Wilson's amazing world record

I was surprised to read the match reports of the second one-dayer between New Zealand and Australia which Australia won quite comprehensively.One report mentioned Gilchrist's record of dismissing first five batsman in a ODI,while the another informed that Vettori by scoring 83 in this match equalled Lance Klusener's record of highest individual score at number 8. But none mentioned a word about Jeff Wilson's amazing record.It was after a gap of 11 years and 331 days that Wilson was playing a ODI – missing 271 games for New Zealand during this period. With this Wilson obliterated all previous records of longest gap between two appearances – both in terms of time and matches.

Wilson had made his ODI debut way back in 1992-93 against Australia at home. After an unimpressive debut where he recorded a duck and conceded 58 runs off his 10 overs, Wilson made amends by playing a slashing innings at Hamilton (44 not out off 28 balls, 3 fours and one six), which gave New Zealand an exciting victory with two balls to spare. Surprisingly Wilson decided to focus on his rugby after that series and played his first match for the All Blacks before his 20th birthday. After a distinguished career in the black jersey, he retired from all rugby in 2002. Wilson then returned to the Otago Volts where he caught the eyes of the national selectors with some strong performances. He was a shock selection for New Zealand's one-day games against a World XI, which replaced the scheduled matches against Sri Lanka, who had returned after the tsunami disaster.Wilson did well, taking 3 for 6 in one of the games, and retained his place for the one-day series against Australia.He did not appear in the first game at Wellington, but played in the second match and history was made.

The previous record of missing most matches in between two appearances was of 218 matches held by South African wicket-keeper Errol Stewart. In terms of time interval, Wilson expunged England’s Wayne Larkins’ record who made a comeback after 9 years and 266 days during the 1989-90 Nehru Cup.

Pietersen’s feats

England’s Kevin Pietersen was in a fabulous form in the ODI series against South Africa as he ended the series with 454 runs at a mind blowing average of 151.33 with 3 hundreds and a fifty. Pietersen, in fact, just missed to overhaul West Indian Chris Gayle’s world record of most runs in a bilateral series. Gayle had aggregated 455 runs against India in 2002-03.

Pietersen, however, managed to equal two world records. When his score reached 58 during the course of his innings of 116 in the last game of the series, Pietersen completed his 500 runs in One-Day Internationals. It took him only 9 innings to accomplish this feat – same number of innings played by England’s Dennis Amiss to hold a long standing world record of fastest 500 runs in a career.

Pietersen also joined the selected band of cricketers who have scored thee centuries in a series / tournament. The other members of this exclusive club are England’s David Gower & Graeme Hick, Australia’s Mark Waugh (twice), West Indians Desmond Hayned & Chris Gayle,Indians Sourav Ganguly & VVS Laxman, Pakistanis Zaheer Abbas & Saeed Anwar.

Hundred off the last ball of the innings

Kevin Pietersen scored his second ODI hundred in the fifth match of seven match series against South Africa at East London yesterday. The remarkable thing with Pietersen was that he reached three-figure mark with a six off Andrew Nel off the last ball of the match.

There are very few instances in One-Day International cricket history of a batsman reaching his hundred off the last ball of the allotted overs to a side. Pietersen is the only one to have done so while batting second. Pakistan’s Yousuf Youhana is the only batsman to appear twice in this elite list. Youhana infact hit a six off the last ball of 50th over to bring up hundred on both the occasions. Pietersen and New Zealand’s McMillan are the only others to have emulated him.

McGrath: Pakistan's nemesis ?

When Glenn McGrath returned the figures of 5 for 27 in the second final of VB Series, it was the third time he was taking a five wicket-haul in the final / grand final of a tournament. McGrath now holds the record of most five-wicket hauls in the final or grand final of a tournament.He was previously at level with two West Indians Joel Garner and Curtly Ambrose, Pakistan’s Azhar Mahmood and Sri Lankan Muttiah Muralitharan with two such instances. Interestingly on all of the three occasions, Pakistan was the opposing side. Clearly Pakistan find McGrath too hot to handle in the crunch situations.

McGrath’s today's figures are also the best by an Australian in the final of a tournament bettering Brett Lee’s 5 for 30 against England in the second final of 2002-03 VB Series.

Inzamam slowest to complete century of catches

Inzamam-ul-Haq became first Pakistani and 13th player (non wicket-keeper) in the ODI history to complete century of catches when he held Andrew Symonds off the bowling of Abdur Razzaq in the first final of VB Series. By taking 335 matches, Inzamam became the slowest to reach this mark obliterating India’s Sachin Tendulkar’s record who took 333 matches to do so.
The following table lists the fielders taking 100 catches in ODIs:

Ct	Fielder	   For	Mts	CpM    Mts for 

                                       100 Cts

156 M Azharuddin   Ind	334	0.47	231

127 AR Border	   Aus	273	0.47	219

120 CL Hooper	   WI	227	0.53	205

111 SR Waugh	   Aus	325	0.34	290

111 SP Fleming	   NZ	230	0.48	210

109 RS Mahanama	   SL	213	0.51	194

108 ME Waugh	   Aus	244	0.44	228

105 ST Jayasuriya  SL	334	0.32	305

105 JN Rhodes	   SA	245	0.43	226

104 BC Lara  	   WI	251	0.41	244

101 IVA Richards   WI	187	0.54	182

101 SR Tendulkar   Ind	342	0.30	333

100 Inzamam-ul-Haq Pak	335	0.29	335

Shahid Afridi sets a new world record of sixes

Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi today became the batsman to hit most number of sixes in one-day internationals in the first final of VB Series.

The six that he hit off Shane Watson was 189th of his career took him past Sri Lankan Sanath Jayasuriya’s tally of 188 sixes.

Interestingly Afridi took 136 matches less than Jayasuriya to overhaul his record.Among the batsmen with 100 or more sixes in a career, Afridi's average of 1.01 sixes per innings is the best. His strike rate of 105.28 is also the highest among all the batsmen with an aggregate of 1,000 runs or more

SA-Eng tie 20th in history

The second match of the seven-match one-day international series between South Africa and England ended in a dramatic tie at Bloemfontein on Wednesday.

Needing to score eight runs for victory in the final over of the match with five wickets in hand, South Africa could score only seven, losing three wickets in the over as the match finished in a tie.

The tied match is the 20th instance in the history of one-day internationals. Australia (7) has figured in most tied matches followed by Pakistan (6), West Indies (5) and South Africa (5).

Interestingly, South Africa has been involved in five of the last six tied one-day internationals.

Click on the link for the complete list of tied one-day internationals:

http://in.rediff.com/cricket/2005/feb/03tie.htm

Comeback Kings-II

Adam Bacher returned to international cricket after a gap of seven years, when he played for South Africa in the first one-day international against England at Johannesburg on Sunday.
The 31-year-old had played the last of his eight one-day internationals against Australia in Sydney at 1997-98.
Bacher missed 183 matches for South Africa during this period, which is the fourth highest figure for any player in the shorter version of the game. The record of missing most matches in between two appearances is of 218 matches held by another South African Errol Stewart.

Click on the following link for a list of all players who missed 100 (or more) matches in between two successive appearances:

http://in.rediff.com/cricket/2005/jan/31bacher.htm

Fourth innings heroes

Swapnil Shah,a cricket fan from Bombay,currently in USA for higher studies and a regular visitor to my blog recently posed a very interesting query. Swapnil wanted to know if Sachin Tendulkar has ever been not out at the end of fourth innings - in matches that India have won, lost, and drawn?

"This is particularly relevant because it is a common belief that throughout his career, Sachin Tendulkar is always believed to have faltered in key matches/ situations. And, also, the match is never over until Sachin Tendulkar gets out !!" Swapnil further emphasised in his email.

Frankly speaking, I had no idea about Tendulkar's performance in the fourth innings of a Test match when I sat down to compile the stats. But it turned out that it is none other than Tendulkar himself, who emerges at top -atleast in matches won by India.

Tendulkar has,however,never remained unbeaten in the fourth innings in a match lost by India,which proves Swapnil's point that match is never over until Tendulkar gets out.

Most times not out in the fourth innings for a winning cause:

SR Tendulkar       6 times

R Dravid           5 times

SM Gavaskar        4 times

SC Ganguly         3 times

(7 players with 2 such occasions) 

Most times not out in the fourth innings for a losing cause:

BS Chandrasekhar   9 times

J Srinath          5 times

BS Bedi            4 times

RJ Shastri         3 times

S Madan Lal        3 times

P Sen              3 times

SMH Kirmani        3 times

Most times not out in the fourth innings in a drawn affair:

DB Vengsarkar      8 times

M Amarnath         5 times

Kapil Dev          4 times

S Madan Lal        4 times

SR Tendulkar       3 times

(8 other players with 3 such instances)