his batting has been well above average. Said
average is typically 25-30 per cent chances missed: Marnus is around 33 per
cent. It was more extreme early in his career. Here is a list of
Labuschagne’s miss rate by calendar year…
At the end of 2022 the Marnus miss rate stood at an
extreme 38 per cent, higher than the whole-career leader Virender Sehwag on
37. In 2023, however, there was a sign of regression to the mean. Marnus has
been missed only twice in 16 innings so far this year, and gained a mere two
runs from the chances. At Delhi he was dropped on 33 but out soon after on
35. At Headingly, he was also dropped on 33 but did not make another run. Based on the numbers of runs gained, Marnus’ average
would drop from 53.4 to 39.8 if he had never benefited from a missed chance.
Of course, this is not realistic: everyone gets dropped from time to time.
But if Marnus was dropped 25 per cent of the time (something that happens to
quite a few batsmen) instead of 33 per cent, his batting average would drop
to about 50, from 53.4. Marnus has been having an indifferent year by his
standards, 718 runs @ 38. The absence of runs gifted through dropped catches
may well have contributed to that. The ‘odd’ data mentioned earlier cropped up when I
compared Labuschagne’s career to Steve Smith and David Warner. Turns out that
the other two are dissimilar in terms of missed chances. Smith remains even
higher than Labuschagne at 34-35 per cent, while Warner is down at 23 per
cent. Why is Smith dropped far more often than Warner? In fact, why is Smith
dropped so often? Well… I don’t rightly know. A large part of the difference appears to be dropped
catches by wicketkeepers. Three Australian batsmen - dismissals by
keepers
As I said, I don’t rightly know the explanation for
this. Part of it might be random variation, part of it might be more batting
to spinners by Smith and Labuschagne; the rate of keepers dropping catches
standing up to the stumps is greater than when standing back. Perhaps Smith
is better at playing with ‘soft hands’, which can make edged chances lower
and more difficult. Another oddity adds to this: Warner has only ever
been stumped once in Tests, but I have recorded seven instances of a missed
stumping, as described by Cricinfo’s commentaries.
Smith and Labuschagne by contrast have been stumped seven times and missed
five times. The drop rate for all three is far more similar when
it comes to slips and gully catches – drop rates for all three are in the
range 29 per cent to 33 per cent. The usual caveats apply when doing stats on missed
chances. The data is prepared by me; others might get different results,
although I hope not significantly so. ******** Many thanks to Gulu Ezekiel for
locating and sending a copy of the entire score for the Tied Test in
Chennai/Madras in 1986-87. I have been
seeking this for decades – literally. More on this
when I have finished re-scoring the score into ball-by-ball form. ******** I have been doing some repair work on some
ball-by-ball records in my Test match database, specifically for the years
2003 to 2005. The problems lay in the identification of extras, almost always
restricted to the 101st over of an innings, which was due to an
old glitch in a data conversion spreadsheet. I had repaired this glitch for
many Tests some years ago, but apparently I had only done so up to Tests in
2003, and had forgotten continue forward. The actual runs scored by teams and
individuals was not affected; only the identities of extras was sometimes
wrong. ******** |
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John Campbell of the West Indies has played 20
Tests. Remarkably, considering the Windies often weak recent efforts,
Campbell has managed to hit the winning run five times. Only five players
have hit the winning run more times in Tests, led by Ricky Ponting with nine.
Each of those five leaders played 75 Tests or more. ******** By my count, Steve Smith has now scored 577 runs
off Stuart Broad’s bowling, thus passing 571 by Pujara off Lyon for the most
‘head to head’. Broad has got Smith 11 times so the batting average of 52.4
is respectable for both players. I have updated the list in the Unusual Records section. I
have also added a list of the most ball bowled head-to head, which is
(perhaps) surprisingly different. Less surprisingly, the list is dominated by
Ashes Tests, since these have always been the most common Tests between two
teams. Lyon bowled only three balls to Pujara in the
Oval Test in June, conceding one run. ******** |
4 August 2023 Going Out with a Bang There has been discussion about Stuart Broad, who
has become the first player in Tests to both hit the last ball he faced for
six, then take a wicket with his last ball bowled. The former feat is much
rarer than the latter; only Wayne Daniel of the West Indies is a clear-cut
precedent for a six off his last ball. Glen Maxwell is also on the list,
although he could conceivably play again, as could Broad (very unlikely,
though). The number of bowlers finishing bowling careers with
a wicket is much longer, and probably a lot longer than most people would
expect. There are more than 130 names currently. I have attached
a link to a list of those bowlers that I know of. Why is the list longer than might be expected?
Remember that most Tests won by runs or by an innings margins will have at
least two bowlers who take a wicket with their last ball, and sometimes this
will prove to be their last match. For most bowlers on the list, it was not
known in advance that this would be their last ball. We remember the relative
few who announced a retirement in advance – Lillee, McGrath, Murali, Broad –
but don’t notice so much the ones who get dropped or otherwise never bowl
again. The first list is up to 2020 and I think is fairly
secure. There is a possibility that a few may yet play again. There is a second list from 2020 to present. The
majority of these will play again; I will leave it to readers to decide who
might or might not. Even Broad could conceivably play again (to my annoyance
he was certainly bowling well enough to continue). There is a possibility that some have been missed.
For Tests with no scorebooks, there may be some who took a wicket with the
final ball of their last over, but the innings continued. Not all bowlers did this in their last Test. The
strangest is Mark Boucher who played 63 Tests after taking his one and only
wicket. A few years ago I worked out that only Gerry Hazlitt
of Australia and Godfrey Lawrence of South Africa took wickets with their
last two balls in Tests. Hazlitt took 5 for 1 off his last 17 balls. I wouldn’t guarantee every last detail of these
lists. ******** Most runs before a new ball was taken
England declared at 524-4 in 82.4 overs against
Ireland earlier this year with no new ball being taken. Highest score at the end of the 80th (six-ball) over
is 529/5 by England in the above match against Pakistan. In the past I have seen lists (including my own) of the most
overs bowled without a new ball, but I don’t think anyone has published a
list of the most runs scored. As can be seen, there is a lot of variation in
the scoring rates in the table, with ‘Bazball’
rather revolutionising this aspect. ******** Some best-forgotten all-round
performances by captains in Tests Pat Cummins had a lousy match in the Old Trafford
Test, but just how bad was it?
Qualification: batted and bowled in the
match. Fewer than 10 runs scored in the match and 0 or 1 wickets taken for
120+ runs. None of these players took a catch. It’s hard to
rank the above so they are listed chronologically. Botham is the only captain
to score fewer runs and have worse match bowling figures in the same Test
than Cummins’ recent effort. (Courtney Walsh once took 0 for 123 in a Test
but did not bat.) ******** Longest innings by Australian batsmen
who failed to reach double figures
NB: First Innings only. (Extremely slow innings are more common in
match-saving second innings situations.) Dodemaide was batting at #9, trying to support his batting
partner on an extreme turning pitch. The longest such first innings on record is 8 off
124 balls by Bill Edrich against West Indies at Lord’s in 1950. Terry
Jarvis’s 9 in 123 minutes at Chennai in 1964-65 may have topped this, but
balls faced is not available. Other batsmen have been slower in reaching double
figures, but I am restricting this to batsmen who did not make it to ten. ******** |
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11 July 2023 More on the Madras Tie! I have commented before on the frustration of being
unable to find original scorebooks for the two Tied Tests, in Brisbane (1960)
and Madras/Chennai (1986). Sustained efforts by myself and others to find
these have drawn a blank. Last year there was a breakthrough. A video of the
final session of the Chennai match was obtained by Lawrie Colliver. Lawrie
re-scored this ball-by-ball, as reported on this blog. Now another advance. It turns out that a facsimile
of a score of the final innings at Chennai was published in a book in India
in 2016! Contacts Gulu and Sreeram alerted me to this. The book is From
Mumbai to Durban: India’s Greatest Tests by S Giridhar and VJ Raghunath,
who had obtained the score from the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association. When I
asked around, I could not locate this book in Australia – the biggest
collections in the country were unable to help – but Amazon had one copy available,
so I bought it. The image of the score was in colour but quite small
(11 cm x 8 cm), and barely readable. Like most pictures in books, it was
printed in halftone, creating a confusing pattern under magnification. I was
able to descreen and sharpen a high-resolution scan
to improve the readability. Another problem was that the writing was not
particularly neat – there was no fixing that. On the upside, there was a
section of the score that gave the score after the end of each over, not
always readable but quite useful. The following shows a magnified version of
a small part of the page, from the high-resolution scan http://www.sportstats.com.au/bloghome_files/image008.jpg Eventually I was able to re-score the first two
sessions of this innings, which could then be attached Lawrie’s score for the
final session. There were various difficulties, and a few uncertainties
remain. An example would be the first ball of the innings, which is no more
than a blob in the score but which must represent two runs, to preserve the
known scoring. The batting section for Gavaskar and Srikkanth
is also indistinct. Also note the third ball of Matthews’ sixth over. It is
not a 6, but a “C” for caught (Srikkanth). However, in the final analysis the re-score holds
together quite well with minimal fudging. I can say with ‘partial’ confidence
that the final score of 347 is accurate, and while apparent errors can be
found, there no clear errors that affect the final score. The rumours of
errors in the scoring are not supported, at least in this innings. The teams
would have known throughout the day how things stood in relation to the
target (presuming that the scoreboard was up to speed). My contacts are endeavouring to get hold of a better
copy of the score, including the other innings. There could even be other
Tests from that source, since a number of Chennai Tests from the 1980s and
90s are not represented by surviving scores. Strangely, the score appears to give an innings time
of 342 minutes, but this is not possible. A time of 409 minutes, found
elsewhere, is much closer to the mark. I have posted an updated article on this final day here. A full version of the scan is here. Remember that the original image is only 11 cm by 8
cm. The updated data page, with the ball-by-ball
re-score, is here. ******** |
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Most runs in an over without a boundary: There were a couple of cases of 15 runs in the
days of eight-ball overs. At SCG in 1936-37, O'Brien and Fingleton hit
2,0,3,1,3,0,2,0,1,3 off Sims, including two no balls that were scored off.
That would count as 17 runs in modern counting. At SCG in 1963-64, Lawry and O'Neill hit a
Pollock over for 0,3,2,3,3,0,2,2. For s six-ball over, there was Tavare and Botham
off Holding at The Oval in 1984 3,1,wide,3(no ball),0,2,3,1 = 14 runs or 15
by modern counting. This is a ‘where known’ record. ******** In the Test at The Oval, Pat Cummins bowled the
first ball and also hit the winning runs. There are only 15 other Tests where
the same player did both, and the Cummins instance is the first where both
balls went for four. ******** In the Women’s Ashes Test, England lost the match
in spite of having a double-centurion (Beaumont 208) and a bowler with 10
wickets (Ecclestone). There is no parallel for this in Men’s Tests. At Old
Trafford in 1896, Ranji scored 62 and 154* and Tom Richardson took 13
wickets, but England lost by 3 wickets. ******** |
28 June 2023 Oval Declaration Goes Pear-Shaped In the Oval Test, Ben Stokes declared England’s
first innings at 393 for 8 on the first day – a first in a five-day
England/Australia Test – even though his best bat, Joe Root, was on 118 and
in full flight. The theory is that putting the opposition in late in the day
(to face 10 overs in this case) stresses the batsmen and creates an advantage
greater than the runs foregone. So I’ve done a little study... Question: does having to start a team innings just before
stumps harms that team's performance? I looked at 1000 recent Tests, match innings 2 or 3
only. From this, I filtered out 2 sets: A.
Teams that
started the innings 10 overs or less before stumps, in days that lasted more
than 75 overs. (188 instances) B.
Teams that
started the innings in the first 10 overs of a day (239 instances). I calculated the scores, runs per wicket and 1st
wicket partnerships for the two sets and compared them. Findings (outcomes).
Conclusion: there is no statistical difference between these
cases; any differences are negligible. In fact the two datasets are so
similar that it is almost spooky. There is no statistical disadvantage in being forced
to start an innings late in the day. However much openers dislike having to
start late in a day, it does no real harm. I did not distinguish between innings starting as a
result of team dismissal or declaration, but I don’t think that it would make
any difference. Anyway, England’s ultimate losing margin of two
wickets speaks for itself. ******** A couple of comments about the colour of cricket
balls… Red balls are centuries old, and probably predate
any published scores. There was an experimental night cricket game on a
football field under lights in England in August 1952, using a ball painted
white, in a Testimonial match for Jack Young. Apart from that, white balls
were first used in a World Series (Packer) One Day match at VFL Park in
Melbourne on December 14, 1977. There were a couple of experiments with 'mustard'
coloured ball in day/night Sheffield shield matches in 1994-95. A pink ball
was first used in a day/night Shield match at the Adelaide Oval in March 2014
(South Australia v NSW). (There had been a pink ball, possibly painted, used
for a charity promotion in a women's daytime match in 2009). There is an article that says that a white ball was
used in a World Series one-day match in Adelaide in November 1977 (prior to
the Melbourne match). It was at the end of a 4-day ‘make work’ match for
Packer players who were not involved in Packer’s main weekend match. The
match finished a day early, so they played a fill-in one-dayer
on the final day. However, the article gets both the ground (it was at
Football Park not Adelaide Oval) and the date wrong, and newspaper reports
from the time do not mention any white ball or night play. The reports do
mention, however, that fielding circles were used for the first time in that
match. ******** |
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I was away on holidays in central Asia for a
while (returning with a broken ankle!). I will still post from time to time,
perhaps with decreasing frequency. I am continuing to post updates to my Test match
database, which has reached 2005. Who knows how far it will go, even 2010
seems a long way off. |
9 June 2023 The Fastest Pair of Ducks Newspaper
reports have the first innings ending at 4:25 and the second innings at 6:25.
Ward would have been out for a second time about 10-12 minutes before the
latter, making his ducks about 108-110 minutes apart, including the break
between innings. (The newspaper clock times would be to the nearest 5 minutes
only.) It
appears that after Ward was out the second time, the last 25 runs were scored
very quickly in about 3 overs. The hat-trick over was WWW044 and Matthews'
next and last over was 230400. Kelleway took the
last two wickets, in the 3rd last and the last overs. I
also did a search for the shortest interval between two dismissals of the
same batsman, regardless of score. The record here was 11 minutes’ play, plus
16 minutes between innings by Percy Sherwell in the
5th
Test of 1910-11 (SCG). Sherwell
batted #10 in the first innings and was last out. He kept the pads on and
opened when the follow-on was enforced, and was first out. There is also the
case of Joe Darling at the SCG in 1901-02. Darling was 9th out in
the first innings and first out on following-on. His elapsed time was
probably closer to 30 minutes than Sherwell’s 27
minutes (there is no surviving score for this Test). Farook Engineer, in a
Test in 1964-65, was also out twice in a very short span, probably just over
30 minutes. ******** A
few comments on long sixes, to add to my
2016 article… Possibly
the longest six at the SCG was by Alan Davidson for NSW v MCC in 1954-55. Hit
forward of the left-hander’s square leg, it struck high on the roof of the
old Brewongle Stand. In an article in The Cricketer in the 60, Ray Robinson
gave a figure of 113 yards, plus 40 feet off the ground, measured with a
steel tape. Perhaps 125 yards or more, given a 45 degree descent angle.
However, there is a description of this shot in the Sydney Morning Herald
from that time, and it does add that the wicket position was slightly on the
western side of the ground, and so favoured Davidson. Checking with Google
Earth does suggest that Robinson’s figure may be a slight exaggeration. I
would say 115 metres, with 120 metres unlikely. The
longest six in the 2023 IPL was 115 metres by Faf du Plessis. It is intriguing that the seven
longest sixes in the IPL (>117m) were all hit prior to 2014. What has
happened to the 120-metre hits? ********
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Ashley Chandrasinghe
batted all day for 46 runs in 90 overs on the first day of the Sheffield
Shield Final in Perth, raising the question of who has scored the fewest runs
in a complete day’s play. It may be in the Sheffield Shield (no one seems to
have suggested any alternatives) but in England Hashim Amla of all people
went from 0 to 37* on the 4th day of Hampshire v Surrey quite recently in
July 2021. Wisden doesn't mention any interruptions, and there were 96 overs
bowled. Amla faced 278 balls. ******* I get 13 instances of left-right combinations in
all 10 partnerships of an innings, most recently the West Indies 2nd innings
against India at St Lucia in 2016. Curiously it first happened in 1884 at The
Oval, when there were fewer left-handed batsmen. On that occasion Scotton, a
left-hander, batted through most of the innings with the right-handers, with
the only other leftie, Emmett the tailender, coming in for the final
partnership when Scotton was out. ******** In the final Tests at Ahmedabad, Ravi Ashwin, a
spinner, bowled the first ball of Australia’s second innings to Matthew Kuhemann, normally a specialist spinner. In the I thought
this must be unique until I found Pallekele 2018
where Jack Leach opened facing the bowling of Dilruwan
Perera, in a very similar situation. There were also a few early Tests where it is
possible, but bowling styles can be difficult to unravel. Hugh Trumble opened
facing Len Braund in a Test in 1902 (4th Test SCG), which seems to be fairly
clear-cut. ******** In the Christchurch Test against Sri Lanka, New
Zealand scored 257 runs without a break in play on the final day, after the
first two sessions had been washed out. This is the most runs in a session by
a single team, even if it stretches the definition of a 'session'. The session lasted about 230 minutes, which is
just a little short of the 241 minutes for the final session at Melbourne in
1998-99. At the Oval in 1884, there were 259 runs after
lunch on the final day. Back then there were no formal tea breaks on most
days, including this one; there was a change of innings though, which lasted
about 17 minutes. The most in a more conventional session is 249 by
South Africa against Zimbabwe in 2005, a 155-minute session. The most in a
2-hour session is still 236 by Australia at Johannesburg in 1921. The Christchurch Test was only the second to
reach a decisive result on the last possible ball, the other being the first
Test at Durban in 1948-49. By coincidence, England also needed 8 runs off the
last over (although it was an 8-ball over) of that match, and they won the
match by 2 wickets with an extra off the last ball. It was a four-day match. Two matches have been won with one ball to spare
- Port of Spain 1934-35 (West Indies def England by 217 runs) and Leeds 2014
(Sri Lanka def England by 100 runs). The two Tied Tests also finished with
one ball to spare. Two other Tests have been left drawn with the scores level
at the end of the match. ******** |
3 April 2023 Bowler v Batsman ‘Hat-Tricks’
There are probably more cases. The first that I
found, Ray Lindwall dismissing Alec Bedser, was spread across 2 series, so
Bedser played quite a number of innings in between without facing Lindwall.
Most recent is Kyle Jamieson dismissing Roston Chase in 2020-21. Some of these 'hat-tricks' do not involve any golden
ducks. Even those that do are complicated. In 2000 Andy Caddick got Curtley
Ambrose three balls in a row that he bowled to him, the last two being first
ball, but in between those ducks Ambrose played innings of 36* and 1 without
facing Caddick. Surprisingly perhaps, Ajit Agarkar is the only
batsman in Test history to make 3 consecutive golden ducks. He went on to a
fourth consecutive golden duck, and five dismissal in six balls, but he does
not appear on the list because different bowlers were involved. ******** At the other end of the scale, here is the updated
list of the most runs scored by a single batsman off a single bowler. Pujara
off Lyon now leads, a sign of the relatively high frequency of
India/Australia Test matches in recent times. Although the number of runs is
very high, the contest can be regarded as rather even, given that Lyon has
now taken Pujara’s wicket 13 times. Steve Smith may have a chance to
challenge this total in the upcoming Ashes, although he will have to bat well
even if Broad get to play most of the Tests. Individual Batsman v Bowler: Most Runs,
all Tests
All the above figures are reasonably exact. The
highest total where estimates are necessary is Javed Miandad v Kapil Dev,
estimated at 470. The relevant section of the “Unusual Records”
section has been updated. ******** |
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I have started working again on the Test Match
Database, continuing (slowly) Test series from 2003. I hope one day to get
the database up to about 2010. ******** Cheteshwar Pujara has now scored more thqn
560 runs off the bowling of Nathan Lyon in Tests matches, taking the #1
position for a batsman off a single bower. I will update the list when the
current Test in Ahmedabad is over. ******** I have completed a rather large project – to scan
and digitise all the paper scores for Test matches that I have collected,
over 20 years or more. There are scores from more than 1550 Tests in the
collection; quite a few of these Tests are represented by more than one
score, and there are 30 more represented by ball-by-ball records from other
sources. Ball-by-ball records from
Cricinfo and other online compilers are not included. I plan to make copies so the material can be
preserved in other hands. There are even a few scores in there for which the
originals have gone missing since the copies were made, including the oldest
one of all, the 1880 Test at the Oval. When I visited the Oval a few years
ago, that score could not be found. ******** |
7 March 2023 A Quick Visit to DRS While I have it in front of me here are some broad
stats on DRS, up to Jan 2023... Tests with DRS: 447 DRS called on: 4795 times Umpire decision overturned: 1285 times = 2.87 per
Test LBW: 303 not out decisions overturned by DRS, out of 1935
reviews. 511 OUT decisions overturned out of 1638 CWK: 181 not out decisions overturned out of 608 161 OUT decisions overturned out of 273 Overall, there are more umpire decisions overturned
in favour of batsmen than bowlers. However, the net effect is fairly small,
averaging about one less dismissal every 2.4 Tests. Conclusion: although DRS can have a major effect on
individual innings, and on close matches in critical situations, its broad
effect on statistics is not great. ******** |
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My
opinion of the pitches being produced in India for the Test matches,
particularly the Indore pitch… Pitches
don’t have to be like this. In ODIs in India, teams regularly get 350 in 50
overs (4 times in 6 matches in this season alone). It shows that respectable
pitches can be made in India, although in some cases it goes too far the
other way, in favour of batsmen. There is also plenty of big scoring in
Indian first-class cricket – some of the pitches must be ok. Test
pitches have long favoured spinners in India; that’s all right, but this
season it is going much too far. When Hayden scored plenty of runs in
2000-01, he played lots of sweep shots as I recall; it negated the spin. Now
that is impossible because of the variable bounce. Anyway,
India was hoist on its own petard at Indore. Perhaps we will see an end to
such extremes in the future. I took a
screenshot of a closeup of the pitch after the
first day at Indore, from the TV broadcast. Martin Briggs wondered if it had
been taken by Neil Armstrong on the moon. More like Mars, I think. ******** Most
ducks by a team in a first-class match… In
the famous MCC v Australians match at Lord's in 1878, lasting only one day,
MCC (33 & 19) suffered 13 ducks. This was topped by "Muslims"
versus "Europeans" at Poona in 1915, with Muslims (21 & 39)
suffering 14 ducks. ******** |
4 March 2023 A Player of the Series in 1951 At the end of the 1950-51 Ashes series, Len Hutton
was given an award as best player, calculated using a runs/wickets/catches
formula. The award, sponsored by the Vok liquor
company, was worth one thousand pounds. Such a sum was big money in cricket
in those days, when Australian Test players were lucky if they could make ten
pounds per day. (The winner of The Open golf championship in 1950 won £300).
Apparently, when the existence of the award had been announced earlier in the
series, the players unanimously decided to share the prize equally, and this
is what Hutton did. Still, the award as it stood was effectively a
Player of the Series award. I don’t know of any similar (single player)
awards being made until John Edrich won Player of the Series in the 1968
Ashes; and even then the concept did not come into regular use until the late
1970s (Ian Botham in 1978). There were other Player of the Series awards in
England in the late 60s, generally one for each team. Curiously, England
returned to the double-award approach in 1986, and this continues, but in
other countries the award is usually to a single player. ******** A small breakthrough. I found a full score for the 4th
Test of 1881-82 (Melbourne), and it was online! Years ago, someone had told
me that this Test score was included in the 1882 Australian England tour
book, which survives at Lord’s, and he sent me a copy, but only the first
innings of the match. I assumed that that was all that was available. It
turns out that the whole match score exists in that source, and a microfilm
version was copied for a project for the National Library of Australia.
Digitised versions are online here. And here. This is the oldest surviving Test match score from
Australia. I have re-scored the whole match now and posted corrected versions
of the match data. As with many
early scores, re-scoring this one was a bit of a struggle, but I hope the
rendering is reasonable. The 1882 team had already assembled in Melbourne by
the time of that 1881-82 Test, and they sailed only three days after the
match. Perhaps because of the imminent departure, the match was left drawn
even though it had been scheduled as timeless. It was the last drawn Test in
Australia until 1946-47. ******* Harry Brook’s diamond duck in England’s one-run loss
at Basin Reserve had me looking for cases of ‘first ball’ diamond ducks, that
is batsmen run out without facing a ball, and from the first ball bowled
after they came to the crease. Most Diamond duckers were at the wicket for a
few balls before being run out, so the list is quite short… “First Ball” Diamond Duck
Brook is the first batsman to score a century and
diamond duck in the same match. Brook has now scored 809 runs off 819 balls,
and is well on track for the fastest first one thousand runs in Tests, in
balls faced. Tim Southee is currently the fastest with 1132 balls, ahead of
Colin de Grandhomme second. ******** |
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Four instances in ODIs of a pair of batsmen
reaching a century off consecutive
balls… RS
Dravid SC Ganguly Ind v SL, Nagpur 22-Mar-1999 SR
Waugh MG Bevan Aus v SAf, Docklands Stadium
16-Aug-2000 G
Gambhir V Kohli Ind v SL, Kolkata 24-Dec-2009 KC
Sangakkara TM Dilshan Sco v SL, Hobart 11-Mar-2015 It is curious that there are no known instances
in Tests, given that there are two cases of a century and double century off
consecutive balls. At Durban in 1999, Gary Kirsten reached 200 off CJ Adams
and Mark Boucher reached 100 off the next ball. At Adelaide in 2012-13,
Michael Clarke reached 200 off Imran Tahir, and Mike Hussey reached 100 off
the next ball. Batsmen who batted both left-handed and
right-handed in a Test innings… Talat Ali, Adelaide 1972-73 (left-handed to
right-handed) Both batsmen had hand/arm injuries. ******** A reminiscence triggered by Australia losing two
batsmen retired hurt in the Melbourne Test against South Africa… I was at the ground the day that the three West
Indians went RH. There were 53,000 at the SCG, what a day. My brother and I
got there an hour before the start of play, but had to sit on the steps of
the stand, which was already full. The noise was immense, peaking as Thomson
bowled the ball; it sounded like baying for blood. I greatly admired the
concentration of Lawrence Rowe, scoring 67 without helmet or much of the
modern protection. Thomson (3-117) was dangerous but inaccurate. Funnily, my memory says that Thomson inflicted
all three injuries, but, on checking, Holding was actually hit by Greg
Chappell's bowling! Holding retired on the last ball of the day. The next
morning Holding wanted to return, but was disallowed. Julien instead returned
to the crease, which was not permitted at the time, but the umpires
overlooked that. I also went to the fourth day of that match. We
sat side-on to the wicket. When Thomson (6-50) was bowling, I simply could
not see the ball once it left his hand. Thomson also took a great outfield catch on the
first day, ******** |
9 February 2023 Dropped Catches Report for 2022 I have done a search for Test match dropped catches
(and missed stumpings), along the lines of previous years, using the Cricinfo
ball-by-ball texts. This study now spans back more than 20 years. For 2022,
the analysis was assisted by Garry Morgan, who kindly sent me his list of
dropped catches.
Certainly the most striking thing about 2022 was the
poor catching of Australia, rising from 18% missed in 2021 to 31% in 2022,
which is by far the worst single-year performance recorded for Australia in
this century. I had picked up 52 misses by Australia, so many that I went
back and checked them all, but all of them seemed reasonable. The only caveat
is that 34 of the 52 misses were regarded as difficult chances, which is a
higher proportion than normal (which is around half). There were 26 % drops
off Australian batsmen in the same set of Tests. For batsmen, what they say about Marnus Labuschagne
seems to be true; he gets dropped more than almost anyone else. Labuschagne
has been dropped off 38% of the chances that he has offered, more than anyone
who has played over 30 Tests, except for Taufeeq Umar (also 38%). Virender
Sehwag saw 37 % of his chances dropped; that at least could be explained by
the fact that he hit the ball harder than anyone else. The explanation for
Marnus eludes me. If the drop rate for Marnus had been normal, he would lose
three or four runs off his batting average. There is a ‘tussle’ at the top of the bowler’s list,
with Stuart Broad retaking the lead over Jimmy Anderson. Broad has had 136
chances dropped to Anderson’s 132: surprising, perhaps. Note that this is 21st
Century data; we don’t have complete numbers for the likes of Muralitharan or
Warne. Next after Anderson is Harbhajan on 99 misses, but again data is not
complete here, since Harbhajan started out in 1998. However, it is possible
to extrapolate the missing data to produce an estimate of 115 missed chances
in total for Harbhajan. ******** Who attended the most Test matches in
person? In 2003, Richie Benaud said he had attended 486
Tests. We don't know the exact number after that but the total will be around
550. That is around 25% of all Tests up to the time of his death, or 31% of
Tests that were played while he was actively attending them. No one is particularly close to Benaud in number of
Tests. Pakistani journalist Qamar Ahmed has over 450, while John Woodcock,
who died last year, was also well over 400. Bill Ferguson scored 204 of the first 382 Test
matches. His scoring career extended from WG Grace to Garfield Sobers. There
had been 443 Tests played when he died. ******** |
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At the Gabba, South African bowler A Nortje
bowled two deliveries in one over that went for 5 wides. I can only find one
precedent (including 4 wides): Neil Johnson of Zimbabwe against England at
Trent Bridge in 2000, in the 104th over. Johnson is only debited with 2 wides in that
innings, but both went to the boundary. ******** Thinking about king pairs, I wondered if there
was a bowler’s equivalent, that is a bowler taking a wicket with his first
ball in each innings of a Test. Turns out to be a very short list and rarer than
a king pair. MC Bird Eng
v SAf (1), Johannesburg 1909/10 Z Khan Ind
v Ban (2), Dhaka (Mirpur) 2007 AR Patel Eng
v Ind (3), Ahmedabad (Patel) 2020/21 Zaheer Khan’s effort was as an opening bowler,
inflicting a king pair on Javed Omar. ******** The last time a Test finished in 2 days and had
more than 33 wickets, as in the Gabba Test v South Africa, was Port Elizabeth
1895-96 (40 wickets). Two other Tests lasting 2 days had 40 wickets: The Oval
1882 (the Ashes Test) and Lord's 1888. The Oval 1890 had 38. One of the Tests of 1912 had 37 wickets on the
first 2 days, but it went into a third day. These Tests were all limited to 3 days. ******** Seeing two batsmen retiring hurt on the same day
(Warner and Green) in the South Africa MCG Test had me reminiscing about the
day that three West Indians retired hurt in 1976… There were 53,000 at the SCG, what a day. My
brother and I got there an hour before
the start of play, but had to sit on the steps of the stand. The noise was
immense, peaking as Thomson bowled the ball; it sounded like baying for
blood. I greatly admired the concentration of Lawrence Rowe, scoring 67
without helmet or much of the modern protection. Thomson was dangerous but
erratic. Funnily, my memory says that Thomson inflicted
all three injuries, but, on checking, Holding was actually hit by Greg
Chappell's bowling! Holding retired on the last ball of the day, mid-over.
The next morning Holding wanted to return, but was disallowed. Julien instead
returned to the crease, which was not permitted at the time, but the umpires
overlooked that. I also went to the fourth day of that match. We
sat side-on to the wicket. Even though we were in the front row on the fence.
when Thomson (6-50) was bowling, I simply could not see the ball. ******** |
31 December 2022 What is a Fair Qualification? When comparing player careers and many other stats,
it is routine to place qualifications on the data, particularly minimum
matches or runs or etc. List the highest career batting averages, and Kyle
Patterson (144.0 in two Tests) is at the top, ahead of Andy Ganteaume, but apply a reasonable minimum and the list
comes out rather differently. But what is a reasonable qualification for such
stats? I have seen lists of highest batting averages that variously have
players like CS Dempster, SG Barnes, RG Pollock, and GA Headley right near
the top (below Bradman of course). On the other hand, I have seen
qualifications so high that even Bradman is excluded. I looked at the question by taking the population of
recognised batsmen (about 90 of them) who have played 80 or more Tests and
looked at their career progression in terms of ‘average average’
and standard deviation at different stages of their careers. The aim here is
to look at how the spread of the stats levels out as careers get longer – it
is not necessary to include shorter careers with this aim in mind.
Batting average in general is relatively steady, but
with an upward trend probably due to those great players who had very long
careers, and were still reaching their peak after they had played 50 Tests. Of greater interest is the standard deviation of the
batting average. Early on, averages are quite variable, but as careers
progress, there is ‘regression to the mean’, the lesser batsmen tend to
improve (those who don’t get dropped and don’t play 80 Tests) while the high
flyers come back to the pack. After ten Tests, TT Samaraweera had an average
of 83.0 and Mushfiqur Rahim 16.2. They finished their careers with averages
of 48 and 38 respectively. This has the effect of excluding some notables like
Graham Pollock (60.97 in 23 Tests) and George Headley (60.83 in 22 Tests). I
think that that these careers were just a bit too limited to get a clear fix
on their abilities. Chances are that they would have regressed towards the
mean if they had enjoyed longer careers.
******** |
