For sportstats home
page, and info in Test Cricket in Australia 1877-2002, click
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Z-score’s
Cricket Stats Blog 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 2010s have now been
posted. More than 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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Much has been said about records set in the Kingston
Test, with West Indies bowled out for 27. Some adds… The innings saw the slowest over rate in Test
history for a complete innings – around 55 balls per hour (pending a check of
times). One could argue mitigating circumstances. ******** In 1974 Gerald Brodribb published a biography of
Gilbert Jessop (The Croucher) that included a ball-by-ball summary of
Jessop’s famous 104 in the Oval Test of 1902. Brodribb did not name his
source, and over many years I have not been able to locate it. Such
frustration. ********* I try to record fielder locations for all catches
in Tests. In the Lord’s Test, Washington c Brook v Archer was the first catch
by a longstop that I have noted since Tom Horan took a couple in 1879 ! I have often thought that longstop would be a
useful position in T20 with all those ramp shots, but I haven't seen it in
Tests. I don't know if anyone recalls anything similar. ******** Most runs on first day as a Test captain…
******** At Hyderabad in 1983, Javed Miandad faced a
hat-trick ball from BS Sandhu and went on to score 280 not out in a
partnership of 451 with Mudassar. Gavaskar probably faced a hat-trick ball to start
his 236 at Chennai but I don't have enough detail to be sure. None of the
reports I have specifically says so. I only have ball-by-ball data for about 80-85% of
hat-trick balls. If wickets are taken with the last two balls of an over,
then either bat could face the hat-trick ball. ******** |
20 July 2025 I have written before (as long ago as 2006!) about
the intriguing limited-overs match in South Africa in 1967 between the
touring Australians and a “Sports Roundup Invitation XI”, effectively a
fully-representative South Africa. Although not ‘official’, it has enough
hallmarks of a One-Day International to be recognised as the first such match
(IMHO).
South African XI v Australians, 50-over match,
Johannesburg 4-Mar-1967
Australia
Innings FoW
TR Veivers retired hurt at 5 for 276. South
Africa Innings FoW
The match was 50 (6-ball) overs a side, with bowlers
limited to 11 overs. Although arguably played in a ‘picnic’ atmosphere, there
was money at stake; it was taken seriously enough for the keeper Brian Taber
to be dropped and Simpson taking the gloves to strengthen the Australians
batting. Grahame Thomas of NSW was in the team and scored 70; he had not
played in the Tests, but his mere presence in apartheid South Africa is
interesting in that he was part-aboriginal – especially in light of the D’Oliveira affair less than two years later. For the
South Africans, the first appearance of Barry Richards is notable. Keith Stackpole hit a ball from fast man Peter
Pollock clean out of the ground, but was out next ball. Tom Veivers then came
in and appears to have retired hurt first ball; he did not bowl later. The
over eventually cost 10 runs even with two wickets (Stackpole, Thomas) plus Veivers’ retirement (1 leg bye, 6, W, RH, 3, W). The match was scored by two women, “Miss P Williams
and Miss SR Hall”. Tour scorer M (Mitch?) McClennan is also named, but the
score is not in his handwriting. (I believe that McClennan was a South
African scorer contracted to score on the tour; he also did 1957-58). An
image of a page from the score is here. I have posted
before an article on
the match by Alf Batchelor. ******** At Lord’s England beat India by 22 runs in spite of
hitting fewer runs off the bat. There have only been five such Tests… Winning a Test with fewer runs off the bat
Tests won by runs margin with no
follow-on. In the 1992 match, Sri Lanka managed to bowl 53 no
balls to Australia’s 19, and lost by 16 runs. ******** |
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250 and 150 in a first-class match. Dhruv Shorey, 252* and 150* Delhi v Assam 2022-23 Shubman Gill 269 and 161, Edgbaston 2025 Warwick Armstrong came very close in 1920: 157*
and 245 in a Sheffield Shield match ******** At Hyderabad in 1983, Javed Miandad faced a
hat-trick ball from BS Sandhu and went on to score 280 not out in a
partnership of 451 with Mudassar. Gavaskar probably faced a hat-trick ball to start
his 236 but I don't have enough detail to be sure. None of the reports I have
specifically says so. I only have ball-by-ball data for about 80-85% of
hat-trick balls. If wickets are taken with the last two balls of an over,
then either bat could face the hat-trick ball. ****** |
11 July 2025 Here is a broad look at a ‘batting decay curve’, the
number of innings by recognised batsmen (those with median batting positions
1 to 6) at every level of scoring. I have taken the liberty of including not
outs by adding the batsman’s career average to the score (this can be
supported statistically, in a broad sense). So an innings of 100 not out by a
batsman who averages 50 registers as a score equivalent to 150. Above a score of 50, I have pooled results to smooth
the curve. So the point at 110 represents the average of scores 106 to 115.
The size of the pool is larger at very high (and rarer) scores. Averaging out
at the high end, across a wide pool, can give values less than 1.
The graph is log-linear because the results are
exponential, with quite a good fit to a simple exponential decay curve (the
trendline is based on data from 15 to 300). Put simply, a batsman’s chances
of getting out when he reaches a given score is about 2.6 per cent, and this
applies, in a broad sense, at all scores from about 20 all the way to 300 or
beyond. Naturally, individual batsmen can and do deviate from this trend, but
the averages are fairly consistent. There are some general deviations, though. That 2.6
per cent probability of getting out doesn’t settle down until a score of
about 15. In particular, There are more than 4200 ducks which represent about
15 per cent of all innings. Between 50 and 100, the chances of getting out
are slightly lower than the long-view average, while from 200 to 250, the
chances are a bit higher. ******** 400 runs in a first-class match without
a quadruple century
[Note: EDITED the Perera instance was left out of
the original table.] |
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“Substitute” bowlers taking a
wicket in same over
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16 April 2025 More on 1957 I mentioned in February the
discovery of some Balls Faced figures for the 1957 England/West Indies
series, found in the Daily Express newspaper. Previously, I had
calculated balls faced figures by re-scoring surviving scorebooks. I have now
tabulated these and compared them to the Express
figures (where available – not all innings were covered) at the link. The comparison
was disconcerting in places, in that there were many differences between the
two data sets. In my original analysis, I had already flagged the fact that
anomalies, even provable errors, had cropped up in some of the scores. This
was not uncommon in scores from this era. Additional uncertainty was created
because byes and leg byes were not marked in the scores; I had to estimate
their position in a way that preserved the batsmen’s runs scored and sequence
of scoring strokes. As a result, balls faced for most large innings contained
uncertainties. If Cowdrey faced
613 balls, then his century came off 527 balls; I previously had 535. The 527
is still the slowest known Test century of all time, although Nazar Mohammad may have exceeded this at Lucknow in
1952-53 (no published figures for Balls faced, but Nazar batted 174 overs to
reach 100, to Cowdrey’s 166). An additional
problem with this innings is the difference in balls faced by the openers.
The rescore gives Peter Richardson 100 balls but the Express says 119,
a wide gap. Once again there are identifiable errors in the score, so maybe
we should accept the Express numbers. But note that the 119 balls
would require about 62 % of the strike to Brian Close’s 38 %, possible but
rather unusual for a 32-over partnership. ******** |
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I have been alerted to a problem with
ball-by-ball files that were posted recently in the online database, wherein
the over-by-over bowler figures could be seriously wrong with respect to runs
conceded. Other columns did not exhibit any problems, so the actual
ball-by-ball data were correct apart from those runs conceded. The problem
cropped up especially in Tests from October 2010 to November 2011. These have
all been fixed now. ******** I was watching the European Club championships,
for a laugh. One team need 65 off the last 17 balls and got them with a ball
to spare. One batsman reached 47 off 10 balls but was out next ball trying to
reach his 50. ******** At Bulawayo in January, Sean Williams was given
not out caught behind, but then walked (there was no DRS in that Test). I
wonder if there are any other examples in recent times. I recall that Ravi
Ashwin once walked when there was no appeal. ******** One thing that has become clear in the DRS era is
that batsmen frequently do not have a clue whether they are out or not, and
even if certain about being not out they can be wrong. There are more than
120 cases of batsmen going to DRS after being given out caught behind, when
in fact they had hit the ball. Many of them were probably hoping for some
glitch in the DRS, but there must also be many who were just kidding
themselves that they hadn't hit the ball. Likewise there must be cases of batsmen who think
they hit the ball but didn't. Lara may be one of them. Mitchell Marsh
appeared to walk before the umpire's decision, after missing the ball at
Adelaide in December. |
4 April 2025 Back pain is making life a bit of a misery at the
moment; I am slowing down. Anyway, here is some broader data on dropped
catches over the last eight years on a team basis, drawn from Cricinfo’s ball-by-ball texts. I won’t say much about it; make of it what you will.
There is a broad but slight improvement trend in this century, but results
for individuals years for particular countries can vary a lot. I am a bit
mystified by Pakistan’s good showing in some years. My general impression has
been that Pakistan is a weak catching team, but they seem to have spells of
very good results. I mentioned recently that I could not find any dropped
catches at all in a recent Test involving Pakistan at Multan. That Test was
in 2025 and is not included in the data here.
Using the Cricinfo bbb texts, I have analysed more
than one thousand Tests for dropped catches going back to 2001. (I started
this process around 2008 but went back and did some earlier Tests from 2001
on, and a few from 1999 and 2000). I have also obtained drop catch data for
almost 400 earlier Tests, the majority involving Australia or England. The
total represents drop catch data for about 55 per cent of all Tests. ******** |
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A small adjustment; at Bridgetown in 1983, West Indies
target of just one run was reached with a no ball bowled by Kirmani. While
Kirmani was (correctly) recorded as bowling 0.1 overs, it can be confirmed
that he bowled two deliveries to Greenidge (source, Barbados Advocate) including
the no ball from "a run up longer than Michael Holding's".
Greenidge did not hit either delivery. https://www.sportstats.com.au/zArchive/1980s/1982WI/1982WI4.pdf ******** |
12 March 2025 Four Wickets in Five Balls: a
Discovery Coming back from an Antarctic cruise, I found that the
ACS Journal has published a little article of mine, on the discovery of a
previously unknown case of four wickets in five balls in a Test match, taken
by Imran Khan in a Test match at Sialkot in 1985. The discovery was made by
my Pakistan contact Shahzad Khan, hence he is listed as lead author. I have rendered the score supplied by Shahzad into
ball-by-ball form, as best as I was able. Although the score, like many from
the subcontinent in the 1980s, contained anomalies and unexplained
inconsistencies, the section containing Imran’s feat was not in doubt. https://www.sportstats.com.au/zArchive/1980s/1985PL/1985PL2bbb1.pdf https://www.sportstats.com.au/zArchive/1980s/1985PL/1985PL2.pdf ******** |
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The England Women managed to drop seven catches
in one day on the way to being clobbered by an innings in the Test at the
MCG. I can find only one men’s Test team that can top that – Pakistan v
England at Faisalabad on 22nd Nov 2005, dropping eight catches and
taking only two on the third day of the Test. ******** |
2 February 2025 Early Reports of Balls Faced in
Tests
This was the
first year of such detailed reporting in the Express. In 1956, there
was a column for minutes batted but not Balls Faced. After 1957, the BF
reporting continued up to 1961 for home Tests. They gave up on it for the
1962 Tests, and it is a shame that it didn’t catch on elsewhere. It has created a
bit of a problem; the BF data found so far is sometimes difficult to reconcile fully with my own
re-scoring of the traditional scoresheets preserved from this series. I will
have to study this more at some stage. The Daily
Express has been a paper that has mostly been out of reach in Australia
in the past. The extended British Newspaper Archive (subscription required)
has been progressively adding more years of this most useful paper to its
online service. ******** Compiling some more dropped catch reports, I found
up to seven missed chances in a single innings of 234 by Rahmat Shah of
Afghanistan against Zimbabwe at Bulawayo last month. This would be a
modern-day record, comparable to the all-time high set by Bonnor in 1883.
However, some are ambiguous and opinions may vary on which if any should be
excluded. Here are the Cricinfo descriptions... 10.4^2&Nyamhuri to Rahmat, 2 runs,dropped
by Myers at the gully region! Short of a length ball angling away with extra bounce,
slices it straight to the gully fielder,
tires to reverse cup it and goes through the hands of Myers!,, 18.4^•&Muzarabani to Rahmat, no run,Back
of a length ball on the fifth stump line, punches off the back foot, thick outside edge to the
gully fielder, dives to his left-side
and grassed it! Myers is the fielder there, dropped his second today, both chances were extremely
difficult though.,, 28.5^4&Williams to Rahmat, FOUR runs,dropped
again! Quicker length ball cuts it square and thick outside edge past the first slip fielder,
similar to the one Ervine dropped
earlier, shoulder height and slow reaction from the fielder,, 37.2^3&Williams to Rahmat, 3 runs,chance!
Full ball just outside off. Turning away and Rahmat attempts a drive. Takes the outside edge
and goes past the diving first slip
fielder. Down to deep third for three runs with Mavuta's
slide stopping the boundary,, 79.6^1&Williams to Rahmat, 1 run,dropped!
Last ball before the second new ball gets
available! Full ball on middle, Rahmat comes down the track, lifts it
down the V, and Nyamhuri
at long-on has misjudged it! He runs in, then tries to backtrack, and all he can get is a
fingertip! Williams looks disappointed and
Shahidi survives,, 92.5^•&Muzarabani to Rahmat, no run,Muzarabani
dropped a sitter! Back of a length ball on the leg stump, plays the leg glance shot early
and finds the leading edge, hits it
straight back to the bowler, easy pickings for the bowler and Muzarabani
fumbles it!,, 116.4^•&Williams to Rahmat, no run,Another
dropped catch? Back of a length ball turning away on the off stump, plays the square cut
late, extra bounce and might have
outside edged back to the keeper, Gumbie failed to grab the ball.
The reaction from Ervine at the first
slip position explains everything.,, AND here are the
Cricbuzz descriptions. There are certainly some
differences... 10.4 Newman Nyamhuri to Rahmat, 2 runs,
dropped! Back of a length outside off,
Rahmat cuts and doesn't bother to keep it down. Goes quickly to gully
and Dion Myers fails to hold onto it.
Tries to reverse-cup and the ball bursts
through his palms 18.4 Muzarabani to Rahmat, no run, back of
length and wide, Rahmat pushes at it
away from the body and the ball takes a thick edge. Dies down onto the
gully fielder who was leaping
forward. Just short 28.5 Williams to Rahmat, FOUR, dropped! short
on length onto off, Rahmat tries to
cut and gets an edge that flies to the left of first slip. Whizzes past him before he could react and runs away
for four 37.2 Williams to Rahmat, 3 runs, slower
through the air, Rahmat goes for the
drive and the outside edge beats a diving Ervine to his right at first
slip 79.6 Williams to Rahmat, 1 run, dropped! A
miscued lofted drive from Rahmat
after he shimmies down the track. Nyamhuri
backpedals from deep-ish mid-on and fails to hold onto it as he tries to
catch it overhead. Another reprieve
for Rahmat! Williams won't be happy with that 92.5 Muzarabani to Rahmat, no run, dropped!
Back of length and gets some extra
bounce onto off stump, Rahmat tried to clip it leg side but gets a
leading edge that lobs back to the
bowler. A simple return catch put down by the bowler. Rahmat Shah gets two lives in this
over! 116.4 Williams to Rahmat, no run, short and
extra bounce outside off, goes over
the attempted cut I concluded that the 37.2 “3 runs,chance!”
incident was not really a dropped catch. (Some reporters don’t use ‘chance’
to mean a dropped catch.) That leaves
us with six dropped catches in Rahmat’s innings. A couple of little extras on dropped catches... -
When Harry Brook scored 171 at Christchurch, he was missed five times.
This equals an England 'record' (again, very much a 'where known' record) of
WG Grace (170) in 1886. As often happens, there is some ambiguity about
Brooks' tally: one of the misses was called leg bye by the umpire, but was
clearly off the bat on replay. If the keeper had made the catch, a review
would have overturned the leg bye call, so it should stand as a dropped
catch. -
I could not find a single dropped catch in the first Test between West
Indies and Pakistan at Multan a few weeks ago. A contact of mine who also
follows these things (Garry Morgan) concurs. In the last 20-odd years I think
that there are only a couple of other completed Tests where I could not find
any misses. I have updated a list of the most fumble-favoured
innings in Tests. Naturally, there could be others yet to be recognised… Batsmen dropped most times in a Test
innings (where known)
UPDATE: Trevor Bailey was reportedly dropped five
times in making 82 against West Indies at Lord’s in 1957. ******** |
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At the start of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series,
Virat Kohli needed 49 runs of Nathan Lyon's bowling to set a new head-to-head
record. However, he managed only 44 runs off Lyon in 5
Tests, taking him to 573 runs, short of the 577 by Steve Smith off Broad.
Kohli did manage to top Pujara's take off Lyon of 571 runs. Most would have backed Kohli to take this record,
but a combination of Kohli's indifferent form, and Lyon hardly being given a
proper bowl, denied him. It is conceivable that they will play one another
again. ******** A few little notes from a day at the cricket... There was a 'double overthrow', although only 3
runs were scored. I know Allan Knott once got a seven this way, but does
anyone know of other instances? There were no advertising logos painted on the
(hallowed) turf, just one word "Melbourne" at the east end. I
wonder if this was a change of policy, or not enough sponsorship. I saw Mike Walsh's name as one of the official
scorers. Mike first scored a Test match at the MCG in 1980-81. Eden Gardens’ record for biggest whole-Test crowd
still stands, although this match was the biggest accurately-counted match. ******** As far as long-serving scorers go, Dr Murray
Power has been scoring for Ireland since 1976, although full Test matches
only started for Ireland much more recently. Apparently the MCG Test was Mike Walsh’s 101st
Test as scorer. Amazingly he is only halfway to Bill Ferguson’s tally. I saw
an inaccurate number given online for Fergie and took a closer look. Fergie
himself claimed that he scored 204 Tests. However, this includes the final
test of 1930-31, whereas the surviving score for this Test includes a note
that Fergie was ill and there was a stand-in scorer. ******** In the 1982-83 Ashes, Ian Botham either batted or
bowled on all 25 days of the five-Test series. Wally Hammond batted or bowled on 30 days of the
1928-29 series, but there were 33 days play in that series (Timeless Tests). There were only 21 days in the 2009 Ashes, but
Stuart Broad batted or bowled on all of them. Also on 21, VS Hazare in Aus in
1947-48, KR Miller in 1950-51 Ashes, and NAT Adcock SA v Eng 1960. Haven't checked these numbers thoroughly. Data is
from bbb files only. ******** |
13 January 2025 Sobers – Separating his Bowling
Styles I have been asked a few times over the years about
Garry Sobers’ variety of bowling styles and what contribution each style made
to his statistics – has anyone compiled any data on this question? I haven’t
seen any, so I took a little time and did some research on this. Unfortunately the surviving scorebooks provide
almost no relevant information, with no specification of bowling styles at
different times. So I turned to detailed newspaper reports and/or film
highlights where available – ten series in all. The selected series extended
from 1959-60 to 1973, covering 44 Tests in all, more than half of Sobers’
Tests in this period. In a few of the Tests, Sobers took no wickets. In
the Tests where he took wickets, I was able to distinguish between pace and
spin for all his wickets, almost 150 of his 235 career wickets. Results look
like so… Garfield
Sobers – Wickets by Bowling Type (Selected Series)
(Unfortunately, in most cases I wasn’t always able
to glean enough info to distinguish between Sobers’ finger-spin and
wrist-spin styles. Sobers said in his autobiography that he stopped bowling
wrist spin after 1966 due to shoulder problems.) While this is not necessarily a random sampling of
Sobers’ Tests in this period, it is quite a large sample. There were about 15 Tests out of the 44 in which he
took wickets with both pace and spin within the same match. There is definitely a historical pattern. While I
didn’t do detailed research prior to 1960, what I did see suggested that all
Sobers’ early wickets were taken with spin bowling – finger-spin I think
(although some reports talk of him bowling “leg breaks” which I take to mean
left arm orthodox). Sobers had been selected initially as a spin bowler, but
within a few years he was setting world records as a batsman, while his
bowling efforts were moderate at best. In 1960-61, he introduced his pace
bowling style, probably because the team touring Australia was already
stronger in spin than pace. In 1961-62 at home, wickets were more spin
friendly and he took most of his wickets accordingly. For a number of years,
he mixed his bowling styles with considerable success. In later Tests, after 1968-69 in Australia, the
table shows that Sobers bowled less and less spin. This was also evident in
detailed film highlights of the World XI matches in 1971-72, where all the
bowling that I could see was pace bowling. Here is a second table summarising all of Sobers’
Test wickets. Some estimates are necessary but I think the final result would
be reasonably robust.
I would stress that I have no information on the
number of overs or runs conceded using the different styles in the above
tables. Note that Sobers’ bowling average in his spin-only stage up to 1960
was a rather indifferent 45.0 (32 Tests, 40 wickets). His bowling average in
his later pace-only Tests from 1969 was 30.9 (20 Tests, 53 wickets). I note that some reporters describe his pace bowling
as “medium pace” and others say “fast-medium”. I don’t know if the
distinctions are meaningful; others may know more about this. ********* Sam Konstas, in the MCG Test against India, scored
his first 50 runs in Test cricket just 66 minutes into his first Test match, facing
52 balls. Probably the fastest for any player: PP Shaw took about 75 minutes
for India in 2018, although that time is only an estimate. Shaw scored 75
before lunch, the most (in a strictly 2-hour session) by any debutant on the
first day. LJ Tancred scored 87 before lunch on debut in 1902, in a slightly
extended session. Konstas’s 60 runs was also just
shy of Rick Darling’s 61 before lunch on debut in 1978. ******** Fewest Balls Faced for an Innings over
60, All Tests
Complete innings only. Others have reached 60 in
fewer balls, but they continued batting. ******** |
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I have mentioned players with the most run out credits
in the past (still led by Jack Hobbs with 19). But what of the players with
fewest credits? The only players with more than 100 Tests and no
run out credits at all are Ross Taylor (112 Tests) and Matthew Hayden (103) Mark Waugh (128), VVS Laxman (134) and
Inzamam-ul-Haq (120) had only one run out credit each. Joe Root in 150 Tests has 3 run out credits.
However, two of them are ‘secondary’ in that he is the second fielder listed.
Shane Warne in his 145 Tests had the same run out stats as Root (1 primary 2
secondary) It is apparent that run outs by slip fielders are
rare. ******** Something a little different. After some
controversy over Mohammad Siraj’s penchant for the ‘celebrappeal’
(wildly celebrating an lbw or caught behind without actually consulting the
umpire) I searched some Cricinfo ball-by-ball texts for that word. This was a very quick search not using any other
terms, so it probably misses some. Results... In 170 recent Tests, there were 38 references to
"celebrappeal". 17 of the 38 went to
review. Stuart Broad was the bowler 11 times, Siraj 5. No
one else more than 2. One by Bangladesh was described as "Broad-esque", another "a Broad-level celebrappeal" Of Siraj's five, none were out. Two were reviewed
but not out, one would have been out but India decided not to review. Of Broad's 11, only two were given out by the
umpire, one of which was overturned on review. One other was given not out, but overturned on a bowling
review. In another of Broad's celebrappeals a run
out occurred while Broad was doing his dance. I should add that 18 of the 38 were actually out,
so Broad's and Siraj's success rates with their celebrappeals
were particularly low. Later: when I extended the search to look at some
earlier Tests and found another 12 references to Broad's celebrappeals
(6 of them were OUT). The first occurrence of the word seems to be 2015 -
Broad again (Durban 2015). That reference says "Broad's celebrappeal was justified this time" suggesting
that it was well-known behaviour before that. The word may well have been
invented in Broad’s honour. ******** Another rarity: In the Adelaide Test against
India, Scott Boland took a wicket with his first ball in the second innings,
after having a catch taken off a no ball with his first delivery of the first
innings. I can only find two cases of a bowler taking a wicket
with his first ball in both innings - Akshar Patel at Ahmedababd
2021 and Zaheer Khan at Mirpur 2007. Suggestions welcome. In Zaheer’s case,
it was the very first ball of both innings. ******** |
21 December 2024 The online database is now complete up to and
including the 2010-11 season. I don’t know how much further I will take it:
certainly up to 2012, but beyond that, sources independent of
Cricinfo/Cricket Archive become progressively harder to find, and so for many
Tests I am not adding much to sources already available. I would like to stress that I am happy to supply
ball-by-ball Test data to amateur researchers (in line-per-ball Excel
format), within reason but free of charge. ‘Reason’ being single series or
season, usually, but ask if you would like more. I am also happy to share series from my ODI
ball-by-ball data, which is not online. I don’t know if or when any of this
will make it to the web. I currently have bbb records for about 800 ODIs from
the 20th Century. These data are not evenly distributed;
Australian coverage is extensive, matches from the subcontinent far less so.
I am hopeful of obtaining more in the future. ******* Stuck in the 90s Following up an enquiry, I dipped into the data to
find out which individual innings involved the most balls faced in the 90s.
The data that I have features the following Most Balls Faced in the 90s
Note Washbrook turning up 1st and 3rd,
and from consecutive Tests! Washbrook’s 114 off 455
balls is one of the strangest centuries; he also spent 67 balls stuck on his
final score of 114, before being dismissed by Ramadhin
in his 10th consecutive maiden over. Batting like that seems simply
weird today. There seems to have been be a ‘culture’ among many batsmen in
the 1950s and 60s that accurate finger-spin bowling could not be hit. Note
also that for Washbrook (and for a number of the other innings in the table)
the number of balls is plus or minus 2 or 3 due to unmarked leg byes in the
scores. Most Balls Faced on 99
Most balls faced on 99 by a batsman who was out for
99 is 17 balls by JG Wright v Eng Christchurch 1991-92. In actual time in the 90s, the most may be ~98
minutes by Saqlain Mushtaq (above). Michael Vaughan’s effort took 87 minutes. There are probably some cases to be found in Tests
that haven’t made it into the ball-by-ball database. ‘Slow-scoring’ records
like this tend to be more common in the past, when more Tests are missing. At the other end of the scale, I had thought for a
long time that no centurion had ever spent only one ball in the 90s. However,
last year Ben Stokes managed it at Lord’s against Australia, going from 88 to
100 with sixes off consecutive balls. He went from 78 to 100 off four legal
balls plus a wide. If anyone can think of other possibilities not
covered, let me know. I checked Jaisimha’s 99 in 504 minutes but I don’t
think it would feature. When Nazar Mohammad took almost nine hours to reach
100 in 1952, he actually sped up a bit in the 90s. ******** There is no precedent for a #10 and #11 (Jasprit and
Akash at the ’Gabba) batsmen needing 33 or more runs to save the follow-on,
and actually getting them. The most by any team needing to save the follow-on
with the 10th wicket is 40 by Bangladesh v Sri Lanka in 2009. The batsmen
were #9 and #11. (I only looked at Tests with 200-run follow-on.) ******** |
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In the Test Match Database, quite a few
discrepancies have been found in secondary stats (such as minutes batted)
between the main scorecards on the one hand and the table of half-centuries
on the other. Most of these problems have come from revisions to the main
scorecards that I have neglected to transfer through to the 50+ files. For
early Tests especially, these problems often derive from uncertainties and
conflicts in the reports that match scorecards are based on. I have now been through all the anomalies and I
have corrected as many of the conflicts as possible. For example, in the very
first Test, I have settled on 210 minutes for an innings of 63 by H Jupp, as
per the main scorecard, previously given as 191 minutes in the 50+ file. Most
corrections are smaller than this. ******** My blog has now passed the 20-year mark. The
first entry was on 6 November 2004. The early entries
are mostly copies of the short columns I wrote for The Age newspaper at the
time. I haven't changed the format of the blog much in 20 years, due to lack
of computer skills. Now very old-fashioned. So be it. ******** In the India A match in Melbourne the other day,
the first four balls of Australia A second innings were faced by four
different batsmen. It went 1,W,W,0 ******** |
29 November 2024 Nathan McSweeney, making his Test debut against
India in the Perth Test, took a catch after just 13 balls were bowled in the
match. Sounds rare, but it turns out to be a bit more common than I thought.
Here are some other names for catches on Test debut in the first over of the
match… HJ Tayfield 0.2 RG Hart 0.3 IM Chappell 0.3 PJP Burge 0.4 MRJ Veletta 0.4 IG Butler 0.5 While ball-by-ball data is incomplete for many
Tests, I have reason to believe that the above list is complete. I had a memory of Chris Sabburg,
who never played first-class cricket, taking a catch (off Kevin Pietersen) on
his first ball as fielding substitute at the ’Gabba in 2013. However,
according to an interview with Sabburg on YouTube,
he had been a sub for a couple of overs earlier in the day, so that
disqualifies him; he came on a second time and took the catch second ball. In innings two of a Test, Allen Lissette in 1955 and
Pragyan Ojha in 2009 took a catch off their first ball when fielding on
debut. Both had batted earlier in the match. ******** Here is an example of the pitfalls of producing a
table of records based on very incomplete information. When Marnus
Labuschagne was out for 2 off 52 balls in Perth, the Fox Sports website (but
not the TV coverage) put up a supposed list of slowest Test innings by
Australian batsmen…
Unfortunately this list is based on dodgy
information. When I generated a list from my own database, using the same
qualification of 50 balls minimum, I got the following…
So there are significant additions. There is also an
error in the TV list – Peter Taylor never scored 4 off 66 balls. The online
scorecards do show this for St John’s in 1991, but Taylor actually
scored 4 off 41 balls, not 66. One reason for this error is that slow-scoring
records were often set long ago, and Cricinfo/Cricket Archive lack the needed
detail for early Tests. By contrast, fast-scoring records are often quite
recent so they do better with that category. ******** |
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It was a long wait, but the 100th score
of 250 or more in Tests has finally arrived thanks to Joe Root. Root’s 262
came 106 Tests after the previous score of 250 (252 by Tom Latham at
Christchurch in 2022). This was equal to the longest pause, in terms of Tests
played, between 250s in history: there was also a gap of 106 Tests in the
1980s. Root clocked up the 100th in Multan
just half an hour in playing time – 9
overs – ahead of Harry Brook, who went on to 317, which I supposed was
the shortest gap between 250s except that the case of Jayawardene and
Sangakkara reaching 250 against South Africa in 2006 was extremely similar. Prior to the 106-Test gap, there had been a
53-Test gap going back to Kane Williamson’s 251 in 2020. This represents
quite a dearth of giant scores in this decade, maybe an effect of ‘Bazball’. Modern batsmen are so prone to hitting the ball
in the air nowadays that it is perhaps not surprising that giant scores have
become so rare. Having said that, it is interesting that Root and Brook hit
only 3 sixes in their combined 579 runs. There were six 250s in the space of 25 Tests in
1957-58. ********* At Chittagong in March, Prabath Jayasuriya was
dropped by three Bangladeshi slips fielders off the same ball. Jayauriya was on 6 when he edged a ball off Khaled Ahmed;
Shanto at 1st slip missed the chance but
it then deflected to Dipu at 2nd
and on to Zakir at 3rd, but none of them could hang on. ******** |
4 November 2024 Why Eleven? There was an interesting question on a ACS chat site
a little while back: what is the origin of having eleven players in a cricket
team? In truth the answer is lost in the mists of time.
The earliest surviving scorecards, from 1744, have teams of eleven, but
earlier descriptions of the game generally lack the detail to help with the
question of origins. The 1727 ‘Goodwood’ rules for a cricket match in Sussex
describes teams of twelve, which complicates things, but it is understood
(not sure how) that eleven was the standard. Someone asked the much-vaunted AI, which came up
with a completely useless answer. The most satisfying answer offered was from Eric
Parker’s History of Cricket, published around 1950. He pointed out how
the numbers 11 and 22 crop up (so to speak) regularly in traditional farming
practices in England. There are 22 yards in one chain, a common farm
measurement; farms possessed a literal chain created for the purpose. Easy to
measure out a cricket pitch. There were 10 chains to a furlong (a “long
furrow” = 220 yards) and eight furlongs to a mile. An area one chain by one
furlong was an acre, being the area that one worker could plough in one day
with a team of oxen. The original stumps (two of them in underarm days)
were 22 inches high placed five and a half inches apart; the ball was five
and a half ounces. I like the connection with the number 22. Beyond
that we don’t have a terribly clear idea when the idea of applying it to
cricket matches arose. ******** It appears that the protocol for measuring minutes
batted has changed, at least as far as online scores go. Drinks breaks are no
longer included in batting times. This represents a break with traditional
practice. While the change has some logic, that break makes historical
comparisons a little harder. Here is a comparison of a recent innings from
Pakistan. The CA/CI (Cricket Archive/Cricinfo) times are on the left and
exclude drinks breaks. Source BB is a score that includes drinks breaks, and
Source C is similar.
There is potential for confusion if the protocols
get mixed, such as when one protocol is used for the whole innings but
another for milestones (50s, 100s etc) from different source. The differences
in the above data, while sometimes small,
appear to go beyond exclusion of drinks breaks. ******** The Draw Drought One effect of the escalation of big hitting and high
strike rates in Tests has been the near-disappearance of drawn Tests. The
trend has been particularly strong in the last year. In the last 50-odd
Tests, there has been only one Test that was drawn after play on Day 5 (and
one other where Day 5 was rained out). That Test, West Indies v South Africa
at Port-of Spain in August, had four full sessions lost to bad weather, and
other sessions shortened. This was brought home when draws seemed to be a
foregone conclusion in two recent Tests; there seemed to be no chance of results
after Day 3 at Kanpur (India v Bangladesh, where almost 3 days were lost to
weather) and Multan (Pakistan v England, with first innings of 566 and 823),
yet both Tests were completed with time to spare. The lack of dull draws is surely welcome, yet with
that comes the disappearance of exciting draws. In the last 100 Tests, there
has been only one that I would class as a draw with a close finish: at
Karachi in 2023 Pakistan (449 & 277/5) v New Zealand (408 & 304/9).
Close Tests haven’t disappeared entirely – there was New Zealand winning off
the last ball at Christchurch in 2023 against Sri Lanka – but hopes for
forcing a draw against the odds are rare now. Nevertheless the preponderance
of result Tests means that such Tests that have close finishes still occur
fairly regularly. ******** |
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Lawrie Colliver has provided a re-score of an ODI
that Australia played in Pakistan in 1988, scored from a newly-discovered
video. It was the only ODI that Australia played on that tour, the others
being cancelled due to floods and rioting in the aftermath of the
assassination of President Zia. apiece – but
Pakistan was declared the winner on account of losing fewer wickets (7
to 8). As far as I know, it is one of only two tied ODIs decided by this
method. It appeared especially odd because, with the scores tied, Pakistan
made no attempt to score from the last five balls, bowled by Dodemaide . Presumably they knew that they were ‘ahead’,
but it almost came unstuck when a wicket fell off the second last ball. Abdul
Qadir faced the last ball and padded it away. A wicket here would have tied
the game in wickets as well as runs. Lawrie’s notes describe it as “plumb”
but it was given not out, and so Pakistan won. ******** India had a remarkable win in the recent Kanpur
Test, coming after more than two days were washed out. It was the first time
that a team has started its first innings on the fourth day and won, with the
peculiar exception of the Cronje 'Leather Jacket' Test. The fourth day also featured the most wickets on
a day with over 400 runs. 437 runs, 18 wickets (85 overs), previously 447/17
(91.4 overs) at The Oval 2013, and 414/17 at Lord's 1931. ******** |
October 2024 A Brief History of Rest Days A recent Test in Sri Lanka had a ‘Rest’ day – actually
a pause for a national election. Like the handful of Tests in this Century
that had such pauses, there were special circumstance involved. The ToSh group had a
little discussion about this, and it got me looking into the history of Rest
Days. I was surprised by some of the observations. The insertion of days off into Test matches,
specifically as rest days, dates only from the 1950s. Prior to that all ‘rest
days’ were literal days of rest, i.e., Sundays, with the occasional pause
also on Christmas Day. For a long time, playing cricket on a Sunday was
severely frowned upon, or even illegal, in Christian countries. Some of the
earliest written records of cricket in the 17th Century are court
records of people fined for playing cricket on the Sabbath. In England, there were no rest days of any kind
prior to 1920. All Tests were three days, commencing early- or mid-week,
aligned with County matches. In Australia, Tests were longer and often
encompassed the weekend, but days off were always on a Sunday, even if the
match started on a Saturday. There is one Test that shows that the idea of
simply granting players a day off did not apply in those days: the first Test
of 1897-98 at the SCG started on a Monday and went for five days without a
break. In 1921, some Tests in England started to straddle
the weekend and the Sunday prohibition applied. It was similar in South
Africa, where a Test in 1922-23 actually had two consecutive days off, a
Sunday and Christmas Day on the Monday. The epic Durban Test of 1939 had two
Sundays in addition to the ten scheduled days. The first Tests with Sunday play occurred during
England’s first tour of India in 1933-34. When West Indies toured India in
1948-49, there was play on Sundays and the five-day Tests had no rest days.
The idea of regular rest days seems to have emerged in the 1951-52 England
tour of India, where there was play on Sundays but a day off after Day 3 of
each Test. Rest days soon became the norm in the five-day and
six-day Tests in Australia and England, but invariably these remained on a
Sunday for many years. The West Indies had the same approach; there were also
a couple of Tests which had two rest days because they occurred over Easter,
pausing for Good Friday and Easter Sunday. The last of these was in 1965
(Georgetown). One of the oddest cases was Karachi 1956. There was
a rest after Day 3 (Sunday); then on Monday (Day 4) Pakistan dominated and
were set 69 to win. Incredibly they scored only 63 for 1 in 46 overs before
stumps, and so had to come back. The next day was another rest day (a day of
mourning for a political figure) and so they waited till Wednesday to score
the needed six runs. Sunday play in Australia was finally introduced in
1968-69 (although not in all Tests). Those Tests with Sunday play had rest
days after Day 2 or 3. England did not have Sunday play until 1981, and even
then it was irregular with most rest days coinciding with Sunday. After 1986-87, rest days in Australia fade from
view, only occurring under special circumstances. New Zealand followed suit.
(The special circumstances were sometimes very odd: the Brisbane Test of
1995-96 was paused for a day so that the broadcaster could show the
Australian Grand Prix.) Rest days in England remained, when scheduled, on
Sundays, before disappearing in the early 1990s. Rest days were dispensed
with in South Africa when that country returned to Test cricket in 1992, but
they continued to be regularly used in the hotter climes of the subcontinent
and West Indies. In a unique occurrence, a Zimbabwe/New Zealand Test in
November 1992 was paused for a day so that an ODI could be played. Not
exactly a rest day! The pressure of tighter schedules was making its
mark, and the last series with normal rest days appears to be New Zealand in
West Indies in 1996. There was a rest day in India’s first Test there the
following year (on Good Friday), but the other two Tests of the series were
so heavily rain-affected that the idea of rest days did not apply. As said earlier, scheduled pauses in Tests since
then have only occurred under special circumstances. A day was taken in a
Test at Sharjah in 2014 following the shocking death of Philip Hughes, but
extra play was added at the scheduled end of the match. Frequency of rest days (Day Prior,
Number of Tests) 1 138 2 269 3 510 4 34 5 3 For the record, here are what can be described as
Rest or Pause Days in Tests from the last 30 years.
******** Most Runs added after the fall of each
wicket (Test innings)
******** |
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Most runs added after a top-scorer was out… At Kingston in 1955 top scorer Neil Harvey (204)
was out at 373 and Australia made 758, so that is 385 runs added. ******** Half of all Test series have been played in the
21st Century, even if one-off Tests are not considered. The proliferation of
two- and three-Test series at the expense of fours- and fives- is part of the
reason. ******** The England v Australia T20 at Southampton, won
by Australia 179 to 151, was the equal highest scoring T20 international
where both teams were bowled out in less than their allotted 20 overs.( There
was a match between Bangladesh and West Indies in 2018 that also produced 330
runs.) In a 348-run match between Australia and Pakistan
on 2 May 2010, both teams were bowled out, but they both played the full 20
overs. ******** At Dhaka in 2004, Irfan Pathan bowled two
hat-trick balls to Mohammad Ashraful in the same innings. The first came
after Pathan had dismissed Rajin Saleh first ball and Ashraful came to the
wicket. The second came when Pathan dismissed Mushfiqur Rahman first ball at
the end of an over. Ashraful was still batting and faced Pathan when he
started his next over, hitting him for 3. Late in the innings there was another hat-trick
ball, bowled by Kumble while Ashraful was still batting, but this time he was
at the non-strikers end. ******** |
15 September 2024 The Slowest Starters In his sixth innings extending over almost 2 years,
Mohammad Ali of Pakistan finally scored his first run in Test matches. The
stroke for two came off his 52nd ball faced. I decided to make a
list to see who had made a slower start… Most balls faced before scoring first
career run in Tests.
Giffen’s number is uncertain because the analysis is
based on (very detailed) newspaper reports. It should be reasonably accurate
because most of it comprised maiden overs. Zahir Khan of Afghanistan did not score until his
eighth innings, but faced only 29 balls in doing so. Most of the above is extracted from the ball-by-ball
database, covering 80 per cent of Tests. Some of the figures are surprising,
and probably could not be guessed from the whole innings data; Hamish
Marshall is an example – his first Test innings was 40 off 121 balls, from
which one would not expect 38 balls to get off the mark. So it is likely that
there would be other cases not identified. One would be Sajeewa
de Silva (KSC de Silva) in the 1990s, whose possible range is 38 to 52 balls,
probably at the lower end of that range. Terry Jarvis of New Zealand scored 9 in 123 minutes
in his first Test innings in 1964-65, but no other detail is available. ******** The Great LBW Drought The 1970-71 series was a watershed in Ashes history,
ending Australia’s hold over the urn in the 1960s and ushering in a more
evenly contested decade. England won that six-Test series 2–0; apart from
Bodyline (1932-33), it is the only time in the past century that England has
regained the Ashes in Australia. There were some statistical oddities. Chief among
them: not one Australian batsman was given out lbw in the entire series. This
remains a sore point among England fans with long memories, although there
was also a low count of English victims, just five. There were mitigating
factors. Most important was an odd change in the lbw Law (as
an “experimental rule”) that was tested out from the Australian domestic
season in 1969-70, to 1971. The intent was to discourage pad play by making
it easier to be given out doing playing “no genuine stroke”, but the specific
wording of the rule had a strange side effect. It reverted ‘standard’ lbws
(where a stroke was played) to the pre-1935 Law, making it mandatory for a
ball to pitch in line with the stumps, so excluding balls pitching outside
off stump. (By 1972, the wording had been modified to restore the pre-1969
criteria for standard lbws, while retaining the new no stroke provisions.
This was permanently written into the Laws in 1980.) There had been a dramatic effect, with the incidence
of lbw in Australian domestic cricket dropping from 8-9 per cent of
dismissals (1967 to 1969) to 4-5 per cent after the rule change, returning to
9 per cent in 1972-73. In the 70-71 Tests, it was only 2.7 per cent. Umpire
Tom Brooks may have amplified the effect; he umpired five Tests (plus the
abandoned Melbourne Test) but gave only two batsmen out lbw, both English.
Incidentally, my father was a 1st Grade umpire in Sydney in those
years and knew Brooks, and I remember Dad remarking that Brooks’ instructions
were that lbw conditions were always extremely difficult to satisfy. In that climactic final Test of 70-71 at the SCG,
Rowan gave Ray Illingworth out lbw to Dennis Lillee. Surviving video
highlights show Illingworth playing no stroke – probably the first batsmen
given out under the experimental rule. (Batsmen had been out lbw playing no
stroke before often enough, but under standard rules.) The other lbw in the series was given at the MCG, by
Max O’Connell, who officiated in two Tests. The table shows the fluctuations in lbws in Test
matches brought on by the changes. Incidence of LBWs in Test matches.
All Test matches, calendar years. “1970”
includes some matches before the experimental rule. The experimental rule was followed in England in 1971,
in Tests versus Pakistan and India. In six Tests, there were only five lbws,
a similar tally to the 70-71 Ashes. Just two of them were against England
batsmen. Only one of the five was a ‘no stroke’ lbw (Snow to Gavaskar). The
only lbw in the three Pakistan Tests was very last wicket of the series. When normality was restored in 1972, there were 27
lbws in five Ashes Tests in England. Curiously, none of them were of the ‘no
stroke’ variety. Today about five per cent of lbws involve the batsman
playing no stroke. Incidence of LBW in Australian
First-Class Cricket 1966-74
******** Understanding the Law Change The 1971 L.B.W. Law is illustrated from Wisden
of that year. It took me a while to understand it. The Section 39 in bold
type is the Law as it had stood for over 35 years. It includes a provision
for lbw to balls “pitched on the off-side of the striker’s wicket”. However,
in 1971 this paragraph was no longer in force and had been completely
superseded by the “experimental rule” in italics. Part (a) of the rule
requires the ball to have pitched in line with the stumps, contrary to the
provision of Law 39. Though not stated explicitly, it applies to standard
lbws. Part (b) – and only Part (b) – allows for balls pitching outside off
stump, but applies only to batsmen making no genuine effort to play the ball.
I cannot be certain that this reversion to the pre-1935
Law was the intention of the new wording, but it certainly was the effect. It
is hard to understand how making standard lbws more restrictive could reduce
the amount of pad play, if that was the goal. ******** |
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I have endeavoured to update my list of unusual dismissals in Test matches. If anyone
can think of cases that I have missed that should be considered, particularly
in recent years, let me know. Test matches only. The list now includes the Bairstow brain fade at
Lord’s last year. ******** |
31 August 2024 Stroke or no stroke? As a follow-up to my last post, here is some data on
batsmen dismissed (bowled or lbw) without playing a stroke. Data is since
Cricinfo began archiving text description in 1999. The data for 1999 to 2001
is probably rather patchy. I have noted 247 cases of no stroke bowled
dismissals since 1999 (4.2 % of all bowled dismissals) and 301 LBW (5.1 %)
*Innings after April 1999 TWM Latham has four no stroke BWDs but no LBW, and Brian
Lara has four no stroke LBWs but no BWDs. Interesting that neither Lara nor
Tendulkar are known to have been bowled this way, but they have 12 LBWs (note
Chanderpaul also). However, there is no data for
them before 1999. Tendulkar’s lbws include the controversial incident when he
was hit on the arm/shoulder trying to duck a McGrath delivery that did not
get up. Most innings played without a ‘no stroke’ bowled or
LBW: Angelo Mathews of Sri Lanka on 195 and Mark Boucher of South Africa on
183. ******** No shot lbw in both innings: KD Mackay, Kanpur 1959-60 (pair of ducks) BC Lara, Leeds 2000. ******** |
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In the Wellington Test of 2023 (New Zealand v Sri
Lanka) not a single batsman was out bowled or lbw. New Zealand won by an innings.
Only one lbw decision was reviewed, the umpire’s not out decision being
upheld. ******** In the Nottingham Test England reached 50 faster
than any team before them, on the second ball of the fifth over. Even more
notable was the fact that it was done on the first morning of the Test; most
previous record-breaking 50s have happened in teams’ second innings when
quick runs were required. The relevant section of the Unusual Records has been updated. ******** |
5 August 2024 Clean Bowled or Played On? For the last twenty years or more, I have
periodically been going through descriptions of ‘BOWLED’ dismissals in Tests
to distinguish between ‘clean bowled’ and ‘played on’ dismissals, with ‘no
stroke’ dismissals thrown in for good measure. Here is a little statistical
study of some of the data for recent years. This does rely on the Cricinfo
commentators noticing edges – and this sometimes requires extensive replays –
but the descriptions are now so detailed that I would expect that a great
majority of cases are noticed. I looked at 668 batsmen out bowled, in 115 Tests. [Bowled
dismissals in total account for 18 per cent of all dismissals (more like 25
per cent for tailenders)]. Of the 668, I noted 155 cases of the ball hitting
bat first, and a further 35 coming off the pad or other body part. That is 23
per cent off the bat and 5.2 per cent off the pad, giving a total of 28.4 per
cent, In another 34 cases (5.1 per cent), the batsmen was
recorded as playing no stroke; nearly all of these were clean bowled. There
were also a (very) few cases where no stroke was offered, but the ball hit
the bat anyway and went onto the stumps. Left-handed batsmen are more likely than
right-handed to play on: 34 per cent to 26 percent (total edge or pad). It
might be that the line required for a right-handed bowler to bowl a
left-hander is more difficult than with a right-handed batsman. There is less difference between left- and
right-handed bowlers: 25 per cent (left) and 30 per cent (right). Pace bowlers get 32 per cent of their bowled wickets
via edge or pad, whereas spin bowlers get only 19 per cent. The incidence of
‘playing on’ varies between countries, and appears to be associated with the
dominance of pace or spin bowling across various countries.
Perhaps of more interest is a strong relationship
between batting position and a propensity to play on. There is a major
difference between top-order and bottom-order bats, presumably linked to much
tighter techniques among better batsmen. It is quite hard to get a ball on
the stumps through a top batsman’s defence without hitting something on the
way.
One interesting question that is hard to answer is:
How many bowled dismissals occur to balls that are not directed at the stumps?
The available descriptions often don’t distinguish between playing on with a
fine edge (when the ball would probably have hit the stumps anyway) and
playing on to a ball that would have missed the stumps. My impression is that
the latter is in the majority, but beyond that I wouldn’t hazard a guess.
Perhaps the massive CricViz database could offer some clues. ******* |
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