Cricket Numbers & Stats

Normalizing India

2008-01-30T20:31:00.000-08:00

Well, the series is done. India finished at 1-2, which is what I predicted before the series to some of my friends in the office. In fact, I am happy they finished so well, because throughout the first 4 days, I thought India was the one under threat at Adelaide. But Sehwag did some good magic to finish things off well for India.

I know I might get some flak for putting these thoughts in the open, but I think I am being true to the facts, so I am going to go out and let it out. Though some people do think that if the Sydney match had any other result, the effective score for the series would have been different. I beg to disagree. In fact, Indians have a habit of normalizing their game over a period of time. If India had in fact won the Sydney test, the motivation to win it at Perth would not have been there. Indian cricket team does have an emotional side to their game and they drawn upon it at difficult circumstance while drain themselves in comfortable situations.

Had India not seen the ignomity of early failures in the 2003 World Cup and the subsequent defacing by holligans back home, I suspect if they could have risen to such high standards in that World Cup. I suspect if India had not been thrown out of the 2007 ODI World Cup, they would not have got themselves together for the T20 Championships.

On the other hand, when Indians are in the lead, they don't seem to consolidate so well. We saw it in South Africa and England and at home against Pakistan last year where India saw initial success but did not translate it to further success later on in the series, even losing out the series in SA.

So, the moot point is Indias normalize their game and even if they had won it at Sydney, they would have lost it in Perth. so, the score of 1-2 in the end seems a reasonably good end to a tough series.

Ganguly dropped, but will it solve India's Future problems?

2008-01-22T20:06:00.000-08:00

Unfortunate, isn't it? Its been a little over 12 months since he returned to ODI cricket on the backing of a sound performance in the SA test series. Having done that his batting performance in the that period has been really good and is better (by a good 10%) than his career averages. Though popular perception is that his strike rate has been low, he maintained it at 73+ which is close to his career strike rate.

	Mat	Inns	NO	Runs	HS	Ave	SR	100	50
Overall Career	311	300	23	11363	183	41.02	73.7	22	72
Since Comeback in 2007	32	30	2	1240	98	44.28	73.02	0	12
Before Comeback	279	270	21	10123	183	40.65	73.79	22	60

But numbers don't say the real thing, do they? It neither explains the fact that he is a poor fielder and may not the best runner between the wickets. It may also not outline, as some conspiracy theorists have pointed out, a fissure between the ODI captain MS Dhoni and the seniors.

I don't know if the fissure is for real or not and I am hoping it is not. However, I do feel that Indian Cricket has to start preparing for the loss of its 5 main stalwarts - Sachin, Dravid, Ganguly, Kumble and VVS Laxman. They have all had pivotal positions in the last few years and each have contributed in an amazingly consistent manner. While Kumble is already announced his retirement from ODI and never played T20, and the possibility of players like Harbhajan and Piyush Chawla stepping in his spin-bowler-shoes, the others don't have viable replacements.

The problem with Batting in Test Matches is going to get acute. Even when they dropped Ganguly in 2006, they couldn't find viable alternatives in the batting line up. I am hoping that some of the youngsters will stand up the void and start performing at International standards. Our recent experiences with batsmen other than the big-4 has been rather bad. We have not yet found a good set of consistent openers and almost nobody to challenge any of the big-4 slots with Yuvraj being the last to be unsuccesful to cement a place. That said, the time to get the void replaced is not much. In all probability, all five will make their exits, either graciously or ungraciously over the next 12-24 months and the replacements should be in by then.

For now, I am hoping that dropping Ganguly will indeed create a better replacement and not just a bunch of failed experiments leading to Ganguly reclaiming his spot.

I am a "Hypeist", so what?

2008-01-20T19:49:00.000-08:00

Well, India did defeat Australia to create History. First victory of a subcontinent team at Perth, first Indian win at Perth, Breaking the 16 match streak twice in a row by Indians, Defeating Australia in Australia in 4+ years, first defeat for Ponting as captain at home and so on. The list of ways to ascribe this win is endless. I salute the Indian team efforts.

I was extremely fortunate to be watching the match on TV when India defeated Australia at Adelaide in 2003 and am thankful that I witnessed Shaun Tait being bowled to give India this victory. I almost remember all the commentary/follow-through after that match and saw Dravid with tears of joy welling up. It was amazing.

It is amazing yet again to see Kumble talk about having two options - "To Go Home or Win and prove ourselves". Yes, I recall telling my friends that those are the exact two options he had after the Sydney fiasco. He chose the best option available, just defeat the Aussies and prove yourself. Amazing.

Interestingly, Sunny Gavaskar was talking about "Hypeists" - those who wrote off India at Perth and also went to say, they would be trounced within 3 days. Those around me will be first to pop up say - Shreeni is a hypeist. Indeed I am. I said the exact same things. And I am very happy I have been proven wrong. Very Very Happy.

Having said that, whats wrong with being a hypeist. Having followed Indian Cricket for more than a decade and a half, its amazing how India manage to crop up the biggest surprises and shocks. Its unbelievable (often inconcievable) that they could lose a match and they would and on some other day, they will come right back and do the unthinkable to defeating the great opposition in harsh conditions. Giving this topsy turvy ride, there are two options, play it safe and diplomatic and always put out a balanced option. Sunny has to do it, he is a commentator after all and good for him.

But I do let my emotions flow and say what I really feel. Also, as you learn about Indian Cricket, you often feel disappointed after being let down by some bad Cricket. My mom used to tell me that disappointment comes with expectation. Isn't it then best that you set your expectations low, specially in a situation when the stacks are heavily loaded against the Men in Blue so as to avoid deep disappointment?

That said, I am in no way indicating that I did not support the Indian team. In fact I was wishing them the best all the time and cheered with every good session in this Test match. But I kept my expectation. Remember that at Sydney, defeat came to us because of one bad over, three wickets after having worked hard for 14+ good sessions?

So, I am a hypeist and don't mind being one.

ps: I am yet to get the word hypeist in an online dictionary. I am also assuming that I heard the word right and this is what it was intended to be. If I am wrong, excuse me.

My musings on Sydney

2008-01-06T19:15:00.000-08:00

India's tour to Australia for Cricket is turning out to be a battle on more than one front. At this point, it doesn't seem muck cricket like, but more like an enduring lesson in diplomacy, sports-psychology and sportsmanship.

India have lost the second test match and Sydney and Australia have achieved a record of 16 consecutive test match wins. A lot will be said and written about this test match. So, I decided to jump in the fray and instead of concentrating on records, decided to write a few thoughts. Anyway, this test match should not be remembered for the records, but for the game itself.

Umpiring

Firstly, the umpiring errors. Its very easy to take the view that Bucknor and Benson were biased against India. But if we think a little more objectively, what else could be the case? Bucknor and Benson were having a truly bad test match and that it could happen to anybody. If that is the case, Bucknor and Benson should be forthcoming in their apology to Indian cricket on their follies and promise to do better in future.

Second possibility is that they are truly incompetent. This is something that the umpires themselves will not accept. So, ICC should step in and annul the test match result and take action against the umpires.

Either of the two scenarios still do not explain why such mistakes (9 of them) are clearly against India (8 of them benefited Australia). Human errors apart, the third umpire making a mistake puts it, in my mind at least, that this match is a proof where umpiring consciously favored Australia.

More of the umpiring biases towards Australia in recent years on this blog. I quote from there:

"whenever Australia face a crisis situation they have more often that not been aided by the on field umpires whether home or neutral. Such attitudes raise questions on the ethical integrity apart from the bias quotient of the officiating umpires. It is for this reason, and for this reason alone that Australian players and media are highly reluctant to make use of technology. Rather, they would prefer to bear [read enjoy] human errors; for they know that at the end of the day technology will not conform to their needs at crisis situations and bail them out. As long as human errors are aiding their cause of establishing world record winning streaks by rescuing them from hopeless positions they would leave the tough part of biting the bullet to the opposition."

Australia's dominance

So, why should the umpires be biased. I don't know. The simplest reason is that Australia wishes to keep the winning thing going at any cost. And it seems the cost to pay is fairness. Australia has been challenged time and again in the recent past and history tells us that no team can keep on winning as well as Australia have done in the past decade. To prolong the streak, they need something more than just good cricket. In the past, they have resorted to sledging. Apparently, that is not good enough, particularly against teams like India which are willing to fight fire with fire.

Once sledging was proved to be ineffective, they have started being unethical on the field, complaining about Harbhajan and getting him a ban when there seems to be no evidence against him. Then, they decide to wrongly appeal on more than one occasion in this match when clearly they clearly knew that, based on cricket alone they could not win the match. Harbhajan's ban serves the important puspose of allowing their captain to score some runs in this series.

Ricky Ponting, who had disciplinary issues as a young cricketer has moved to be a great player. That said, he also wishes, as anybody else would, to stamp himself as one of the greatest captains of the game. His two World records, enviable test and One day record indicate that he is in line for the same. But sometimes all this can get to you. Now, Ponting wants to usurp Steve Waugh's record at any cost, even at the cost of cheating. if they continue to keep cheating, they might not just complete this tour of India at 18 consecutive wins, but also probably end next year at 25, the following year at 35 and so on. Nothing can stop you if you wish to play the unfair game.

India's Gumption

If Australia seems like an unfair winner to this test match, I feel India is a fair loser of this test match. True that they played the game to spirit and that they had a lot of things going against them. All that still doesn't explain Wasim Jaffer and Yuvraj Singh repeatedly failing at crucial points to hand over the onus to the Aussies. It also doesn't explain the poor batting display during Michael Clarke's penultimate over of the match. Well knowing that 12 more balls can get them to safety, unable to play a part-time slow bowler with three wickets in hand is not acceptable. It needs gumption to turn history on its head and India lacked it at key times in this match.

Having said that, I have to hand it to the Indians for playing so well and putting up such a fantastic performance and getting so close. They have two more matches and to prove that the Umpiring decisions alone won Aussies the match, they should defeat Aussies in both test matches and prove that they were in fact the best team in this competition. And lets all hope that God (and more importantly the umpires) are with them for the upcoming two matches.

Boxing Day tests roundup

2007-12-29T17:25:00.000-08:00

So, India did lose the first test at MCG, as I feared in my previous post, this defeat did make it to the Highest margins of defeat by runs record. Shameful. This is India's third worst defeat, behind 342 run loss against Australia at Nagpur 2004 and 341 run loss against Pakistan in Karachi 2006.

If Australia do win this series, which I am feeling might probably happen, it will be their 8th consecutive series victory, which will be their best ever consecutive performance and they will come in line to eclipse England's record of 9 successive test series win between 1884-1891.

If Australia win at SCG, they will equal their own record of 16 consecutive test match wins. That previous sequence was broken by India in the famous Kolkatta test where VVS Laxman hit that beautiful 281. Lets see if India can stop them from progressing once again.

West Indies defeated South Africa yesterday to go 1Up in the series. Its a significnt achievement for West Indies. Not only have they secured a victory against South Africa, no less, they have done it in the first test. West Indies, like India are known to be slow starters in any series. They previous win in the first test came against Pakistan in 2005. And prior to that in 2002 against Bangladesh. So, you can judge how rare, but deserving victory this is. Its only the start, and they must secure the series win, unlike India, which squandered a 1-0 lead against SA to lose 2-1 last year.

Indias Target in perspective

2007-12-28T07:27:00.000-08:00

India's target of 499 seems huge. Of course, India's own poor batting performance lead to them having such a huge target to chase. But lets actually see what's happened in the past in the fourth innings.

At least on one occasion, England has scored 654/5 in the fourth innings of the test match against South Africa. They were chasing 696 in the 1938-39 series and ended just 42 short. Two centuries and one double century was hit in that epic innings of 218.2 8 ball overs.

Apart from that great effort, there have been 13 other occasions where a team has scored 400 or more runs in the fourth innings, with 3 leading to victories.

Only in this decade did Sarwan and Chanderpaul hit centuries to score 418/7 against - guess who - Australia to win the match. The bowling comprised of McGrath, Gillespie, Lee and McGill. Just a month back, Sri Lanka, lead by a wonderful knock by Sangakkara, scored 410 against Australia and got into 96 runs of victory. Don't forget that India's chase of 406 against the West Indies in Port of Spain is legendary.

Thats not a lot, but enough precedent to go after this target whole heartedly and see if they can get across. Its time to make fresh history....

ps: If they don't make, hope they don't make it to the list of highest margin of victories.

MCG disaster

2007-12-27T08:23:00.000-08:00

Well, at the end of the second day of the first test between India and Australia, you have already seen so much. Firstly, we saw a fantastic performance from Aussie openers, which Hayden followed up to a century, then the fantastic bowling performance from Kumble. And then, you see a forgettable performance from Indian batsmen.

This test is not going to go from a draw either due to dour batting or due to rain. It certainly seems set up for a result and at this moment, if I could bet, I would bet all the damn money in my life of Aussies.

This match will also go down, I am guessing, as probably the tale of the biggest lost opportunity in Indian Cricket for some time to come. Australia are world champions and it takes a lot to defeat them and that too at home. But here you are, in the first test, your bowlers unexpectedly did such a good job and set up the match for India to take control.

All this famed Indian batting line up came off with nothing, zilch and it will be yet another humiliating victory and with that Australia might take the momentum all the way to a sizable win in this series. What a shame....

Who can we put our fingers on? My take is Dravid. If he is so unhappy playing at the opening position, he should have put it out on the table and declined to take field. Thats the gracious thing to do. You come out, do what you did today and hand over the momentum to the opposition and set up non-existent demons and the others just follow suit. I did watch him innings, almost entirely. This was neither such a bad pitch or such a brilliant bowling performance that you need to stifle yourself so much. But, anyway, all this is in retrospect.

India had a golden opportunity to play well, set up the game for a good finish, hopefully finished the winner and if not, given the Aussies the shivers.

100th Test roundup on Ganguly

2007-12-25T20:20:00.000-08:00

The folks at Cricinfo have always been good with statistics. I wanted to do a roundup on Sourav Ganguly on the occasion of his playing his 100th test match today. But before I could start on it, CricInfo has done a fantastic roundup. Go ahead and see it there.

I am summarizing it here:

Seventh Indian to play 100 test matches behind Tendulkar, Kapil Dev, Gavaskar, Kumble, Vengsarkar and Dravid. Mohd Azharuddin ended his career after 99 tests...
Due to his good performance against Pakistan, 2007 is his most successful year, completed 1000 runs in a calendar year, second-highest aggregate by an Indian in a 3 match series etc.
His record is better in away tests compared to home tests, and better as a non-captain compared to while he was a captain.
He is the most successful Indian left handed player.
Most successful captain ever.

Jayawardene overtakes DeSilva

2007-12-19T21:27:00.000-08:00

Jayawardene is currently batting on 213* against England with Sri Lanka placed at 499/7. After this century, which is his 21st, he broke the Sri Lankan record of maximum test Centuries. The earlier record was held by Aravinda DeSilva (20). Other SriLankan high century scorers are Sangakkara and Attapatu ( both 16).

Player	Mat	Inns	NO	Runs	HS	Ave	100	50
DPMD Jayawardene (SL)	93*	151	11	7247	374	51.76	21	30
PA de Silva (SL)	93	159	11	6361	267	42.97	20	22
KC Sangakkara (SL)	71*	116	9	6032	287	56.37	16	24
MS Atapattu (SL)	90	156	15	5502	249	39.02	16	17

The world wide record is of course held by Sachin Tendulkar with 37 centuries. Other highlights of Jayawardene's career has been making 374 against South Africa, which is the fourth highest score in a test Innings. He also shared a World record partnership 624 for the 3rd wicket with Sangakkara in the same match. That partnership of 624 is still the highest ever test partnership for any wicket and the first and only partnership of over 600 in the history of Test Cricket.

Jayasuriya Roundup

2007-12-18T19:39:00.001-08:00

Sanath Jayasuriya recently announced his retirement from International Test Cricket. It brings to an end a rather amazing career. He has scored just under 7000 runs in 110 matches and picked up 98 wickets in the same. He is a triple centurion, having scored the massive 340 against India, two other 200s and has 10 other 100s along with 31 50s. His best performances have come against Bangaladesh, India and Pakistan against who he averages well above 50.

I did write in an earlier blog that Sanath Jayasuriya is among the fastest players in the world. It is also well know that he is a really good six hitter. Lets actually take a good look at how many sixes has he actually hit.

In ODIs, he holds the record for hitting the highest sixes (11) in an innings and shares the same with Shahid Afridi. He also did manage to score 7 sixes in another innings.

Max sixes in an Innings

Player	Runs	Balls	4s	6s	SR	Team	Opposition	Match Date	Scorecard
ST Jayasuriya	134	65	11	11	206.15	Sri Lanka	v Pakistan	04/02/96	ODI # 1088
Shahid Afridi	102	40	6	11	255	Pakistan	v Sri Lanka	10/04/96	ODI # 1125
ST Jayasuriya	109	87	7	7	125.28	Sri Lanka	v Bangladesh	03/21/07	ODI # 2546

Continuing in ODI mode, he also holds the record for the maximum sixes in career. He has hit 245 sixes scoring more than 2 sixes in every 100 runs he has scored. Considering that Shahid Afridi is scoring sixes at a much faster rate and is second only to Jayasuriya at the moment, he might take over from Jayasuriya anytime.

Aggregate sixes in ODIs

Player	Mat	Inns	Runs	Ave	4s	6s	Runs in 6s/100 Runs	6s/Innings
ST Jayasuriya (Asia/SL)	403	392	12207	32.63	1348	245	12.04	0.63
Shahid Afridi (Asia/ICC/Pak)	249	237	5239	23.28	491	237	27.14	1
SC Ganguly (Asia/India)	311	300	11363	41.02	1122	190	10.03	0.63
SR Tendulkar (India)	407	397	15962	44.33	1747	166	6.24	0.42
CL Cairns (ICC/NZ)	215	193	4950	29.46	345	153	18.55	0.79
Inzamam-ul-Haq (Asia/Pak)	378	350	11739	39.52	969	144	7.36	0.41
AC Gilchrist (Aus/ICC)	277	269	9297	36.03	1130	143	9.23	0.53
RT Ponting (Aus/ICC)	287	278	10701	43.85	940	133	7.46	0.48
BC Lara (ICC/WI)	299	289	10405	40.48	1035	133	7.67	0.46
IVA Richards (WI)	187	167	6721	47	600	126	11.25	0.75
Wasim Akram (Pak)	356	280	3717	16.52	247	121	19.53	0.43
HH Gibbs (SA)	220	213	7222	36.65	820	115	9.55	0.54
JH Kallis (Afr/ICC/SA)	269	255	9314	44.77	722	113	7.28	0.44
Abdul Razzaq (Asia/Pak)	231	198	4465	29.96	333	103	13.84	0.52
PA de Silva (SL)	308	296	9284	34.9	712	102	6.59	0.34
RL Powell (WI)	109	100	2085	24.82	185	75	21.58	0.75
JM Kemp (Afr/SA)	85	66	1512	31.5	98	60	23.81	0.91

* There are players who have hit more sixes than Powell and Kemp, but they have been specially included here because of the fast rate at which there are hitting sixes.

In Test matches however, he has scored 59 sixes, which is impressive, but falls well short of the current record of 100 sixes by Adam Gilchrist. He has also scored 10 sixes in T20s, however he falls short of 15 sixes held by Yuvraj Singh.

If you combine the three forms, Test, ODI and T20s, Jayasuriya again comes trumps. He has scored an impressive 314 sixes. Again he is being closely followed by Shahid Afridi and could overtake him anytime.

Maximum 6s in combined careers of ODIs, Tests and T20s

Player	Mat	Inns	Runs	6s	Runs in 6s/100 Runs
ST Jayasuriya (Asia/SL)	520	587	19426	314	9.7
Shahid Afridi (Asia/ICC/Pak)	285	292	7080	295	25
AC Gilchrist (Aus/ICC)	381	411	14964	255	10.22
CL Cairns (ICC/NZ)	279	299	8273	240	17.41
SC Ganguly (Asia/India)	410	461	17709	240	8.13
BC Lara (ICC/WI)	430	521	22358	221	5.93
IVA Richards (WI)	308	349	15261	210	8.26
SR Tendulkar (India)	550	627	27261	208	4.58

Remarkable debut - Immaduddin [Update]

2007-12-16T20:08:00.000-08:00

Update: Sorry for posting this blog. It was supposed to go into my other general blog - "Tidbits here and there" and has been rightly moved there. I am sorry for posting the same here. I will be a little more careful in future.

Disgraceful moment video

2007-12-16T01:37:00.000-08:00

For the many who never saw the "Most disgraceful event in Cricket History", here is the video of the same. Do visit the wikipedia page on this.

Delhi vs Chandigarh

2007-12-15T05:47:00.000-08:00

Delhi Jets team is taking on Chandigarh Lions in their Indian Cricket league semi final match currently. The match is in progress and I don't know the results. This match reminds of an old, eventful match which was significant for me.

I started watching cricket in 1994 and soon took to the game, the statistics and so on. The cricket fever was so dominant in me that I wanted to even follow Ranji Cricket. As we know Ranji cricket, during those days was not shown live on TV and if you wanted to watch it, you went to the grounds.

I did go to see one match and it was the only time that I have ever gone to see a First Class match in the ground. I have never seen an International match in the ground. So, coming back to the match in question, it was the same two teams (of course, in the avatar of Delhi vs Punjab) fighting it out in the 1994-95 Ranji Trophy semi final match at Ferozeshah Kotla. In the first 3 days, Delhi had scored 554 and had got Punjab's first six wickets for 298. At that point, Bhupinder Singh Jr and Pankaj Dharmani got together. I went to watch on fourth day hoping that Delhi will bowl them out, enforce or follow on, or otherwise bat and set a nice target.

What happened was history-in-the-making. The two put on a massive
460 for seventh wicket, which is still the First-Class record for 7th wicket. By the time the time ran out (on 5th day), Punjab put on 780/8 and were through to the finals against Mumbai. They eventually lost the finals. Delhi, after scoring 554 could not believe that they could not make it to the finals and it was a humiliating match for them.

Pankaj Dharmani went on to make his Debut for India in ODI, but then never again played for India. If my memory serves right, Bhupinder Singh Jr never got an India reckoning. I can never forget the mauling that the two gave to the Delhi bowlers, Prabhakar, Wassan and co. Such matches come one in a long long time and I can proudly say I was there to witness this part of cricket history.

Debut Co-Performances in Tests

2007-12-11T01:52:00.000-08:00

Yasir Arafat (Pak) picked up 5-for in his debut match against India yesterday at Bangalore. In the next innings, Ishant Sharma (India) also picks up 5-for and I get thinking that this is an interesting stat (assuming that Ishant also made his debut in this match). However, I realize that Ishant made his debut against Bangladesh earlier this year. So, I thought about finding good co-performances by debutants in tests. So what did I get?

If you take the best performance in an Innings in Test matches and consider the best 50 performances (the list includes best performance of AE Trott, 8-43 down to U Chandana 6-179), you find three matched containing two entries. But as it happens, all three were instances where the same bowler performed well in both innings:

Innings Best Co-Performances

Player	Overs	Mdns	Runs	Wkts	Team	Opposition	Ground	Match Date
F Martin	27.0x5 *	9	50	6	England	v Australia	The Oval	Aug 11, 1890
F Martin	30.2x5 *	12	52	6	England	v Australia	The Oval	Aug 11, 1890
RAL Massie	32.5	7	84	8	Australia	v England	Lord's	Jun 22, 1972
RAL Massie	27.2	9	53	8	Australia	v England	Lord's	Jun 22, 1972
ND Hirwani	15.2	3	75	8	India	v West Indies	Chennai	Jan 11, 1988
ND Hirwani	18.3	3	61	8	India	v West Indies	Chennai	Jan 11, 1988

* 5 ball overs
But if you consider the other statistic - best performance in a Match, then you find that there have been test matches where two players have performed excellently, with both making theing debuts:

Match Best Co-Performances

Player	Overs	Mdns	Runs	Wkts	Team	Opposition	Ground	Match Date
TK Kendall	71.1x4 *	28	109	8	Australia	v England	Melbourne	Mar 15, 1877
A Shaw	89.3x4 *	50	89	8	England	v Australia	Melbourne	Mar 15, 1877
CTB Turner	62.2x4 *	33	68	8	Australia	v England	Sydney	Jan 28, 1887
JJ Ferris	78.3x4 *	37	103	9	Australia	v England	Sydney	Jan 28, 1887
AL Valentine	106	36	204	11	West Indies	v England	Manchester	Jun 8, 1950
R Berry	57.5	25	116	9	England	v West Indies	Manchester	Jun 8, 1950

* 4 ball overs

As you see that in 2 of these 3 occassions, it was debutants from opposites sides who put in a good effort.

Muralis Record

2007-12-10T22:36:00.000-08:00

Murali broke the test record for higher number of wickets recently. Here is a video clipping of him doing it. I am still working on a detailed stats analysis of his performance. Maybe I will put one out in near future.

My heartfelt thanks for Sunny Vishwa, my cousin for presenting me the link to this video.

Little too many extras..

2007-12-10T03:48:00.000-08:00

Update: By the end of innings, India have indeed given away the highest total in extras in the history of Test Cricket. Am Updating the Tables accordingly - 14:45 IST, 11-Dec-2007.

In today's day of play between India and Pakistan, third Test, Bangalore, India conceded 70 runs in the total of 369/5. This is the second highest extras' score in an test Innings. The innings is not yet over and in all likelihood, India will give away some more and end up conceding the highest even number of extras (The previous highest being 71 by West Indies against Pakistan in 1988.

Top 3 times, the benificiary of such generosity has been Pakistan:

Batting Team	Score	Ext	b	lb	w	nb	Conceding Team	Match Date
Pakistan	537	76	35	26	0	15	v India	12/08/07
Pakistan	435	71	21	8	4	38	v West Indies	04/02/88
Pakistan	291	68	29	11	0	28	v West Indies	02/18/77

Extras as a percentage of the innings total were highest in these innings:

Batting Team	Score	Ext	b	lb	w	nb	Conceding Team	Match Date	Extras as %age of total
Pakistan	291	68	29	11	0	28	v West Indies	02/18/77	23.37
Australia	248	53	17	6	2	28	v West Indies	03/23/91	21.37
England	252	52	19	13	10	10	v West Indies	06/05/80	20.63
Zimbabwe	319/8	65	10	18	1	36	v Sri Lanka	10/11/94	20.38

India, at various occassions have given high number of extras (more than 50) in an innings:

Batting Team	Score	Ext	b	lb	w	nb	Match Date
Pakistan	537	76	35	26	0	15	12/08/07
England	477/4d	55	16	22	5	12	08/23/90
Pakistan	496/9d	52	17	20	13	2	03/08/05
South Africa	510/9d	53	9	22	1	16	11/20/04
England	515	51	12	31	1	7	09/05/02
England	633/5d	60	4	27	11	18	07/12/79
England	564	50	18	18	0	14	07/04/96
New Zealand	630/6d	53	21	28	1	3	10/16/03
Sri Lanka	952/6d	58	28	9	7	14	08/02/97

Whats interesting to note is that India did not concede so many noballs and wides as they did Byes and leg Byes which normally is attributed to the Wicket Keeper. And as we all, MS Dhoni could not play this test and Dinesh Karthik is substituting with gloves for him. Well, well well....

Update: By the end of innings, India have indeed given away the highest total in extras in the history of Test Cricket. Am Updating the Tables accordingly - 14:45 IST, 11-Dec-2007.

Yuvi's six sixes

2007-12-10T01:09:00.000-08:00

I know I have not been able to blog for the past week or so. I have been doing a lot of travelling in this time period. While I generate a suacy piece of statistic for you, check out this video. Its the video of Yuvi hitting six sixes. Its not new, but neither is it boring or stale. Its worth another watch....

Update: I am sorry for not thanking Sunny Vishwa, my cousin for providing me with this link. Thanks Vishwa

Double Delights (and triples too....)

2007-11-30T20:12:00.000-08:00

So, Wasim Jaffer did manage a good 192 yesterday against Pakistan and is purpoted to have missed the "rare" feat of scoring 200 runs in a day because of the bad light conditions preventing him from playing another 5.3 overs or so. Its a different matter that the past 5.3 overs or so, he played pretty slowly and moved from 190-192 in that period.

Anyway, coming back to our rare feat of scoring 200 runs in a day, in the long history of Cricket, the feat of scoring 200 or more has been achieved 37 times with one of those innings extending to 300 also. It was scored by the Don on 11-Jul-1930. Those scored more than 250 in a day include Don Bradman (twice), W Hammond, Dennis Compton.

In fact the Don achieved the feat of scoring more than 200 on a amazing 6 occassions. Others who have done it more than once are W Hammond, Brian Lara and Aravinda De Silva. The specific list of their performances are:

Player	Runs	Team	Opposition	Match Date
DG Bradman	309	Australia	v England	11150
DG Bradman	271	Australia	v England	12620
DG Bradman	244	Australia	v England	12649
DG Bradman	223	Australia	v West Indies	11339
DG Bradman	201	Australia	v India	17555
DG Bradman	200	Australia	v South Africa	11654

Player	Runs	Team	Opposition	Match Date
WR Hammond	295	England	v New Zealand	12144
WR Hammond	223	England	v New Zealand	12137
WR Hammond	217	England	v India	13377
WR Hammond	210	England	v Australia	14055

Player	Runs	Team	Opposition	Match Date
BC Lara	227	West Indies	v England	38087
BC Lara	205	West Indies	v Australia	36232
BC Lara	202	West Indies	v Australia	38681

Player	Runs	Team	Opposition	Match Date
PA de Silva	206	Sri Lanka	v Bangladesh	37458
PA de Silva	203	Sri Lanka	v New Zealand	33269

More detailed records can be obtained from Cricinfo's page on most runs in a day.

ps: Please forgive the poor formatting. I am posting this out of the borrowed laptop of my Mama-in-law, which, in his own admission, is in a pretty poor shape, and off a poor Reliance Info Card connection. This might continue to be the case while I am on my Campus recruiting trip.

Eden Even

2007-11-29T20:48:00.000-08:00

I will make today's post relevant to today's test match between India and Pakistan. As of now, India are batting at 43/1. In the past, India have played 34 test matches with 8 victories and 8 defeats. Interesting, Pakistan's record is no different. Out of 6 matches played here, they have won 1 and lost 1 with all others being draws. Thats even Eden for both...

Interesting, between Indo-Pak matches, the two victories that have come about, both have come about by teams who won the toss and elected to bat. So, India, that way have history on their side. Of course, that matters for very little...

Indian Victory, 16-20 March 2005
by 195 runs (Dravid 110 & 135, Younis Khan 147, Mohd. Yousuf 104, Kumble 7/63)

Pakistan Victory, 16-20 feb 1999
by 46 runs (Saeed Anwar 188, Shoaib Akhtar 4/71 &4/47, Javagal Srinath 8/71)

Kings of Ducks goes to Atapattu

2007-11-28T20:10:00.000-08:00

Of sucessful batsmen in International Test Cricket (those who have scored 5000+ in their career), lets see how players faired with respect to getting off the mark. Three players have more than 20 Ducks:

Name	Matches	Innings	Runs	Ducks
SR Waugh	168	260	10927	22
MS Atapattu	90	156	5502	22
MA Atherton	115	212	7728	20

But if you convert the metrics to look at how may innings a batsman goes through before hitting a duck, the picture is quite different. I have considered players with Innings/Duck being less than 12. For those above 12, you can be rest assured that they can go through 2 series of about 7-8 matches without scoring a duck!! Atapattu is clearly the King of Ducks now. Gilchrist also has an alarmingly high share of ducks in his innings, with Michael Atherton and Mark Waugh following closely.

Name	Matches	Innings	Runs	Ducks	Innings/Duck
MS Atapattu	90	156	5502	22	7.09
AC Gilchrist	92	130	5420	14	9.29
MA Atherton	115	212	7728	20	10.6
ME Waugh	128	209	8029	19	11
SP Fleming	106	181	6774	16	11.31
DG Bradman	52	80	6996	7	11.43
IT Botham	102	161	5200	14	11.5
N Kapil Dev	131	184	5248	16	11.5
SR Waugh	168	260	10927	22	11.82
DC Boon	107	190	7422	16	11.88
ME Trescothick	76	143	5825	12	11.92

Those who go through the maximum innings without a duck are:

Name	Matches	Innings	Runs	Ducks	Innings/Duck
KD Walters	74	125	5357	4	31.25
Javed Miandad	124	189	8832	6	31.5
R Dravid	113	193	9564	6	32.17
WR Hammond	85	140	7249	4	35
MA Taylor	104	186	7525	5	37.2
CH Lloyd	110	175	7515	4	43.75

Indians faired in the following manner with kapil Dev going through least Innings before scoring a duck and Rahul Dravid going through the most. Hardly any surprises there!!

Player	Span	Mat	Inns	NO	Runs	Ave	0	Innings/Duck
N Kapil Dev	1978-1994	131	184	15	5248	31.05	16	11.5
VVS Laxman	1996-2007	84	137	18	5161	43.36	9	15.22
SC Ganguly	1996-2007	97	157	14	5868	41.03	9	17.44
SR Tendulkar	1989-2007	141	228	24	11207	54.93	13	17.54
SM Gavaskar	1971-1987	125	214	16	10122	51.12	12	17.83
M Azharuddin	1984-2000	99	147	9	6215	45.03	5	29.4
R Dravid	1996-2007	113	193	23	9564	56.25	6	32.17

Any comments?

Afridi 5000 at 110

2007-11-27T20:35:00.000-08:00

Shahid Afridi is the only player to have amassed more than 5000 runs in ODI having a strike rate of more than 100. Vital statistics:

Matches: 249
Innings: 237
Not Outs: 12
Runs: 5239
Highest: 109
Ave: 23.28
Balls Faced: 4757
Strike Rate: 110.13
100s/50s/0s: 4/28/21

Others with high strike rates (>90%) are:

Virender Sehwag (5231at 96.88)
Adam Gilchrist (9246 at 96.66)
Sanath Jayasuriya (12207 at 90.40)
Viv Richards (6721 at 90.20)