A rare century and Anderson's 50

Stats highlights from the opening day at Trent Bridge, when Murali Vijay scored his first overseas Test century

09-Jul-2014

A big feature of M Vijay's innings was the number of deliveries he left alone - 103 out of 294  •  Getty Images

M Vijay's unbeaten 122 is his fourth Test century, and his first outside India. Before this Test, his highest score outside India had been 97, in Durban last year. In that Test as well, India had batted first, and Vijay batted through the entire opening day, finishing unbeaten on 91. In 11 previous overseas Tests, Vijay had averaged 21.25, while his home average is 51.70.

Vijay's hundred is only the sixth by an India opener in Tests in England since 1980: the others who scored centuries are Ravi Shastri (two), Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid (two). There have only been seven previous instances of an India opener scoring a century in the first innings of a Test match (as opposed to the first innings for a team) in Australia, England or South Africa. The last such instance was in January 2007, by Wasim Jaffer in Cape Town.

Though Vijay scored a hundred, his opening partner Shikhar Dhawan managed just 12, and the stand was worth 33. Since the Durban Test of 2010, India's opening partnership has averaged 18.22 in 35 stands in overseas Tests, with only one 50-plus partnership. In home Tests during the same period, they averaged 58.45, with 11 fifty-plus stands in 24 innings.

India lost all their four wickets early in each session: in the first seven overs of each session, they had a combined scored of 52 for 4; in the remaining 69 overs in the day, they scored 207 runs without losing a wicket.

Over the entire day, the India batsmen left alone 165 deliveries out of 540, a percentage of 30.55. Of those 165 balls, 103 were left alone by Vijay, out of the 294 he faced, a percentage of 35. Unlike a typical innings, though, Vijay left alone more deliveries as his innings went along: in the first session, he left alone 30% of the balls he faced, which increased to 35.6% in the afternoon and 38% in the final session of the day.

Shikhar Dhawan's wicket was James Anderson's 50th at Trent Bridge, in only his eighth Test. By the end of the opening day, he had added Cheteshwar Pujara's wicket to his tally, which gives him 51 wickets at Trent Bridge, at an average of 18.03. Among all instances of bowlers who've taken 50 or more wickets at a ground - there are 43 such instances - Anderson's average is the sixth-best, and his strike rate of 38.2 is the second-best, next only to Alec Bedser's 35.6 at Old Trafford. Anderson has also become the second England bowler - after Ian Botham - to take 50 or more wickets at two venues. Anderson has 68 wickets at Lord's at 25.14, while Botham has 50-plus wickets at Lord's and The Oval.

MS Dhoni's unbeaten 50 is his fifth half-century in 14 Test innings in England, where he averages 43.54. In his three previous Test innings at Trent Bridge, his scores were 5, 5 and 0.

Stuart Binny has become the oldest Indian to make his Test debut since Sameer Dighe, who was 32 years and 161 days old when he played his first Test, against Australia, in March 2001. Binny is only the fourth India player since 1985 to make his Test debut after the age of 30 - apart from Dighe, the others in the group are Robin Singh and Syed Saba Karim.

James Anderson Murali Vijay MS Dhoni India England England vs India India tour of England

S Rajesh is stats editor of ESPNcricinfo. @rajeshstats