Among the draws – all 18 of them – there have been protests, flare-ups and the odd moment of success

Andrew Miller29-Nov-2022After consecutive “home” series on neutral ground in the UAE, Pakistan are finally set to host England for their first Test visit in 17 years. It promises the renewal of a rivalry that has not exactly been packed with tense contests down the years, but has produced an extraordinary amount of controversy. Here’s a recap of England’s eight previous tours.1961-62 – England won 1-0
A curious itinerary greeted MCC’s first official tour of Pakistan, with the three-match series wrapped either side of a full five-Test visit to India – whose subsequent plans to tour West Indies had caused a fixtures rejig. And as it transpired, the one-off Test in Lahore in October could not have been further removed from the two follow-ups in Dacca and Karachi in January and February, where the tone would be set for a diet of lifeless decks over the subsequent two decades. By then, however, England were already 1-0 up in the series after a gripping final-hour win in Lahore, where the new captain Ted Dexter marshalled a high-tempo run-chase with the elan he would soon be bringing to the new-fangled Gillette One-Day Cup. It would be England’s only victory in the country for 39 years, and one of only two to date in 24 Tests and counting.Ted Dexter (second left) and members of the England touring party after returning from Pakistan in 1962•Hulton Archive/Getty Images1968-69 – Series drawn 0-0
South Africa had been England’s original winter destination, but the D’Oliveira Affair put paid to that prospect, and as MCC scouted around for a back-up plan, they hit upon a country that was lurching, with ever more volatile certainty, towards revolution. “The Pakistan tour was a fiasco”, Wisden intoned, at the end of a stalemate in which the three Tests became focal points for mounting unrest, from the first day of the series in Lahore, to the third and final day of the third Test in Karachi, where play was abandoned after a mob had torn down the gates and vandalised the pitch. In between, the schedule was controversially rejigged to send the teams 1100 miles east to Dacca (now Dhaka), where law and order was already breaking down ahead of the bloody war that would, two years later, lead to the birth of Bangladesh. With the city in a state of siege, it was left to a group of teenaged student leaders to guarantee the team’s safety. On the field, a quartet of England centuries were the tour’s stand-out performances: Colin Cowdrey in Lahore, D’Oliveira in Dacca, and Colin Milburn and Tom Graveney in Karachi, where Graveney struck two intruders on their backsides with his bat, and quipped: “They were the two best strokes I made on the whole tour.”1972-73 – Series drawn 0-0
An arduous four-month tour, encompassing five Tests in India, three in Pakistan and a first-class stop-over in the newly-renamed Sri Lanka, came to a dispiriting end on a trio of pitches in Lahore, Hyderabad and Karachi that, Wisden moaned, would still have ended as draws “had they gone on playing for the rest of their lives”. That said, England were twice obliged to guard against mishap after conceding challenging leads in the first two Tests, but on neither occasion were they bowled out in their second innings. The Karachi Test, once again, was marred by crowd unrest and pitch invasions, and was eventually abandoned early due to a dust-storm, after Norman Gifford’s five-for had briefly given England hope of a win against the head. The match also happened to be the last of Tony Lewis’s brief reign as captain – he would play one more Test back in the ranks before being dropped for good the following summer – but its most notable detail was arguably the fact that Majid Khan, Mushtaq Mohammad and Dennis Amiss were all dismissed for 99.Shakoor Rana and Mike Gatting infamously faced-off in Faisalabad on the 1987-88 tour•Getty Images1977-78 – Series drawn 0-0
By the end of another chaotic campaign, England had played 12 Tests across 16 years of touring in Pakistan, and drawn each of the last 11 – a record that Wisden attributed to various factors including food, accommodation, crowd indiscipline and “a shadowy political background” but, most of all, to the hosts’ “obsessive fear of defeat”. The emergence of the legspinner Abdul Qadir seemed to offer Pakistan the means to unlock their own benign surfaces – most particularly in the second Test in Hyderabad, where he exploited the rough created by Bob Willis’s heavy-limbed followthrough to take a first-innings 6 for 44. However, Wasim Bari’s overly cautious declaration killed off any remaining jeopardy, and not for the first time, the tour’s main talking points came off the field: the riots in Lahore that stemmed from a premature celebration of Mudassar Nazar’s century, then the threatened recall of the so-called “Packerstanis” – Imran Khan, Mushtaq Mohammad and Zaheer Abbas – all of whom had signed to play in Kerry Packer’s inaugural season of World Series Cricket, but whose arrivals in Karachi prior to the third Test caused uproar. It wasn’t entirely clear at whose behest they had turned up – it might even have been a publicity stunt from Packer himself – but at the eleventh hour, the Pakistan board confirmed that they would not be considered, and the threat of an England boycott fell away.1983-84 – Pakistan won 1-0
Qadir’s threat was no secret this time around, but his mastery of flight and variation remained unfathomable to England. Barely three days after arriving from a chaotic tour of New Zealand – one beset by injury, ineptitude and subsequent accusations of recreational drug use – England rocked up to the first “result” wicket that they had encountered in more than a decade of Pakistan tours, and finished a distant second-best in a misleadingly tight three-wicket loss. Nick Cook claimed 11 wickets to Qadir’s eight, but the legspinner’s bamboozling display was best epitomised by a stunning googly that Ian Botham was barely able to pick even after it had nestled in short-leg’s hands. “Only a philistine could watch Qadir without fascination,” wrote John Thicknesse in The Cricketer. He was briefly neutered on a dead deck in Faisalabad, but burst back to prominence with ten wickets at Lahore as the series ended amid a compelling tussle for the upper hand. Going into the rest day with England still trailing on their second innings, England’s captain David Gower – by now deputising for the injured Willis – promised positivity in a bid to square the series, and delivered in person with a magnificent 173. But, after Mohsin Khan and Shoaib Mohammad had matched that total in their opening stand, Gower rather went back on his word with a go-slow in the field, and it took a late five-for from Norman Cowans to guard against an unlikely defeat.Nasser Hussain and Graham Thorpe celebrate victory in the dark, Karachi 2000•Getty Images1987-88 – Pakistan won 1-0
Bad blood abounded in one of the most acrimonious series of all time. Mike Gatting’s infamous finger-jabbing row with umpire Shakoor Rana in Faisalabad was the image that flashed around the globe in an embodiment of the “it’s not cricket!” cliché that the sport still, somehow, clings to to this day. And yet, their stand-off was very much in keeping with the animosity that existed between England and Pakistan throughout the 1980s, as years of festering grievances home and away came to an inevitable climax. Barely four months had elapsed since Pakistan had prevailed on an ill-tempered tour of England, during which complaints about the home umpiring – specifically an old adversary, David Constant – had been batted away by the TCCB. Factor in a draining World Cup campaign in between whiles, in which England’s defeat in the final had matched Pakistan’s semi-final elimination on home soil in the anti-climax stakes, and the time was hardly ripe to renew such a fractious rivalry. The fuse was lit during the first Test at Lahore, where umpire Shakeel Khan gave – by England’s count – nine erroneous decisions, among them Chris Broad, who had to be persuaded to leave the crease by his opening partner, Graham Gooch. The irony was that, with 9 for 56 in the first innings, en route to a series haul of 30 at 14.56, Qadir hardly needed a leg-up to be the difference between the teams. Even so, when the flashpoint came, late on the second day in Faisalabad, it was with England in a position of rare dominance – with Pakistan five-down in their first innings and still almost 200 runs behind. But the loss of the third day’s play, with Rana refusing to officiate until Gatting had issued a grudging written apology, kiboshed any hope of a result.2000-01 – England won 1-0
Fresh from their first victory over West Indies in three decades, Nasser Hussain’s England sealed another famous series win, and in incredible circumstances too, with the winning runs in Karachi coming amid ever-encroaching darkness on the final day of the tour. The advent of central contracts and the appointment of Duncan Fletcher as head coach had been significant factors in a heightened team cohesion, but ultimately this tour was a triumph for Hussain’s hard-bitten leadership – in particular his insistence that England “stay in the game at all costs”, and wait for the pressure to tell on their hosts. Graham Thorpe epitomised this indomitability with a grindingly slow century in Lahore, which contained a solitary boundary in his first 100 runs and in the process thwarted Saqlain Mushtaq, whose eight wickets in the innings came at a cost of 164, and despite a wobble in Faisalabad, they were never seriously in danger of defeat. Then, in Karachi, Mike Atherton responded to Inzamam and Yousuf’s twin hundreds with a ten-hour 125, spanning 430 balls at a tempo slower even than his great Johannesburg rearguard – an effort that the Telegraph correspondent Michael Henderson had described as “insufferable”. Its impact, however, soon became apparent as Pakistan – in what would these days be acknowledged as a “tricky third innings” – chose neither to stick nor twist in stumbling to 158 all out. England’s target, then, was 176 in 44 overs, a chase that Atherton himself ignited with a sprightly 26 from 33. Moin Khan, Pakistan’s captain, was unconcerned, knowing full well that the fast-setting winter sun would come to his aid if he slowed the game down. But umpire Steve Bucknor was having none of it, and – with England’s 12th man Matthew Hoggard dispatched to sightscreen duties – Thorpe donned his night-vision goggles to seal a famous win with an under-edged cut through fine leg, and with mere minutes of serviceable light to spare.Marcus Trescothick bats during his 180-run stand with Ian Bell in Multan•Getty Images2005-06 – Pakistan won 2-0
After the extraordinary highs of the 2005 Ashes, England crashed back to earth in a thoroughly dispiriting fashion in Pakistan, with a brace of defeats – one agonisingly close, the other crushingly complete – that epitomised the sudden dismantling of a fleetingly world-class team. Already lacking Simon Jones through injury, the loss of the captain Michael Vaughan to a knee injury was a further grievous blow, although one that his stand-in Marcus Trescothick seemed to have taken in his stride in leading from the front with a brilliant 193 in the first Test in Multan – sadly the mental toll of that effort would only become apparent in hindsight. In between whiles, Andrew Flintoff bowled supremely to drive England towards victory, only for Shoaib Akhtar and Danish Kaneria – in a classical Pakistani pace/legspin double act – to swipe the match by 22 runs in a breathless finish. Inzamam-ul-Haq’s twin hundreds in Faisalabad scotched England’s attempts at a fightback, and when Mohammad Yousuf racked up a career-best 223 in the third Test in Lahore, the end was meek and inevitable. Despite the heightened security surrounding the tour, England’s first post 9/11, there was little sign at that juncture that they would not be returning for another two decades.

Touring South African teams don’t generally fare well against spin, but not this one

Firdose Moonda17-Mar-2021It’s rare that a South African team can walk away from a series in India and claim superiority. The men’s side have won one out eight Test rubbers, one out of five bilateral ODI series and one of out of two T20s match-ups. Before Sunday, the women’s team had won one out of two ODI series in India. Now, not only have they successfully secured a second trophy, by the biggest margin a South African team has earned in India (4-1), but they did it by overcoming a national nemesis: spin.In losing 13 wickets to India’s spinners across the five matches at an average of 53.15 and a strike rate of 70.7 (one wicket to every 11.5 overs of spin) South Africa subjected the home tweakers to their worst result in a series where they have bowled at least 100 overs and significantly worse than the last time they played South Africa. Then, in a three-match series in 2019, India’s spinners took 18 wickets at 19.05, struck every 5.2 overs and squeezed South Africa at only 3.53 runs an over.”Two years back when we toured here India demolished us with their spin,” stand-in captain Sune Luus said. “But we had a Pakistan series before this and we played in Durban which is kind of subcontinental in its conditions. India bowled a lot of spin to us but we found ways to attack. We knew they were just going to throw a lot of overs of spin at us and we were mentally ready for that.”In January, South Africa hosted Pakistan for three ODIs and three T20s, all at Kingsmead. Against the likes of Nida Dar and Nashra Sandhu, they won the ODIs 3-0 and the T20s 2-1 and performed well against the spinners. In the ODIs,11 out of 26 South African dismissals in the series came against spin and they scored at 4.01 runs to the over. In the T20s, they lost six out of 11 wickets to spin and scored at 6.01.That preparation has proved invaluable and it also gave South Africa much-needed match-practice and the opportunity to develop the habit of winning.South Africa won the first two ODIs against Pakistan against by slender margins (three runs and 13 runs), both times defending totals. In this series, after two one-sided matches, the results got closer to each other. South Africa had to beat both India and the weather in the third match, recorded their highest successful chase in the fourth and snuck home in a low-scoring thriller in the finale.Sune Luus’ unbeaten fifty included five fours and two sixes•Getty ImagesAfter developing a reputation for falling at the final hurdle in heartbreaking performances like the semi-final of the last fifty-over World Cup in Bristol or the semi-final of the T20 World Cup last March in Sydney, it seems as though South Africa have found ways to hold their nerve in tense situations. “The more games you play, the more you get yourself into pressure situations which you need to get through, We’ve been in enough pressure situations to identify where we are struggling and where we can get better,” Luus said. “If you look at teams like Australia and England, they’ve played a lot of games and been in a lot of semi-finals and finals and they can handle pressure. We need to keep on getting into semi-finals and work through that to get to finals. We are a world class team that have been working hard for a lot of years and we really want to be on top of the world and to compete with Australia and England and I think we are there. The more games you play, especially against teams like India, Australia, England, the more you can learn how to deal with pressure.”All that would be ideal if the women’s World Cup was being played as originally planned, now. Instead, it has been pushed back to March 2022 and South Africa will want to maintain this form for another 12 months. Luus believes they can do that by continuing to find similarities between the matches they play now and big-tournament situations. “If we are looking towards the World Cup next year in New Zealand, they have high scoring grounds and so that’s (like the fourth match) type of totals we are going to be chasing or setting. It was a good experience now to get the feel for it and see how you manage a chase, when you start going, when you hold back and when you just rotate strike,” Luus said. “All five games were different scenarios and that’s the experience we are going to need for the World Cup.”South Africa’s victory in India puts them second on the ODI rankings, their highest to date, with Lizelle Lee on top of the batting charts, Shabnim Ismail and Marizanne Kapp at No.3 and 4 on the bowling list and Kapp the third-highest allrounder, their stocks are rising. This series also showed off several lower-profile players – Lara Goodall, Anneke Bosch and Tumi Sekhukhune – which suggests there’s depth in the talent pool and plenty for South Africa to work with.”We are so excited to win the series in India. It’s a very special achievement for our team. It’s never easy to play here and take the series away from the Indian team like we did.” Luus said. “We can go into the T20 series smiling because our fifty-over game is coming together very nicely.”

Anderson’s story is remarkable because of the improvement he’s shown with his bowling in this period

S Rajesh11-Feb-2021When James Anderson defeated the defences of Ajinkya Rahane with a stunner on the final day of the Chennai Test, he went on top of the list for most wickets taken by a fast bowler after the age of 30. That wicket was Anderson’s 342nd after turning 30, and he later added Rishabh Pant to that tally as well, to increase his lead over Courtney Walsh (341) on this list.This should say a lot about Anderson’s fitness levels, and his story is even more remarkable because of the improvement he’s shown with his bowling in this period.ESPNcricinfo LtdAnderson turned 30 on July 30, 2012. Since then, he has averaged 23.45 in 87 Tests. Among the 15 fast bowlers who have taken 150 or more wickets during this period, only three – Pat Cummins, Dale Steyn and Kagiso Rabada – have better averages. None of them, though, has taken even 60% of the number of wickets Anderson has taken in this period. In the 71 Tests Anderson played before turning 30, he averaged 30.37, which means his average has improved by almost 23% since he turned 30.ESPNcricinfo LtdBefriending the older ball
When Anderson started out he was excellent with the new ball but with the older ball in hand, he wasn’t quite as effective. In the 71 Tests he played before turning 30, he averaged 27.67 in the first 15 overs of an innings, but between overs 16 and 80, he conceded 34.54 runs per wicket.ESPNcricinfo LtdOver the last eight-and-a-half years, though, the skillset has gradually expanded to include reverse swing, cutters, changes of length, pace and angle, and greater cricketing nous which comes with experience. Not only does he have a wider range of skills now, but also seems to have a much clearer idea of the execution.The results are there for all to see. Since August 2012, Anderson’s average in the first 15 overs has improved marginally – from 27.67 to 25.09 – but in the 16 to 80 overs range, the difference is stark: from 34.54, the average has dropped to 24.16, an improvement of 30%.Among the 23 fast bowlers who have bowled at least 500 overs during this phase of an innings in this period, only three have better averages – the South African trio of Rabada, Steyn and Vernon Philander.ESPNcricinfo LtdOvercoming the Asian challenge
For a bowler like Anderson, whose innate strength is the ability to swing the ball, doing well in Asia is a huge challenge. Before 2012, he played only five Tests in the continent, taking 12 wickets at 45.41. Then, in early 2012 – just before he turned 30 – he played back-to-back series in the UAE against Pakistan and in Sri Lanka. Though he didn’t take a huge number of wickets – 18 in five Tests – he was giving little away: those 18 wickets came at an average of 24.72, and an economy rate of 2.46.That was followed by a solid series in India, and though he had a lean time in Asia between 2016 and 2018, he has bounced back superbly this time around: he had a match haul of 6 for 46 in Galle, which was followed by 5 for 63 against India in Chennai. Since turning 30, Anderson concedes nearly nine fewer runs per wicket in Asia, compared to his numbers before he turned 30.ESPNcricinfo LtdHowever, with Anderson, it’s not only the wickets that matter; it’s also the control he provides to the team with his ability to choke the run-flow: among the 13 non-Asian fast bowlers who have bowled at least 200 overs in Asia since the beginning of 2012, Anderson’s economy rate of 2.4 is the best, marginally better than Philander’s 2.5.The extra bows in Anderson’s armoury have been even more useful in Asia, as they have made him a threat even with the older ball, something that wasn’t necessarily true in the early days of his career. Before he turned 30, Anderson averaged 47.77 runs per wicket between overs 16 and 80, and had a strike rate of 101 balls per wicket. Since then, the average has improved to 22.72. Nowhere was that improvement more evident than in the 27th over of India’s second innings in Chennai, when those two wickets of Shubman Gill and Rahane decisively swung the game England’s way.ESPNcricinfo LtdHowever, his numbers in Australia haven’t improved as dramatically – he averaged 35.79 in eight Tests there before turning 30, and 35.09 in ten Tests since then – but his last series there was pretty impressive: 17 wickets at 27.82, conceding just 2.11 runs per over.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe matchwinner
In the post-30 phase of Anderson’s career, England have won 37 of 87 matches he has been part of, and in those 37 wins, Anderson has taken 170 wickets at a stunning average of 16.43. Among the 23 bowlers who have taken at least 75 wickets in wins during this period, no one has a better average. In defeats or draws, the average goes up to 30.36. His numbers in wins illustrate just how important Anderson is, even at 38, to England’s Test fortunes.

Two sensational efforts from Pakistan pace bowlers, a blitz from a Netherlands batter and a stunning performance in a World Cup final

ESPNcricinfo staff17-Oct-2022 • Updated on 18-Oct-2022Voting for these match-ups has ended. Carlos Brathwaite’s 3-23 & 34* and Umar Gul’s 5-6 move to the quarter-finals.Stephan Myburgh’s 63 vs Carlos Brathwaite’s 3-23 & 34*63 (23) vs IRE | Stephan Myburgh | Sylhet, 2014
To qualify for the Super 10, Netherlands needed to vault from No. 3 to No. 1 in the group on net run-rate, which left them having to score 190 runs in 14.2 overs against Ireland – odds most teams might think would rule them out. But Stephan Myburgh was the master mathematician. He took three sixes off offspinner Andy McBrine’s first over and three more off Alex Cusack to bring up the team fifty in 3.1 overs. They got to 91 by the time the powerplay ended with Myburgh bringing up his own fifty in only 17 balls, which at the time was the second-fastest in the format. Not long after that, he was toasting a victory that even now seems unbelievable.Related

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3-23 & 34*(10) vs ENG | Carlos Brathwaite | Kolkata, 2016
Nineteen to win in the final over. Four balls, four sixes. “Carlos Brathwaite, remember the name”. Those hits at Eden Gardens will forever remain part of cricketing folklore. What gets forgotten is that Brathwaite was effective with the ball too: he picked up the key wickets of Jos Buttler and Joe Root to finish with figures of 4-0-23-3. He then came in at No. 8 with West Indies 107 for 6 in 15.3 chasing 156, and took West Indies to their second title in the company of Marlon Samuels.ESPNcricinfo LtdUmar Gul’s 5-6 vs Shaheen Shah Afridi’s 3-315-6 vs NZ | Umar Gul | The Oval, 2009
New Zealand were 72 for 4 when Umar Gul, Pakistan’s death-overs specialist, came on in the 13th over, and took five of the next six wickets to knock out the opposition for 99. Gul’s impact was instantaneous and devastating: he dismissed Scott Styris and Peter McGlashan with his third and fourth deliveries, sent Nathan McCullum’s leg stump cartwheeling in his next over, and ended with the dismissals of James Franklin and Kyle Mills – again off consecutive balls – in his third.3-31 vs IND | Shaheen Shah Afridi | Dubai, 2021
Shaheen Shah Afridi removed India’s top three batters in a sensational performance that set up their maiden win over India in men’s World Cups. Afridi, with a reputation for striking in the first over, welcomed Rohit Sharma with a yorker that swung into his pads and trapped him lbw. With the first ball of his second over, KL Rahul was bowled when he tried to play one to leg with the angle as it came in to him. And later in the 19th over, Afridi got Virat Kohli to top-edge a slow bouncer to the keeper.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

A look at how this unglamorous shot made all the difference for India, and why Australia could not employ it effectively themselves

Karthik Krishnaswamy19-Feb-2023Cheteshwar Pujara faced five of the last six balls of the Delhi Test match. First, he levelled the scores with a flicked single to deep square leg after skipping out to Travis Head. Then, getting the strike back at the start of the next over, he played two more flicks off Todd Murphy, one to square leg, one to short midwicket.After another dot ball not involving a flick, Pujara hit the winning runs: down the track again, and a firm whip over midwicket for four.Five balls, four variants of the leg-side flick. And in that lay a story, perhaps even story of the 2022-23 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.The flick can be a delightful stroke to watch, but it isn’t always a glamorous one. ESPNcricinfo, for instance, runs a video series titled , where current or former players pick their favourite exponents of eight shots that circle the dial: straight drive, cover drive, cut, reverse-sweep, scoop, sweep, pull and the lofted hit down the ground. The flick, as you may have noticed, isn’t one of them.The flick, however, is the Test batter’s run-scoring lifeblood. Since the start of 2021, according to ESPNcricinfo’s data, the flick has brought batters more Test runs than any other shot – 17,697, to be precise – with the cover drive way behind in second place at 12,979.Related

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In that time, batters have played the flick a whopping 22,373 times. It’s in third place behind defended (62,637) and left alone (25,277), of course, but those aren’t scoring shots.The reason why the flick is such a key part of Test cricket is simple. Bowlers target the top of off stump constantly, and when they miss their lines and lengths at Test level, they usually only miss it by small margins. So while the rank long-hop and the wide half-volley are rare occurrences, the ball that’s a touch straighter than ideal, or a touch fuller or shorter, is more frequent. Test batters can flick balls from all sorts of lines and lengths – if the angle is just right, a back-of-a-length ball can be worked to deep backward square leg from a fourth-stump line.Spinners are particularly prone to getting flicked, and not just with the turn. Top batters can use their feet to get to the pitch of the ball, or go deep in their crease to give themselves time, and twirl their wrists to play the shot against the turn too. Because of the pace spinners bowl at, their margin for error is smaller, and the more turn there is, the smaller that margin becomes – the ball turning into the batter is likelier to end up on the pads, and the ball turning away is likelier to start from a line closer to leg stump.The first two Tests of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy have been played on pitches with plenty of help for the spinners, and the margins for error have consequently been fairly small.Over these two Tests in Nagpur and Delhi, India’s batters have been able to play the flick far more frequently against the spinners than Australia’s batters. They’ve also had to defend significantly fewer balls.There are many ways of looking at these numbers. You could say Indian batters are naturally wristy and fond of playing the flick. You could say they use their feet better to get down the pitch or go deep in the crease, to create opportunities to play the flick. You could say that the two teams have employed different batting gameplans, India’s revolving around positive footwork and shots down the ground or through the on side, and Australia’s around the sweep.This last argument is particularly compelling if you watched the closing stages of the Delhi Test, and watched and read the post-mortems. Australia lost a lot of wickets to sweeps and reverse-sweeps, and India barely ever played those shots. The experts shook their heads and told you how unwise these shots were on this third-day surface, where the ball was frequently shooting through low.But here’s the thing. Australia’s players and team management know this. They know how dangerous cross-bat shots can be on pitches like this. But R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja have bowled with the sort of control that has left them with few other scoring options. They’re certainly not getting drive balls and cut balls, and they’re not getting a whole lot of flick balls either.They’ve chosen two different responses to this challenge in the two Tests of this series. In the second innings in Nagpur, Australia defended for their lives and were bowled out in 32.3 overs. In the second innings in Delhi, they swept at everything and were bowled out in 31.1 overs. Their captain Pat Cummins said their batters had underplayed their hand in Nagpur and overplayed it in Delhi.Against spinners with the control of Ashwin and Jadeja and on pitches with both turn and natural variation, those can be the only options for visiting batters. Neither is the right answer, but there’s no real middle way either, unless the bowlers have an off day.In the given conditions, the sweep shot was fraught with danger, but Australia were left with little choice•Getty ImagesAnd in Delhi, the sweep helped Australia compete on a level footing with India over the first two days. It was a defining feature of Usman Khawaja’s 81 on day one, and of Marnus Labuschagne’s batting when Australia raced away to a quick start in the third session of day two.The sweep, therefore, was a symptom of Australia’s problems and not its cause.And the problem hasn’t been that they’re a bad team. The problem is that they’re just not as good as India in Indian conditions. You would only back a handful of teams over the game’s history to beat this Indian team in Indian conditions.Australia’s spin attack on this tour is among the best that has visited this country in a decade – Nathan Lyon is a world-class offspinner with more than 450 Test wickets, while Todd Murphy and Matthew Kuhnemann have bowled with terrific control for visiting spinners who’ve made their Test debuts on this tour. They’ve bowled with better control than a lot of overseas spinners who’ve come to India with a lot more Test experience, and they’ve barely bowled any long-hops or genuine half-volleys.But it’s only natural that Australia’s spinners don’t have the inch-perfect control of Jadeja and Ashwin on Indian pitches. The margins for error are tiny. Minute errors in line and length don’t leap at you in real time, but they all add up over the course of a series, one flick at a time.

Her Test debut was as much a vindication of her talent as it was a bulldozing of perceptions around it

Annesha Ghosh20-Jun-20216:00

Mithali Raj – ‘I’m mightily impressed with the debutants’

Mohit Sharma remembers seeing some of the traits before. The intrepid strokeplay, the solidity in defence, the clarity in approach, the seeming lack of nerves. “Never before had I seen a girl bat like that or with that kind of an easy, fearless attitude,” he recounts.Sharma, who last played for the India men’s team in 2015, followed the England vs India Bristol Test on TV. “This is the first time I’ve had the opportunity to watch women play Test cricket,” he says over a phone call. But there’s an element of familiarity to this novel experience of his.About five months ago, at a camp of the Haryana men’s team, the domestic side he represents, Sharma played some half a dozen practice matches against Shafali Verma. And bowled at her at the nets, too. So the 96 and 63 that Verma, 17, scored in the one-off Test, becoming the youngest woman to hit twin fifties on Test debut, wasn’t entirely surprising to him.”At the camp, Shafali would handle the new ball with ease,” Sharma recalls. “It didn’t matter to her if the pacers were clocking 135kph or higher, or what the stature or skillsets of the bowlers were. In all of those five-six matches, she confidently survived a good 15-18 overs opening the batting. So, scoring runs wasn’t her only achievement.”That rang true for Verma’s performance in Bristol, too. She batted for the better part of days two and three, and a part of the morning session on day four, trying to get the better of England’s 396 first-innings tally and then a follow-on deficit of 165. The 235 balls she faced across the two innings, the second-most by an India debutant in women’s Tests, were as much a vindication of her talent as it was a bulldozing of perceptions around it.Shafali Verma became the youngest woman to hit twin fifties on Test debut•Getty ImagesBefore this Test, 75 percent of her 617 international runs had come in boundaries. Capped only in T20Is, her 29 sixes, the most by any woman player in T20Is since her debut in September 2019, and her No.1 ranking in the format, have been a testament to her ability. In the Test against England, her record three sixes, the most by a woman Test debutant, did her reputation as a big-hitter no harm.But broken down to its individual components, her Player-of-the-Match winning debut was remarkable also because of its more elemental, less dazzling facets. The blocking, the grinding, the restraint, all high elbow, supple wrists – and doing it for prolonged phases of play.”Shafali, [as] we know, does have a range of shots and she can be very effective in a format like this if she gets going,” Mithali Raj, the India Test and ODI captain, said after the match. “In no time, we could see the score would be somewhere else if she gets going. And once we knew it’s a used wicket and there won’t be much movement, we thought it would be a good time to give her a Test debut, and she lived up to it.”Related

• Shafali Verma's matchup dominance against Katherine Brunt sets career tone

• Interview – Verma: 'I played 150 bouncers at a time'

• Stats: Debutants take the limelight on the return of Test cricket

• Mithali: The girls have shown they can stand up even without much practice

• Shafali's target on Test debut: 'Learn about choosing the right balls to play'

Before her dismissal in the second innings, Verma’s approach in the opening half-hour of the final day was a study in character as well as a test of it. Sophie Ecclestone, the No. 1-ranked bowler in T20Is, began with a slip and a short leg in place. Her left-arm spin was angled largely into the body, with the drift playing its part, and Verma responded with only forward presses and straight-bat back-foot plods.Three overs later, in Ecclestone’s third on the day, Verma threatened to cut loose, starting with an inside-out shot, right off the middle of the bat, over the bowler’s head. The tossed-up delivery carried all the way over the fence. Restraint be damned.The start to the over was reminiscent of the momentum-changing four she struck off Brunt on day two en route to her record 167-run opening stand with Smriti Mandhana. The end to that over, with Verma having offered up a catch off Ecclestone, was a reminder that the Bristol Test was, after all, the teenager’s first competitive red-ball game.”Personally, [I felt] her fifty in the second innings was a very beautiful fifty,” Raj said. “The 96 she scored was a good knock, but the fifty came with a little more sorted head and a little more experience. The sweetly timed drives… It was beautiful to watch her.”Verma was dismissed long before India saved the match, from where it looked like their four-Test unbeaten streak would not extend to five. The feisty draw, broadcast live to global audiences, could have wide-ranging, long-lasting ripples.

“I’m sure from here on, she’ll go from strength to strength and will be very, very important to the batting of the Indian team, in all formats.”Mithali Raj on Shafali Verma

For starters, Verma is still uncapped in ODIs. For the home series against South Africa in March, she didn’t receive a call-up for the 50-overs assignment. (The team management or selectors never explained why.) But the Bristol Test left little room for any uncertainty to cloud Verma’s immediate future.The England tour now transitions into its limited-overs leg. A maiden 50-over appearance for India in the three-ODI series should only be a matter of (a week’s) time. In the larger scheme of things, discussions around the playing combination and putting on competitive first-innings totals leading into the 2022 ODI World Cup must start revolving around Verma’s role.”I’m sure from here on, she’ll go from strength to strength and will be very, very important to the batting of the Indian team, in all formats,” Raj said. “She beautifully adapted to this format. She didn’t go like how she would go bonkers in the T20 format. Sensibly she played the new ball and it’s great to have her.”Shafali Verma had the opportunity to share the dressing room with the likes of England and Velocity batter Danielle Wyatt in the Women’s T20 Challenge•BCCIIt couldn’t be more ironic that Verma now sits atop the list of most runs by a Test debutant without a first-class cap. The Bristol draw was India’s first Test in nearly seven years. The three-day senior women zonal tournament, the only domestic red-ball domestic event, ceased to exist after the 2017-18 season. The absence of an Under-16 national competition means an entire demographic remains untapped or under-exposed or both until the players reach the Under-19s and Under-23 competitions.Against the backdrop of the dearth of a well-outlined pathway for female cricketers in India, Verma’s journey to a Test cap remains something of a study in the relation between intent and talent-nurturing. At the Haryana men’s camp earlier in the year, Verma was the only female player. It was the Haryana Cricket Association, her state unit, that ensured Verma got a regular hit at the nets, in practice matches, and took part in the fitness sessions alongside the men’s players.”I had to even remind my bowlers, ‘ (Don’t go easy on her because a girl; she might take you to the cleaners),'” Sharma, who led the opposition team in the practice games featuring Verma at the Haryana camp, remembers. “All of us bowlers gave our 100 per cent. There was no leniency because she is a girl. We knew we were up against a good batter.”For all the paucity of Test cricket for women internationally and of a structure that assists planned, long-term development of India’s female cricketers, Verma’s record-breaking debut in the longest format remains a success story like no other. Imagine what could happen if India got down to unearthing talent by design, not by accident.

Being in a group full of Asian oppositions could prove a test if the pitches are slow and low

Deivarayan Muthu21-Oct-2021

Big picture

Just four months ago, Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor sealed victory in the World Test Championship final, leaving the New Zealand public clamouring for image of the pair walking off to be immortalised as a statue at the Basin Reserve. New Zealand are now out to have another crack at a world title in the same year, but at this T20 World Cup in the UAE, they will have to do so without Taylor – their joint-most-capped player in T20Is – and there are also some (minor) concerns over Williamson’s fitness in the lead-up to the tournament.Related

• Lockie Ferguson ruled out of T20 World Cup with calf tear

• Guptill hopes to draw confidence from 2016 T20 World Cup performance to turn UAE form around

• Williamson on course for T20 World Cup opener

• T20 World Cup prize money: Title winners to get $1.6 million

• Fit-again Conway ready to create World Cup 'legacy' after Test high

New Zealand dominated their most recent home summer, which saw the emergence of Glenn Phillips and Devon Conway, winning 10 of the 13 completed T20Is. From thriving on easy-paced hit-through-the line tracks on small grounds, Williamson’s men will have to adapt quickly to the slow, low pitches on bigger grounds in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.It helps New Zealand that ten of their 16 squad players were part of the recently concluded IPL, and they can also draw some confidence from the past. In the 2016 T20 World Cup group-stage game in Nagpur, they benched Tim Southee, Trent Boult and Mitchell McClenaghan to accommodate three spinners in Mitchell Santner, Ish Sodhi and Nathan McCullum – and stunned India on a rank turner.While Williamson has already indicated that conditions will decide New Zealand’s XI, facing India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh – if they qualify for the tournament proper – will be a tricky proposition.

Recent form

None of New Zealand’s World Cup squad players travelled to Bangladesh, where a Tom-Latham-led second-string side lost the T20I series 3-2. The subsequent tour to Pakistan was called off amid security concerns, minutes before the first ODI was scheduled to begin in Rawalpindi. However, a good chunk of New Zealand’s players have been active in franchise cricket, including the IPL, CPL, the Hundred and the Vitality Blast.

Batting

Phillips and Conway have evolved into versatile middle-order batters, and a fit Williamson could have a big role to play, but there could be a bit of trouble at the top if Martin Guptill and Tim Seifert can’t maximise the powerplay in these conditions. Guptill has played nine T20 games in the UAE, scoring 126 runs at an average of 14 and a strike rate of 104.13. Seifert has had stints with the Knight Riders’ franchises in the CPL and IPL but has played just 10 T20s in Asia.Jimmy Neesham and Daryl Mitchell, picked ahead of Colin de Grandhomme, will be tasked with the responsibility of finishing the innings.Lockie Ferguson could be a vital cog in the bowling line-up•Getty Images

Bowling

Having recovered from injury and Covid-19, Lockie Ferguson proved his form and fitness for Kolkata Knight Riders in their run to the final in IPL 2021. Ferguson can devour oppositions with his breakneck speed, which most subcontinent teams aren’t used to facing. Adam Milne, who was in stellar form in the Hundred, could have added more X-factor to New Zealand’s attack, but the team management has instead leaned towards the experience of Boult and Southee, keeping Milne as a reserve bowler.New Zealand don’t have a specialist offspinner although Phillips is open to doing the job against left-handers. Santner was the only New Zealander who didn’t get a game in this IPL, but head coach Gary Stead believes he will be able to shake off the rust during the warm-up games.Kyle Jamieson had impressed with his change-ups in Chennai during the first leg of the IPL, but his T20 form has tapered off since. In his last seven T20s, he has managed just a solitary wicket at an economy rate of 10.09.

Player to watch

Ferguson aside, Phillips has become a sought-after T20 package. In addition to being the top six-hitter in T20s this year, Phillips is one of the better players of spin in the New Zealand line-up, having honed his skills while working with Ramnaresh Sarwan at the CPL. A back condition has limited his ability to keep wicket in recent times, but he can aggressively patrol the outfield and bowl quickish offspin.

Key question(s)

Do New Zealand have enough depth in their squad? They’ve picked only one reserve player in Milne, and left out compelling T20 options in Colin Munro and Finn Allen. If the ball doesn’t swing or seam around, how effective will Boult or Southee be in the UAE?

Likely XI

1 Martin Guptill, 2 Tim Seifert (wk), 3 Kane Williamson (capt), 4 Devon Conway, 5 Glenn Phillips, 6 Jimmy Neesham, 7 Mitchell Santner, 8 Kyle Jamieson/Daryl Mitchell, 9 Lockie Ferguson, 10 Ish Sodhi, 11 Trent Boult/Tim Southee

On the brink of a milestone only seven other bowlers in history have crossed, the Australia spinner looks ahead to his side’s next six Tests in England

Andrew McGlashan05-Jun-2023Nathan Lyon is already in rarified air as a Test cricketer. But he’s close to joining an even more exclusive club.With six Tests over the next two months there is every chance that he will claim the 18 wickets he needs to reach 500 – a milestone only achieved by seven bowlers in the history of the game.Lyon is not someone who likes focusing on personal milestones during a playing career, but he is able to acknowledge the significance of the landmark that is within his grasp during the upcoming Ashes series. His 400th wicket also came against England, during the 2021-22 series, when he had Dawid Malan taken at silly point on the fourth day at the Gabba.Related

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“Yeah, I don’t like talking about myself in that light, but it is pretty amazing when you sit back and look at the names who have been able to take 500 Test wickets,” he said before flying to the UK. “I know I’ve been very fortunate and I’m grateful for my journey so far. It has been amazing, and if I’m able to tick that little box over the Ashes, it would be very special.”If I start looking at what I’ve been able to achieve, the Tests and the series that we’ve won, I’ll feel like the end can sneak up on you quite quickly. I still feel I’ve got a lot of cricket left in me and I know personally, I want to tick off some big goals in the many years to come. I’ll definitely look back at it when I do call stumps, but that’s not for a while yet.”Lyon, who made his Test debut in 2011 and claimed a wicket with his first delivery, now embarks on a two-month tour of the UK with two major prizes up for grabs: the World Test Championship and the Ashes, which Australia have not won in England since 2001.Lyon’s key role in Australia’s WTC final Facing India at The Oval on June 7 is the first matter of business for Australia before thinking about the Ashes, even though that series begins just four days after the Oval match ends. The WTC has been much more of a singular focus for the Australians this time after they missed the inaugural final due to over-rate penalties.”This is my World Cup final,” Lyon said. “Being part of the 2019 [ODI] World Cup, where we weren’t good enough against England in the semi-final, it did feel the World Cup dream probably slipped away.”Spinners Matt Kuhnemann (left) and Mitchell Swepson (right) in a BBL game. “I do feel the depth of Australia’s spin stocks has improved out of sight,” Lyon says•Bradley Kanaris/Getty ImagesLyon was a central figure in Australia’s campaign to secure their spot in this year’s WTC final. In this two-year cycle he claimed 83 wickets in 19 Tests at 26.97, 15 wickets more than the second most prolific bowler in this period, James Anderson. While history suggested Australia would dominate at home, they were handed a tough overseas draw with visits to Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India.Though only the tour of Pakistan produced a series win – and a very significant one at that – crucially Australia picked up three Test victories in those series, clinching their place in the final with the win in Indore where Lyon claimed 8 for 64. That followed five-wicket hauls in the other two successes: 5 for 83 in Lahore in a match that went to the final hour of the final day and 5 for 90 in Galle.”I’m pretty proud of the whole squad – players and coaches – the mentality of everyone, the way we played our brand of cricket, the different challenges of playing in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India and at home,” Lyon said. “Feel like the World Test Championship final is a reward for our efforts over the last 24 months, but there’s a lot to play for now. We really need to make sure we go on with it and finish the job that we set out to do.”To go over to each country and play my role and be able to help contribute to a few wins, it’s been amazing, but it’s also been a massive learning curve for me and all our squad. Not one [performance] stands out – they are all equal in their own right. Saying that, it means nothing now. I need to make sure I’m playing my role [in the final].”Lyon’s looming centuryThe proximity of the WTC final to the Ashes has made for a curious build-up. The match against India deserves its own billing but the prospect of the five contests that follow it is mouth-watering given the resurgence in England’s Test cricket over the last 12 months.Lyon, who has recently launched an online platform called GOATD, which will provide members exclusive behind-the-scenes access to his tour, is on his fourth Ashes trip.”Feel like every Ashes is getting bigger,” he said. “England have been talking about the Ashes for a long time but for us we are purely focused on the WTC final and feel like we’ve got to be. We know we are there for the long haul and it will be a big challenge with what England throw at us, but right now the focus is purely on India.””To hopefully crack 100 consecutive games would be an extremely proud moment, but let’s try play 98 first”•SuppliedLyon’s first Ashes trip, in 2013, can be seen as a key moment in his career. He was omitted for the first two Tests, when Ashton Agar was preferred – Agar famously left a bigger impression with the bat by making 98 at No. 11 on debut. Lyon returned at Old Trafford. He has not missed a Test match since, currently sitting on 97 in a row.”It’s something that I’m pretty proud about, having played 97 consecutive Tests. To hopefully crack 100 consecutive games would be an extremely proud moment, but let’s try to play 98 first,” he said.This will be the earliest Ashes series in the UK since 1997 and it will be wrapped up before August – a month where in recent times such series have just been getting going. Lyon had a brief spell with Worcestershire in 2017, which gave him a taste of bowling in early-season English conditions, but he does not think much will have to change.”I’ve been watching a fair amount of county cricket and talking to the likes of Sean Abbott [at Surrey] and getting some intel on the surfaces,” he said. “Stokesy has come out and said they want hard, fast, flat wickets, so that’s what we are expecting.”While India come first, what of the prospect of being taken on by England’s Bazballers and their batters trying to put him into the stands? “Won’t be the first it’s happened to me,” Lyon said. “I have the record of most Test sixes in history so a couple won’t matter to me.”The shadow of Headingley 2019Australia retained the Ashes in 2019 under Tim Paine’s captaincy, so that was certainly a success, but it was also a missed opportunity to come away series winners: England levelled the series at The Oval after, of course, the Stokes-inspired Miracle at Headingley.Enough time has elapsed that Lyon is philosophical at looking back at his impending return to that ground; this year’s series features the same venues in the same order.”I know 99% of people probably think the run-out [that Lyon failed to effect during England’s last-wicket partnership in their successful chase] cost us everything, but we should have won that game well and truly before taking it so deep,” he said. “But Ben Stokes is going to go down as one of England’s greatest. Definitely feels like we missed a trick but to go over there and retain the Ashes was extremely special.The missed run-out of Jack Leach at Headingley in 2019: “I’m expecting the crowd [at Headingley in 2023] to let me know, but it’s not the first mistake I’ve ever made and it won’t be the last”•Getty Images”I’m not scared of the ground, I’m looking forward to being back at Headingley. Was probably one of the best Test matches I’ve ever been a part of. I’m expecting the crowd to let me know, but it’s not the first mistake I’ve ever made and it won’t be the last.”Future bright, but Lyon has no plans to leave Unlike in 2019, Lyon has a fellow spinner alongside him in the Test squad. Todd Murphy has been one of the breakout stars in the Australian game over the last 12 months and claimed 14 wickets on his maiden Test tour, in India, including a seven-wicket haul on debut in Nagpur.Australia’s schedule over the next couple of years – they do not tour the subcontinent for Tests until they go to Sri Lanka in early 2025 – means that, barring injury to Lyon, and the end of his long unbeaten Test run, Murphy is likely to have to wait for his next opportunity – unless an SCG Test calls for two spinners.But his emergence has gone a long way to answering the question of who replaces Lyon when the time comes. Along with Matt Kuhnemann’s swift elevation to Test cricket in India, the presence of Mitchell Swepson, the emergence of Corey Rocchiccioli at Western Australia, and hopefully a return for legspinner Tanveer Sangha from injury next season make for a sense that the spin stocks are in a healthy place.”Think the depth is growing very fast,” Lyon said. “[Matt and Mitch] have done exceptionally well in their own right and have played a role in winning games overseas. Hopefully I’ve been able to help the guys out here and there but I do feel the depth of Australia’s spin stocks has improved out of sight and it will be a good space for the next decade or so.”Lyon has no plans on vacating his position anytime soon. “The hunger and drive to get better is still there, and I still feel like I have a lot to offer Australia. I’ve never conquered this game of cricket and never will – feel like I can keep learning and keep getting better. Until that day comes when I can’t get any better or the hunger dries. That’s when I call stumps.”No. 500 may not be the last of his landmarks.

Mumbai play three of their four remaining games at home, while RCB only play one at home

S Rajesh08-May-2023Mumbai Indians

Royal Challengers Bangalore
With only 17 games left in the league stage, it’s still impossible to separate most of the teams on the IPL points table. Five are locked on 10 points eac, and two on eight each. The overall points distribution makes this one of the closest IPLs ever. The standard deviation, which is a measure of how dispersed or clustered a set of data is around the mean, for the points table this season is 2.366; only once in the previous 15 seasons has it been smaller after 53 games: 1.984 in 2020.With five teams on 10 points, every match that pits two of them against each other will have a huge bearing on the fortunes of the teams and the table. Tuesday’s match is one such, with Mumbai Indians locking horns with Royal Challengers Bangalore. Both teams are on 10 from 10 games, with net run rates that are quite close as well. Both teams also have games to come against Gujarat Titans and Sunrisers Hyderabad.One crucial difference, though, is that Mumbai have three home games to come, compared to just one for Royal Challengers. Both teams have 50-50 win-loss records at home this season, with Mumbai winning two and losing two and RCB winning three and losing three. Towards the business end of the tournament, however, more home games might yet prove to be a crucial advantage for Mumbai Indians.Sixteen points is said to be the magic number for qualification, but as things stand, as many as six teams can finish on 16 or more points. That means the winner on Tuesday will still have plenty of work to do, though it will still be a significant step towards qualification.On the other hand, if a couple of teams – Gujarat Titans and Chennai Super Kings – break away from the pack with wins in their remaining games, then even 14 might be enough for qualification for two of the remaining teams. For instance, the loser of Tuesday’s game can finish on 14 and still qualify even without net run rates coming into play.

Also, what’s the record for the highest IPL total without a half-century?

Steven Lynch09-Apr-2019In a recent IPL match KKR scored 206, with no batsman reaching 50. Was this a record? asked Brett Renike from Australia
That’s a good spot, because Kolkata Knight Riders’ 206 for 5 against Royal Challengers Bangalore in Bengaluru last week was indeed a record IPL total without an individual half-century – the highest individual contribution was Andre Russell’s rapid unbeaten 48. The previous record – and the only other such score over 200 – was Mumbai Indians’ 202 for 7 against the Super Kings in Chennai, in one of the earliest matches in the very first IPL, in April 2008.Somerset made 226 for 5 in vain against Kent in a floodlit Vitality Blast match in Canterbury last August. And the international record is Australia’s 221 for 5 against England in Sydney in 2006-07, when the highest individual score was Adam Gilchrist’s 48.In one of last week’s ODIs, the first four Australians in the order all reached 50. Was this a record? asked Tom McGuirk from Canada
The match you’re talking about was the one in Dubai on March 31, which Australia won to complete a 5-0 whitewash of Pakistan. Usman Khawaja made 98, Aaron Finch 53, Shaun Marsh 61 and Glenn Maxwell 70.This was actually the 16th time the top four in the order had all reached 50 in the same ODI. Australia had done it twice before – against South Africa in Johannesburg in 2005-06 (Adam Gilchrist 55, Simon Katich 79, Ricky Ponting 164, Mike Hussey 81), and against India in Jaipur in 2013-14 (Finch 50, Phillip Hughes 83, Shane Watson 59, George Bailey 92 not out). Remarkably, Australia lost both those games!In that Jaipur game, Maxwell also added 53 from No. 5 – it’s the only occasion the top five in the order all made half-centuries in the same ODI. The only other instance of five was achieved by Pakistan against Zimbabwe in Karachi in 2007-08: numbers 2-6 all reached 50, but at the top of the order Salman Butt was out for 4.I realised that Faf du Plessis had a batting average of 293 early in his Test career. Was this a record, at least for South Africa? asked Dale Kriege from South Africa
South Africa’s Faf du Plessis raised his batting average to 293.00 during his second Test, in Australia in 2012-13. He followed 78 and 110 not out on debut in Adelaide with 78 not out and 27 in Perth – so was in sight of an average of 300 when he was out on the second innings.That’s the eight-highest Test batting average anyone has ever had – but there is another South African who did better. Jacques Rudolph started with 222 not out (against Bangladesh in Chittagong in 2002-03), and added 71 in the following Test. Just before he was dismissed for 10 in his third – against England at Edgbaston in 2003 – he had a Test average of 303.The highest Test batting average ever recorded was by the West Indian Lawrence Rowe. After making 214 and 100 not out on debut, against New Zealand in Kingston in 1971-72, he had taken his average to 336 immediately before being dismissed for 22 in the next match, in Port-of-Spain. Rowe came down to earth a little after that, with innings of 1 and 0!The others who boasted higher averages than du Plessis were the England trio of David Lloyd (308.00), Reginald “Tip” Foster (306) and Ian Bell (303), India’s Rohit Sharma (302), and the West Indian Frank Worrell (294). New Zealand’s Jimmy Neesham comes next with 277.Tom Latham and Kane Williamson have made more than 700 runs in their last ten innings•Getty ImagesI know Alzarri Joseph’s 6 for 12 was an IPL record, but was it the best in all Twenty20 cricket? asked Jai Manohar Prakash from India
Alzarri Joseph’s 6 for 12 for Mumbai Indians against Sunrisers in Hyderabad the other day – on his IPL debut – broke the competition record set in 2008 by Sohail Tanvir, who took 6 for 14 for Rajasthan Royals against Chennai Super Kings in Jaipur in 2008, the first IPL season.The best figures in all senior T20 cricket are 6 for 5, by the Malaysian-born Somerset slow left-armer Arul Suppiah, against Glamorgan in Cardiff in 2011. In the other big competitions, Shakib Al Hasan claimed 6 for 6 in the CPL, for Barbados Tridents against Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel in Bridgetown in August 2013, while Lasith Malinga took 6 for 7 in the Big Bash, for Melbourne Stars against Perth Scorchers in Perth in December 2012. The international record is 6 for 8, by another Sri Lankan, Ajantha Mendis, against Zimbabwe in the World Twenty20 in Hambantota in September 2012.Graeme Pollock scored 677 runs in his last ten Test innings. Is this the record? asked Jeremy Bradbury from England
My first thought was that Graeme Pollock’s aggregate – which included a murderous 274 against Australia in Durban in 1969-70 – would be a record for anyone’s last ten Test innings. But, as I’ve found out often, first thoughts can be dangerous!In fact there are three batsmen who collected more in their last ten innings. Graham Yallop made 693, while a rather more celebrated Australian, Charlie Macartney, managed 753. But top of the list is the West Indian Seymour Nurse, whose 766 runs included 258 in his very last innings, against New Zealand in Christchurch in 1968-69.Of current batsmen, the New Zealanders Kane Williamson and Tom Latham have made 738 and 701 runs respectively in their last ten innings, but those figures will presumably change.And there’s an update to last week’s question about batsmen who made no scores in the nineties in Tests, from Anne Monaghan
“You said that Michael Vaughan was next after Don Bradman for making the most Test centuries without a score in the nineties. But Greg Chappell scored 24 centuries and, although he did make 98 against England in Sydney in 1979-80, he was not out in that innings, so was never dismissed in the nineties.”Use our feedback form or the Ask Steven Facebook page to ask your stats and trivia questions