It's a numbers game! Here The Cricketer takes a look back at some of the stats to come out of the world of cricket this week...
Dom Sibley and Zak Crawley’s 107-run partnership at the Wanderers was England’s first century stand for the first wicket in Tests since 2016. Alastair Cook and Keaton Jennings shared 103 for the first wicket in England’s second innings at Chennai after the hosts had put 759-7d on the board.
As for the Kent batsman, Crawley has bettered his score in each of his five Test innings so far. The opener’s career-best 66 followed knocks of 1, 4, 25 & 44.
Three figures next time out?
Just when it looked like England were slipping to a score in the low 300s, Stuart Broad (43) - his highest Test score since December 2017 - and Mark Wood (35*) blasted four fours and seven sixes between them to fire England to 400. The 82-run stand was the highest 10th-wicket partnership at the Wanderers in Test cricket, surpassing the 71 put on by Fanie de Villiers and Allan Donald against Pakistan in 1995.
Anrich Nortje has been in fine form throughout the series and picked up a richly deserved maiden Test five-for at the Wanderers. The bowler dismissed Joe Root, Ben Stokes, Ollie Pope, Sam Curran and Chris Woakes to take his series tally to 16 wickets at 26.68
Faf du Plessis might as well stop attending the toss. As the money favoured his opposite number in Johannesburg, it made it seven consecutive lost coin tosses in Tests for du Plessis.
Without wanting to poop the party. This feels like a stat the world could do without. Anyway. Here it is. On day one at the Wanderers, England registered their 500,000th run in men’s Tests. Those half a million coming from 1,022 matches and for the loss of 15,506 wickets. Australia are second on the list, with 432,706.
Joe Root picked up career-best Test bowling innings figures of 4 for 87 at St George’s Park - the first time the England skipper had taken three or more wickets in an innings.
Most Tests before taking 3 wickets in an innings:
— Andrew Samson (@AWSStats) January 19, 2020
GA Gooch 97
JE Root 91
KP Pietersen 88
SR Tendulkar 75
NJ Astle 71
It wasn't all glory for Root however. The England skipper joined an unfortunate club of bowlers who have conceded the most runs off a Test over.
Root conceded 28 off (44466 & 4b) against Keshav Maharaj as England laboured to take the final wicket in Port Elizabeth.
Robin Peterson (466444 vs Brian Lara in 2003) and James Anderson (462466 vs George Bailey) have both suffered the same fate.
At Port Elizabeth, Dom Bess became the first England spinner to take the first five wickets in a Test innings since Derek Underwood who claimed the first seven against Australia at Adelaide in 1975.
Ollie Pope’s maiden Test hundred saw him become the sixth cricketer to record a century and six catches in a single Test.
Century and 6 catches in a Test
— Andrew Samson (@AWSStats) January 20, 2020
F Woolley 133* & 11, 6 ct Eng v Aus Syd 1912
G Sobers 150*, 6 ct WI v Eng Lord's 1973
M Hayden 41 & 130, 7 ct Aus v SL Galle 2004
J Kallis 224, 6 ct SA v SL CT 2012
S Smith 119 & 8, 6 ct Aus v SL Colombo 2016
O Pope 135*, 6 ct Eng v SA PE 2020
Rohit Sharma is storming up the leaderboard as far as ODI hundreds are concerned. The India batsman stuck his 29th century in one-day internationals, hitting 119 against Australia at Bengaluru. Only Ricky Ponting (30), Virat Kohli (43) and Sachin Tendulkar (49) have hit more ODI tons.
“I can’t really sugarcoat it, it was just a p**s-poor effort. Another embarrassing effort.”
That was Chris Lynn’s assessment after Brisbane Heat suffered the worst 10-wicket collapse in Big Bash history.
Brisbane were cruising at 84-0 inside six overs - chasing 165 against Melbourne Renegades - before imploding to 120 all out.
Lynn, AB de Villiers at Matt Renshaw fell in quick succession before the Heat staged a mini recovery. Needing 53 from 45, Brisbane lost their final seven wickets for seven runs in 16 deliveries.
Having fallen two runs short of a hundred against India at Rajkot, Steve Smith struck 131 at Bengaluru - his first (9th overall) ODI hundred since January 2017. Smith passed 4,000 ODI runs in the process, making him the 18th Australian to reach the milestone.
Angelo Mathews registered his maiden double-century in Test cricket this week. The 32-year-old Sri Lanka hit an unbeaten 200 at Harare in his side's 10-wicket victory over Zimbabwe.
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