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Anantha Narayanan

Tests during 2012: an alternate look

A detailed statistical review of individual and team performances in Tests played in 2012

Unlike last year this review has come out on 1st January itself, thanks to the 200-over finish of the MCG Test.

1. Cricket Oscar of the year

There is a wonderful end-of-the-year award called Chess Oscar which is awarded to the best Chess player of the previous year. It is my proud moment to inform that Vishwanathan Anand has secured it six times. I have decided that I would institute a Cricket Oscar for the player who was the most effective cricketer who contributed most to the game during the previous year. It will mean something for the readers of the blog at least.

This year the award goes to Alastair Cook of England. He scored 1200 plus runs during the year, scored 4 hundreds in his first four Tests as captain, led from the front and took England to an unlikely victory in India. I expected the series to end 2-1, albeit in India's favour. Cook, almost single-handedly, turned the tide in the second innings at Ahmedabad and then, with help from Pietersen, Panesar, Swann, Anderson and Trott completed a famous series win.

Michael Clarke was the only other contender. His batting was divine and captaincy, most of the times, was flawless. However Australia's inability to close out the Adelaide Test, leading to a home series loss, held out against Clarke.

2. A look at performance of teams during 2012

Team Tests Wins-Home Neutral Away Draws-Home Neutral Away Losses-Home Neutral Away Performance
South Africa 10 1 0 4 0 0 5 0 0 0 80.5%
Australia 11 5 0 2 2 0 1 1 0 0 74.1%
Pakistan 6 0 3 0 0 0 2 0 0 1 68.3%
West Indies 10 2 0 2 1 0 1 2 0 2 50.0%
England 15 2 0 3 2 0 1 2 3 2 43.7%
Sri Lanka 10 3 0 0 2 0 0 2 0 3 36.0%
India 9 3 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 3 35.0%
New Zealand 10 1 0 1 2 0 0 1 0 5 29.0%
Bangladesh 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0.0%
Zimbabwe 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0.0%

This is the traditional 2-1-0 method of evaluating team performance, with a tweak. I have analysed the matches from home-neutral-away points of view. I have used the 2-1-0 values for the neutral matches and weighed the home matches down by 10% and the away matches upwards by 10%.

South Africa was the team of the year. Completion of the home series win against Sri Lanka was followed by three away series wins against the two top teams, England and Australia and the difficult-to-tour New Zealand. 5 wins and 5 draws adorned their year. Australians were very good, barring the unexpected series loss at home to South Africa. Pakistan did quite well, in matches played away and in neutral locations. West Indies had an up-and-down year but finished at 50% score.

England, India, Sri Lanka and New Zealand were good in patches. They ultimately ended the year with negative results. England finished the year on a high with their unexpected away series win over India. New Zealand finished the year well, drawing the away series in difficult Sri Lanka with a Taylor-made win. It was unfortunate that Taylor was stripped of part-captaincy and the issue remains unresolved.

3. An alternate look at performance of teams during 2012

Team Own RpW Oth RpW Difference Own WpT Oth WpT Difference
 
Australia 44.0 28.0 16.0 18.5 13.5 5.1
South Africa 46.3 33.2 13.1 16.5 13.6 2.9
West Indies 36.6 33 3.6 16.5 15 1.5
Pakistan 30.7 27.3 3.3 16.8 16 0.8
England 32.5 32.9 -0.3 15.9 15.6 0.3
Sri Lanka 28.7 36.9 -8.2 14.6 17.1 -2.5
New Zealand 26.7 34.2 -7.5 13.9 17.4 -3.5
India 30.8 41 -10.2 13.7 15.9 -2.2
Bangladesh 34.9 64.3 -29.3 11.5 20 -8.5
Zimbabwe 9.7 70.7 -61 7 20 -13

I can hear impatient calls of "Where is this "alternate look"?" Ah! that is coming now. Why were the teams successful. Good bowling and batting and fielding is fine. But what are the numbers. In this table I look at two sets of numbers to throw light on the success of certain teams and failures of the others.

First the RpW (Runs per wicket) values. I have compiled the "own RpW" and "other RpW" values and got the difference. This difference will indicate the success or lack of, for various teams. Note the huge positive differences for Australia and South Africa.

My other comparison is between "own WpM (wickets per match)" and "other WpM". After all a team has to take 20 wickets to win. Australia and South Africa have big positive differentials in this measure.

4. The top team performances

2027 2012 Aus 82.09 vs Ind 17.91 Australia won by an innings and 68 runs
2029 2012 Aus 81.14 vs Ind 18.86 Australia won by an innings and 37 runs
2031 2012 Aus 80.16 vs Ind 19.84 Australia won by 298 runs
2033 2012 Nzl 89.26 vs Zim 10.74 New Zealand won by an innings and 301 runs
2049 2012 Saf 80.37 vs Eng 19.63 South Africa won by an innings and 12 runs
2054 2012 Ind 83.54 vs Nzl 16.46 India won by an innings and 115 runs
2068 2012 Aus 86.18 vs Slk 13.82 Australia won by an innings and 201 runs
These are the seven imposing wins during 2012. The criteria for selection is match rating points of 80 and above for the winning team. The first three matches came and went in the space of a month. Then three different teams achieved it during the rest of the year. Australia ended the year with the biggest hammering of a team in years defeating Sri Lanka in two-and-a-half days.

5. The important series result summary

Australia - India        : 78.8 - 21.2
Pakistan  - England      : 72.7 - 27.3
New Zealand-South Africa : 38.7 - 61.3
England   - West Indies  : 61.8 - 38.2
Sri Lanka - Pakistan     : 56.7 - 43.3
England   - South Africa : 35.5 - 64.5
Australia - South Africa : 44.6 - 55.4
India     - England      : 42.5 - 57.5

6. The Team performance summary

Team          P  W  D  L   Team Rating Pts
Total   For    Vs
Australia 11 7 3 1 719.7 65.4 - 34.6 South Africa 10 5 5 0 623.6 62.4 - 37.6 Pakistan 6 3 2 1 347.9 58.0 - 42.0 West Indies 10 4 2 4 512.0 51.2 - 48.8 England 15 5 3 7 726.4 48.4 - 51.6 Sri Lanka 10 3 2 5 428.0 42.8 - 57.2 India 9 3 1 5 379.7 42.2 - 57.8 New Zealand 10 2 2 6 399.9 40.0 - 60.0 Bangladesh 2 0 0 2 52.2 26.1 - 73.9 Zimbabwe 1 0 0 1 10.7 10.7 - 89.3

This table is a summary of the Match rating points secured by teams. Even though Australia's overall results are slightly inferior to South Africa, their comprehensive innings wins have helped them move to the top of the table. During the year, on an average, they were 65-35 against opponents. South Africa were slightly behind. Pakistan and West Indies also performed creditably and finished on the positive side. The other six sides finished on the negative side.

For those of you who may have come in recently and wonder what the Match Rating is all about, please CLICK HERE to read the analysis done by me after the England - India tour of 2011. It is a single comprehensive index summarizing the team performances in the match.

7. The top batting performances

2038 2012 Jayawardene D.P.M.D  Slk Eng 180  225.9
2049 2012 Amla H.M             Saf Eng 311* 220.9
2034 2012 Azhar Ali            Pak Eng 157  204.5
2027 2012 Clarke M.J           Aus Ind 329* 203.1
2062 2012 Pietersen K.P        Eng Ind 186  199.1

These are the top 5 batting performances. Jayawardene's 180, a very much under-rated one, is an all-time classic and has moved into the all-time top-20 too. It is an innings reminiscent of Clem Hill's 188. Sri Lanka is reduced to 15 for 3. Jayawardene, with a next highest score of 27 to support him, scores 180 of the next 300 runs added, against a very good English attack. Ultimately this is a match-winner in a match of low scores.

Amla's 311, played away, against a good English attack and ultimately a match-winning innings is a truly wonderful effort. Let us not be fooled by the fact that South Africa lost only two wickets. England's strong batting line-up lost 20 wickets for similar runs. Clarke's 329 was, in many ways, the ultimate innings. Australia's win in the first Test was not very convincing. In reply to 191, they were floundering at 37 for 3. Then walks in Clarke and makes the ultimate statement. Unbeaten on 329 runs, two partnerships either side of 300, a disdain for records and a bone crusher delivered. India never recovered. They disappeared off the series.

Azhar Ali's innings was very different. After two forgettable two first innings, completed in 7 hours, Pakistan were 40 in arrears and lost two wickets before the arrears were cleared. Azhar Ali held the innings together, first with Younis Khan and then with Misbah-ul-Haq and took Pakistan to a respectable 365. Then they won comfortably. 442 balls of utmost patience and Azhar Ali came of age. Pietersen's 186 was quite different. On a square turner, India posted a respectable 327 and soon England were in trouble at 68 for 2. Pietersen played one of the great modern day innings, scoring 186 runs off 233 balls. A scoring rate of 80 on a treacherous pitch where the rest struggled. This innings changed the path of the series and afterwards India were always behind, home advantage notwithstanding. Only Pietersen could have played such an innings.

The other performances worthy of a mention are Samuels' match-winning effort of 123 against New Zealand, Pujara's top-drawer double hundred at Ahmedabad and Warner's 180 on a difficult Perth pitch against India.

My selection for the batting performance of the year is Pietersen's epochal 186.

8. The top bowling performances

2030 2012 Saeed Ajmal          Pak Eng 24.3  7  55  7 171.5
2062 2012 Panesar M.S          Eng Ind 22.0  3  81  6 163.3
2032 2012 Abdur Rehman         Pak Eng 10.1  4  25  6 162.8
2038 2012 Herath HMRKB         Slk Eng 38.0  9  97  6 152.9
2053 2012 Philander V.D        Saf Eng 14.5  4  30  5 150.7

On the first day of the first Test at Dubai, Ajmal set the tone of the series with a sterling performance capturing 7 for 55 and dismissed England for 192. Although England had their moments, they did not recover afterwards. Panesar's 6 wicket haul at Mumbai helped secure an easy win for England. The ball was turning a lot but Panesar's skill in prising out top order wickets, especially those of Sehwag and Tendulkar, was worthy of special mention.

In the Abu Dhabi Test, England were set 145 to win and everyone must have expected a comfortable win. But Abdul Rehman, rather than Ajmal, who played the supporting role, was unplayable and the leaden-footed English batsmen were skittled out for 72. A few months later the same team tackled spin as if they were batting on a feather-bed. That indicates the quality of bowling of Rehman and Ajmal.

At Galle, England were set a difficult, but not impossible, task of scoring 340 for a win. Herath captured 5 of the top 7 wickets and won the match for Sri Lanka, with a spell of 6 for 97. It was not an easy win. Finally the top pace bowling performance of the year. England were again set 340+ to win and tie the series. With the no.1 position on the line this was a nervous period for both teams. Philander's opening spell when he dismissed Strauss, Cook and Bell sealed the victory. Afterwards he dismissed Prior when he looked like taking England to an unlikely win and then captured the last wicket. An excellent match-winning performance.

My vote goes to Saeed Ajmal.

9. A look at the Test batsmen of 2012

Batsman              Cty  M  I  N Runs   Avge
Full post
Test XV - the final readers' selection

Selection of an all-time Test XV based on readers' votes

Finally we come to the moment billions (not that often misused word), a few hundred, have waited for. All the entries for the all-time best XV have been received, processed, cleaned up, shenanigans identified & put in place and the final Readers' XV determined.

The geographic distribution of responses has been given at the end.

Methodology

1. All the valid entries were placed in a text file. I wrote a custom program to tally the reader selections to create a Player-Reader matrix. Each set of fifteen players was assigned a weighted index using a complex algorithm to pin down identical selections. Then I created multiple Excel files. One for the number of reader votes received. Another for the number of selections by each reader that made into the final XV. Which brings us here.

2. I imposed certain restrictions on the selection of each XV. I did not want the reader to specifically exclude any period whatsoever. This was essential to have a fair field of selection across the years. Another restriction was that a reader had to specifically confirm if Bradman was excluded. Only one reader, out of such three, reverted with a series of convincing explanations. The other two simply did not bother, hence their entries were not included.

3. A few readers had raised the possibility of other readers misusing the system to put in multiple entries. I had always been aware of such attempts and set up diverse steps to locate and exclude such attempts. These steps have been documented in the form of a MS Word document. But why start with the unsavoury??? A link to that document provided at the end of this article.

4. The final selection is strictly bases on 'one reader, one vote' system. Be it Martin Crowe, Rajesh, Madhu or me, we all get one vote each. However I would have given slightly more weight to these selections to resolve a tie but it was not required.

Summary of numbers

No of valid entries received: 205
No of players selected:       119
No player was selected by all readers
Highest selection :           204 (Bradman-99.5%)
No of players with single selection each: 31
The votes gathered by the top 15 players: 2210-72.5%

Top 30 selections

NoPlayerVotes% of Total ...No PlayerVotes% of Total
1Bradman 20499.5...16Hadlee 8642.0
2Warne 18791.2...17Lillee 6431.2
3Sobers 17786.3...18Kallis 6230.2
4Marshall 17082.9...19Hutton 4120.0
5Gilchrist 16982.4...20SF Barnes 4019.5
6Murali 15676.1...21Waqar 2512.2
7Lara 15475.1...22Dravid 2411.7
8Hobbs 14470.2...23RG Pollock 2411.7
9Tendulkar 13967.8...24Holding 2311.2
10Akram 13766.8...25BA Richards 18 8.8
11Viv Richards13465.4...26Flower 18 8.8
12Gavaskar 13364.9...27Sangakkara 18 8.8
13McGrath 11556.1...28Sutcliffe 18 8.8
14Ambrose 9847.8...29Sehwag 18 8.8
15Imran 9345.4...30Hayden 17 8.3

7 players were selected by over 75% readers, 13 by over 50%, 18 by 25% or more and 24 by just over 10%. The 30th best selection, Hayden, received 17 votes (less than 9%). 40 players have 10 or more votes. There are big drops after Gavaskar (#12 with 133 votes), McGrath (#13 with 115 votes), Hadlee (#16 with 86 votes), Kallis (#18 with 62 votes) and SF Barnes (#20 with 40 votes).

The Readers' XV

The following final XV has been selected strictly based on votes received. There is no doubt that this is an excellent group of players. While there could be individual differences of opinions from readers, there is no doubt that this is an all-time best XV representing countries and eras in a very fair manner.

PlayerCountryRuns/WktsAverage
HobbsEng541056.95
GavaskarInd1012251.12
BradmanAus699699.94
SobersWin803257.78
LaraWin1195352.89
Viv RichardsWin854050.24
TendulkarInd1564354.51
GilchristAus557047.61
.
ImranPak36222.81
AkramPak41423.62
MarshallWin37620.95
WarneAus70825.42
MuraliSlk80022.73
McGrathAus56321.97
AmbroseWin40520.99

There are 5 West Indians, 4 Australians, 2 Indians, 2 Pakistanis, 1 Englishman and 1 Sri Lankan in this elite list of fifteen players.

Bradman is in with a record 99.5% votes. It may resemble the ballot to elect the President of a banana republic. Well, Paul Sime need not fear any reprisals from the President's secret service. He had clearly explained his selections. My estimate is that if we had received 1000 votes, Bradman would have got 99.94% selection (Thanks, david !!!). The lily needs no gilding. And before someone comments that it is absurd to destroy the lily because melting is an essential step for gilding, let me include the original quote by Shakespeare - ''To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw a perfume on the violet,... Is wasteful and ridiculous excess." (Milind, thanks!!!). So let us move on.

I must admit that I was startled by the second highest selection. While I expected Sobers at this position, to my pleasant surprise, it is Shane Warne who garnered 92.7% of the votes. This indicates the very very high opinion of informed readers in considering Warne as the best spinner of all time and a genuine match-winner.

He is, as expected, followed by Sobers who secured 86.2% votes. I am bewildered by the rather high 14% exclusion. I feel Kallis edged out Sobers in some selections while a few top batsmen may have elbowed out Sobers for the batting spot.

Gilchrist is next with 82.8% votes. Once again I am amazed that over 17% did not choose Gilchrist. I think Andy Flower, no less a keeper-batsman, took away quite a few votes. Possibly the solidity of Flower was preferred by some (nearly 9%). It is also possible that keepers with better keeping ability (on what basis, I cannot understand) like Knott may also have got the nod.

In fifth position is the undoubted master of aggressive pace bowling, Marshall with 82.3%. Quite on the expected lines. A true match winner and the best fast bowler amongst all the greats.

My two favourites, Muralitharan and Lara, appear next. Muralitharan just edging out Lara by two votes. Two wonderful champions, crowd-pleasers, fighters, elegant performers: all rolled into single packages. No real surprise that over 3 out of 4 readers selected these two players' players.

The next three positions are held by Hobbs, Tendulkar and Wasim Akram, with just under 70% of votes. It is a measure of the readers' understanding of the game that similar numbers have selected two maestros who played nearly 100 years apart. Hobbs and Tendulkar were masters of flawless technique and extremely consistent. That Hobbs received more votes than Tendulkar is a testament to the very fair manner in which the readers had approached this task.

Viv Richards, Gavaskar, McGrath and Ambrose occupy the next four positions. I expected a slightly higher position for Richards and Ambrose. But they are comfortably in. These 14 players were in my selection of 15 players

The last position was a closely fought one. Imran Khan finished comfortably ahead of Hadlee by 7 votes and secured the 15th spot. Maybe a different demographic distribution of readers might have got Hadlee in, as also couple of other batsmen like Kallis or Chappell.

I am extremely happy with the 15 selected and take pride in the fact that Imran was in my XV until the very late stages and Hadlee just about edged him out. At the same time I am happy at Imran's selection since most of the concerns were raised at his exclusion.

In summary, I am surprised that Warne and Kallis got higher votes than expected, and Sutcliffe received fewer. I am saddened that Greg Chappell and Ponting did not get more votes.

The 13 readers who selected 14 of the final XV

No selection matched the final 15. Apart from me, 12 others included 14 out of these 15. It can be argued that my selection closely resembles the final list solely because most readers relied on my list and altered a few spots but a glance down the most commented article reveals the thought behind these selections, The table below lists all these and the selection changes from the final list. KC (from US) matched my selection. Jay and Kaushik had identical selections as also Arnab and Rohith. That is all. These 6 are the only identical choices amongst the 200+ selections. Madhu, Cricinfo Stats wizard, got 14 correct while Rajesh, Cricinfo Editor, got 13 correct. Martin Crowe, who selected the wonderful quartet of Lillee, Hutton, O'Reilly and SF Barnes, matched the other eleven. These four find a place in the second XV.

Readers/WriterSelectedNot selected
 
Madhu RamakrishnanLilleeAkram
SumitLilleeImran
PersaudLilleeMcGrath
AnanthHadleeImran
KCHadleeImran
ArnabHadleeAmbrose
RohithHadleeAmbrose
JayKallisImran
KaushikKallisImran
MeerWaqarSobers
AamirWaqarHobbs
Lucky StrikeHuttonAkram
RaghuveerDravidTendulkar
PradeepBarry RichardsViv Richards

The 4 readers who selected 1 and 2 players of the final XV

Now the other end. One reader, Mike (from Australia), succeeded in selecting only Bradman out of the final XV. However since his selection encompassed all the eras and countries it is fine. Pete, Dennis and Sam39083 selected two players each. All three selected Bradman and Sobers and 13 other players.

The Second XV

The second XV has been selected mostly based on numbers but also with a bit of tweaking to get the team balance correct. It would be silly to just go by the numbers. It may be a good idea if the readers do not come out with comments like "A has got 1 vote more than B, why was B selected?". It would be totally counter-productive.

Hutton
Barry Richards
Sutcliffe
Kallis
Greg Chappell
Graeme Pollock
Dravid
Andy Flower (wk)
Hadlee
Lillee
SF Barnes
Holding
Waqar Younis
O'Reilly
Bedi

The overwhelming number of votes given for Warne and Muralitharan meant that the other spinners got very few votes. Still the numbers at least were reasonable. It is possible that one could have gone for Kumble over Bedi or Ponting over Dravid/Chappell. But those selected were thoroughly deserving of their inclusions. I am certain that this team would give the Top XV a run for its money. They would certainly win a Test or two in a 5-Test series.

Readers should remember the magnitude of the task I have completed. Cutting and pasting teams sent by readers in different formats, correcting spellings (how many 'Marshal's), affixing Viv or BA as warranted, affixing RG or SM as warranted, following up and effecting changes, tracking all below-15 and above-15 selections and validating these, checking for duplicate entries, taking care of multiple changes to teams and finally the special work to weed out suspicious entries and so on. All these with a 83.5% physical condition.

So please accept that there could be a few errors. However I am certain that these errors would not cause any change to the final selection. Frankly the only votes that matter are those to Imran and Hadlee. Imran is 7 ahead and is very unlikely to be caught up, on account of my errors. And many of the entries rejected had Imran. Even if you point out some errors please do not expect me to rush in and correct those.

To view/download the complete Player-Reader-Matrix Excel file, please CLICK HERE.

To view/download Word Document about my steps to locate and remove multiple selections, please CLICK HERE.

The geographic distribution of responses

Afghanistan     1
Antigua         1
Australia      32
Bahrain         3
Bangladesh      1
Barbados        2
Canada          1
Germany         1
Iceland         1
India          75
Ireland         1
Israel          2
Italy           1
Japan           3
Netherlands     1
New Zealand     4
Pakistan       19
Saudi Arabia    1
South Africa    3
Sri Lanka       3
UnitedArabEmir  2
United Kingdom 23
USA            24
205

What next?

Let us all settle back and relax, me the most. My next article will be an alternate review of 2012 by first week of January 2013. I have to do a lot of work to get the simulation programs up. Whether I want to carry out a simulation or not is also unclear. Let us give this a break. All you guys have a great Christmas, New Year, Pongal, Sankranti and Id-e-Milad. Your comments are, of course, welcome and will be published with the normal response criteria.

Have a great holiday season

Full post
The best bowling trios in Test cricket

Determining the best bowling trios in Test matches by analysing various performance aspects of a bowling attack

Since three bowlers generally represent the entire bowling strength of a team, I have extended the logic used in my earlier Test Bowling Pairs article, based on the important requests made at that time. The fourth bowler, barring the West Indian teams of the 1980s, typically plays a supporting role only. It was a very sensible request so I have completed the analysis in this article.

The bowling trios have been selected after a lot of preliminary analysis. Some of the wonderful bowling pairs did not have a third bowler to match their skills, while a few of the other bowling pairs had two high-quality third bowlers. I have selected 14 bowling trios and presented their numeric summaries only. My custom graphs have been well received but those will have to wait for the new year under a different article. I have made brief comments after every table and presented a concluding summary at the end.

Initially a brief list of the bowler trios which were considered but not included. It is unlikely that significant bowler trios beyond this list exist. I would not be doing any work on a reader-suggested bowler trio unless it is a genuine oversight on my part.

Bowling trio           Tests    Wkts
Lillee/Walker/Thomson 12 154 Willis/Botham/Dilley 11 113 Willis/Botham/Emburey 15 160 Willis/Botham/Edmunds 18 124 Willis/Botham/Old 9 127 Donald/Pollock/Ntini 9 107 Wasim/Waqar/Shoaib 5 40 Roberts/Holding/Marshall 9 105 Roberts/Holding/Garner 17 193 Sarfraz/Imran/Qadir 9 91 Imran/Qadir/Qasim 10 87 Murali/Vaas/Jayasuriya 68 753 -Ignored due to the limited impact by third bowler.

Warne, McGrath & Lee

P01.  Total: 519 @ 25.53
Warne 202 @ 25.27, McGrath 170 @ 21.64, Lee 147 @ 30.37
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Warne       : 1181(1992)-1826(2007) 202 @ 25.27 (506 @ 25.47)  99.2%
McGrath     : 1235(1993)-1826(2007) 170 @ 21.64 (393 @ 21.65) 100.0%
Lee         : 1479(1999)-1902(2008) 147 @ 30.37 ( 84 @ 33.74)  90.0%
Trio Career:  1479(1999) to 1826(2007)
All matches:           177 Wins: 111 (62.7%)
Trio matches:           38 Wins:  30 (78.9%)
Trio Home matches:      21 Wins:  17 (81.0%)
Trio Away matches:      17 Wins:  13 (76.5%)
Non-Trio matches:      139 Wins:  81 (58.3%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  69 Wins:  46 (66.7%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  70 Wins:  35 (50.0%)
Team Wkts:  680 @ 26.56  Team WpT: 17.89   Trio WpT: 13.66 (76.3%)
Balls: 36518 Trio %: 74.1
Warne %: 28.9 McGrath %: 24.4 Lee %: 20.9
Wkts:    680 Trio %: 76.3
Warne %: 29.7 McGrath %: 25.0 Lee %: 21.6
S/R:    53.7 Trio :  52.2
Warne :  52.2 McGrath :  52.4 Lee :  51.9

Lee brought in a much higher match-winning quality and raised the Warne/McGrath win % by well over 10% to an incredible 79%. That is 4 out of 5 Tests. Lee had the best strike rate amongst all three. These three captured over 75% of all team wickets.

Warne, McGrath & Gillespie

P02.  Total: 625 @ 24.38
Warne 222 @ 26.81, McGrath 247 @ 19.34, Gillespie 156 @ 28.90
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Warne       : 1181(1992)-1826(2007) 222 @ 26.81 (463 @ 24.50) 109.4%
McGrath     : 1235(1993)-1826(2007) 247 @ 19.34 (295 @ 23.42)  82.6%
Gillespie   : 1343(1996)-1799(2006) 156 @ 28.90 (103 @ 21.96) 131.6%
Trio Career:  1343(1996) to 1760(2005)
All matches:           172 Wins: 106 (61.6%)
Trio matches:           47 Wins:  30 (63.8%)
Trio Home matches:      16 Wins:  11 (68.8%)
Trio Away matches:      31 Wins:  19 (61.3%)
Non-Trio matches:      125 Wins:  76 (60.8%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  69 Wins:  47 (68.1%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  56 Wins:  29 (51.8%)
Team Wkts:  803 @ 26.81  Team WpT: 17.09   Trio WpT: 13.30 (77.8%)
Balls: 43993 Trio %: 74.6
Warne %: 28.3 McGrath %: 25.6 Gillespie %: 20.7
Wkts:    803 Trio %: 77.8
Warne %: 27.6 McGrath %: 30.8 Gillespie %: 19.4
S/R:    54.8 Trio :  52.5
Warne :  56.0 McGrath :  45.6 Gillespie :  58.2

The combination of Warne, McGrath and Gillespie gathered the most wickets by any bowling trio. Gillespie under-performed when bowling with the other two greats. McGrath raised his game significantly.

Miller, Lindwall & Johnston

P03.  Total: 391 @ 22.96
Miller 107 @ 22.98, Lindwall 144 @ 22.12, Johnston 140 @ 23.80
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Miller      : 0275(1946)-0430(1956) 107 @ 22.98 ( 40 @ 23.05)  99.7%
Lindwall    : 0275(1946)-0487(1960) 144 @ 22.12 ( 48 @ 21.06) 105.0%
Johnston    : 0290(1947)-0408(1955) 140 @ 23.80 ( 20 @ 24.70)  96.4%
Trio Career:  0290(1947) to 0408(1955)
All matches:            51 Wins:  30 (58.8%)
Trio matches:           36 Wins:  24 (66.7%)
Trio Home matches:      20 Wins:  14 (70.0%)
Trio Away matches:      16 Wins:  10 (62.5%)
Non-Trio matches:       15 Wins:   6 (40.0%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  10 Wins:   4 (40.0%)
Non-Trio Away matches:   5 Wins:   2 (40.0%)
Team Wkts:  627 @ 24.63  Team WpT: 17.42   Trio WpT: 10.86 (62.4%)
Balls: 41201 Trio %: 59.0
Miller %: 16.0 Lindwall %: 19.3 Johnston %: 23.7
Wkts:    627 Trio %: 62.4
Miller %: 17.1 Lindwall %: 23.0 Johnston %: 22.3
S/R:    65.7 Trio :  62.1
Miller :  61.5 Lindwall :  55.2 Johnston :  69.7

This trio of the 1950s has a very good winning percentage for that era.

Walsh, Ambrose & Bishop

P04.  Total: 412 @ 23.92
Walsh 135 @ 25.27, Ambrose 139 @ 22.26, Bishop 138 @ 24.26
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Walsh       : 0997(1984)-1544(2001) 135 @ 25.27 (384 @ 24.25) 104.2%
Ambrose     : 1095(1988)-1509(2000) 139 @ 22.26 (267 @ 20.43) 109.0%
Bishop      : 1117(1989)-1407(1998) 138 @ 24.26 ( 25 @ 24.56)  98.8%
Trio Career:  1117(1989) to 1407(1998)
All matches:           110 Wins:  51 (46.4%)
Trio matches:           37 Wins:  16 (43.2%)
Trio Home matches:      18 Wins:   9 (50.0%)
Trio Away matches:      19 Wins:   7 (36.8%)
Non-Trio matches:       73 Wins:  35 (47.9%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  34 Wins:  18 (52.9%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  39 Wins:  17 (43.6%)
Team Wkts:  561 @ 27.40  Team WpT: 15.16   Trio WpT: 11.14 (73.4%)
Balls: 34147 Trio %: 65.5
Walsh %: 22.3 Ambrose %: 22.4 Bishop %: 20.8
Wkts:    561 Trio %: 73.4
Walsh %: 24.1 Ambrose %: 24.8 Bishop %: 24.6
S/R:    60.9 Trio :  54.3
Walsh :  56.5 Ambrose :  54.9 Bishop :  51.4

A very even distribution of the spoils. But the win % dropped due to the general decline in West Indian cricket.

Holding, Garner & Marshall

P05.  Total: 331 @ 22.51
Holding  98 @ 25.63, Garner 110 @ 21.04, Marshall 123 @ 21.33
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Holding     : 0764(1975)-1068(1987)  98 @ 25.63 (151 @ 22.85) 112.2%
Garner      : 0797(1977)-1072(1987) 110 @ 21.04 (151 @ 21.13)  99.5%
Marshall    : 0837(1978)-1175(1991) 123 @ 21.33 (253 @ 20.93) 101.9%
Trio Career:  0880(1980) to 1068(1987)
All matches:            92 Wins:  42 (45.7%)
Trio matches:           26 Wins:  16 (61.5%)
Trio Home matches:      15 Wins:  10 (66.7%)
Trio Away matches:      11 Wins:   6 (54.5%)
Non-Trio matches:       66 Wins:  26 (39.4%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  22 Wins:  11 (50.0%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  44 Wins:  15 (34.1%)
Team Wkts:  444 @ 24.18  Team WpT: 17.08   Trio WpT: 12.73 (74.5%)
Balls: 24588 Trio %: 67.5
Holding %: 21.3 Garner %: 22.9 Marshall %: 23.4
Wkts:    444 Trio %: 74.5
Holding %: 22.1 Garner %: 24.8 Marshall %: 27.7
S/R:    55.4 Trio :  50.2
Holding :  53.4 Garner :  51.1 Marshall :  46.8

Good win % and share of team wickets.

Sobers, Gibbs & Hall

P06.  Total: 421 @ 27.75
Sobers 124 @ 30.73, Gibbs 161 @ 25.93, Hall 136 @ 27.18
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Sobers      : 0386(1954)-0738(1974) 124 @ 30.73 (112 @ 38.10)  80.7%
Gibbs       : 0448(1958)-0770(1976) 161 @ 25.93 (149 @ 32.78)  79.1%
Hall        : 0459(1958)-0648(1969) 136 @ 27.18 ( 56 @ 24.59) 110.6%
Trio Career:  0461(1958) to 0648(1969)
All matches:            72 Wins:  28 (38.9%)
Trio matches:           37 Wins:  19 (51.4%)
Trio Home matches:      14 Wins:   7 (50.0%)
Trio Away matches:      23 Wins:  12 (52.2%)
Non-Trio matches:       35 Wins:   9 (25.7%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  17 Wins:   3 (17.6%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  18 Wins:   6 (33.3%)
Team Wkts:  620 @ 28.79  Team WpT: 16.76   Trio WpT: 11.38 (67.9%)
Balls: 45323 Trio %: 67.3
Sobers %: 22.6 Gibbs %: 28.1 Hall %: 16.5
Wkts:    620 Trio %: 67.9
Sobers %: 20.0 Gibbs %: 26.0 Hall %: 21.9
S/R:    73.1 Trio :  72.4
Sobers :  82.7 Gibbs :  79.2 Hall :  55.1

Both Sobers and Gibbs prospered in the company of each other and Hall.

Willis, Hendrick & Botham

P07.  Total: 204 @ 22.27
Willis  65 @ 24.02, Hendrick  54 @ 21.37, Botham  85 @ 21.51
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Willis      : 0676(1971)-0991(1984)  65 @ 24.02 (260 @ 25.65)  93.6%
Hendrick    : 0739(1974)-0908(1981)  54 @ 21.37 ( 37 @ 31.78)  67.2%
Botham      : 0806(1977)-1190(1992)  85 @ 21.51 (302 @ 30.39)  70.8%
Trio Career:  0806(1977) to 0908(1981)
All matches:           112 Wins:  37 (33.0%)
Trio matches:           17 Wins:   9 (52.9%)
Trio Home matches:      11 Wins:   5 (45.5%)
Trio Away matches:       6 Wins:   4 (66.7%)
Non-Trio matches:       95 Wins:  28 (29.5%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  48 Wins:  15 (31.2%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  47 Wins:  13 (27.7%)
Team Wkts:  290 @ 23.30  Team WpT: 17.06   Trio WpT: 12.00 (70.3%)
Balls: 17897 Trio %: 62.7
Willis %: 19.2 Hendrick %: 20.7 Botham %: 22.8
Wkts:    290 Trio %: 70.3
Willis %: 22.4 Hendrick %: 18.6 Botham %: 29.3
S/R:    61.7 Trio :  55.0
Willis :  53.0 Hendrick :  68.6 Botham :  47.9

All three of the English trio performed better in each other's company.

Anderson, Broad & Swann

P08.  Total: 428 @ 29.02
Anderson 140 @ 29.19, Broad 127 @ 29.69, Swann 161 @ 28.35
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Anderson    : 1646(2003)-2062(2012) 140 @ 29.19 (138 @ 32.38)  90.2%
Broad       : 1853(2007)-2062(2012) 127 @ 29.69 ( 45 @ 38.27)  77.6%
Swann       : 1898(2008)-2062(2012) 161 @ 28.35 ( 49 @ 29.86)  94.9%
Trio Career:  1901(2008) to 2062(2012)
All matches:           124 Wins:  59 (47.6%)
Trio matches:           37 Wins:  17 (45.9%)
Trio Home matches:      21 Wins:  14 (66.7%)
Trio Away matches:      16 Wins:   3 (18.8%)
Non-Trio matches:       86 Wins:  42 (48.8%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  47 Wins:  27 (57.4%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  39 Wins:  15 (38.5%)
Team Wkts:  598 @ 31.43  Team WpT: 16.16   Trio WpT: 11.57 (71.6%)
Balls: 37399 Trio %: 68.5
Anderson %: 23.0 Broad %: 20.6 Swann %: 25.0
Wkts:    598 Trio %: 71.6
Anderson %: 23.4 Broad %: 21.2 Swann %: 26.9
S/R:    62.5 Trio :  59.9
Anderson :  61.4 Broad :  60.6 Swann :  58.0

Again all three of the English trio performed better together. Swann is slightly better than the others while Broad is the most improved. This is the only currently-playing trio.

Prasanna, ChandraSekar & Bedi

P09.  Total: 266 @ 30.82
Prasanna  61 @ 40.02, ChandraSekar 103 @ 27.82, Bedi 102 @ 28.34
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Prasanna    : 0520(1962)-0832(1978)  61 @ 40.02 (128 @ 25.79) 155.2%
ChandraSekar: 0552(1964)-0851(1979) 103 @ 27.82 (139 @ 31.18)  89.2%
Bedi        : 0612(1967)-0854(1979) 102 @ 28.34 (164 @ 28.94)  97.9%
Trio Career:  0614(1967) to 0832(1978)
All matches:            83 Wins:  21 (25.3%)
Trio matches:           24 Wins:   7 (29.2%)
Trio Home matches:      11 Wins:   5 (45.5%)
Trio Away matches:      13 Wins:   2 (15.4%)
Non-Trio matches:       59 Wins:  14 (23.7%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  31 Wins:   7 (22.6%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  28 Wins:   7 (25.0%)
Team Wkts:  346 @ 32.84  Team WpT: 14.42   Trio WpT: 11.08 (76.9%)
Balls: 26287 Trio %: 75.1
Prasanna %: 23.6 ChandraSekar %: 23.6 Bedi %: 27.9
Wkts:    346 Trio %: 76.9
Prasanna %: 17.6 ChandraSekar %: 29.8 Bedi %: 29.5
S/R:    76.0 Trio :  74.2
Prasanna :  101.9 ChandraSekar :  60.2 Bedi :  71.8

It is amazing how much Prasanna faltered when playing in the company of the other two. It could be Prasanna's own insecurity while playing together or the way captains used them, Perhaps a mixture of both.

Kumble, Harbhajan & Zaheer

P10.  Total: 316 @ 30.32
Kumble 125 @ 28.93, Harbhajan 116 @ 29.35, Zaheer  75 @ 34.15
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Kumble      : 1149(1990)-1891(2008) 125 @ 28.93 (494 @ 29.83)  97.0%
Harbhajan   : 1413(1998)-2062(2012) 116 @ 29.35 (292 @ 33.43)  87.8%
Zaheer      : 1512(2000)-2062(2012)  75 @ 34.15 (219 @ 31.47) 108.5%
Trio Career:  1589(2002) to 1887(2008)
All matches:           159 Wins:  53 (33.3%)
Trio matches:           25 Wins:  13 (52.0%)
Trio Home matches:      14 Wins:   7 (50.0%)
Trio Away matches:      11 Wins:   6 (54.5%)
Non-Trio matches:      132 Wins:  40 (30.3%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  55 Wins:  27 (49.1%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  77 Wins:  13 (16.9%)
Team Wkts:  417 @ 31.34  Team WpT: 16.68   Trio WpT: 12.64 (75.8%)
Balls: 26758 Trio %: 74.8
Kumble %: 29.1 Harbhajan %: 28.2 Zaheer %: 17.5
Wkts:    417 Trio %: 75.8
Kumble %: 30.0 Harbhajan %: 27.8 Zaheer %: 18.0
S/R:    64.2 Trio :  63.3
Kumble :  62.3 Harbhajan :  65.0 Zaheer :  62.6

Kumble, Harbhajan and Zaheer secured over 12 wickets per Test, amongst the highest among non-Australian trio of bowlers. The overall results seem to be slightly below-par.

Wasim, Waqar & Mushtaq Ahd

P11.  Total: 431 @ 23.69
Wasim 173 @ 18.97, Waqar 150 @ 23.18, MushtaqAhmed 108 @ 31.96
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Wasim       : 1010(1985)-1584(2002) 173 @ 18.97 (241 @ 26.96)  70.3%
Waqar       : 1127(1989)-1637(2003) 150 @ 23.18 (223 @ 23.82)  97.3%
MushtaqAhmed: 1135(1990)-1666(2003) 108 @ 31.96 ( 77 @ 34.39)  92.9%
Trio Career:  1135(1990) to 1502(2000)
All matches:           131 Wins:  48 (36.6%)
Trio matches:           33 Wins:  16 (48.5%)
Trio Home matches:       9 Wins:   4 (44.4%)
Trio Away matches:      24 Wins:  12 (50.0%)
Non-Trio matches:       97 Wins:  32 (33.0%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  46 Wins:  16 (34.8%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  51 Wins:  16 (31.4%)
Team Wkts:  541 @ 26.00  Team WpT: 16.39   Trio WpT: 13.06 (79.7%)
Balls: 29525 Trio %: 71.9
Wasim %: 26.3 Waqar %: 21.6 MushtaqAhmed %: 23.9
Wkts:    541 Trio %: 79.7
Wasim %: 32.0 Waqar %: 27.7 MushtaqAhmed %: 20.0
S/R:    54.6 Trio :  49.2
Wasim :  44.9 Waqar :  42.5 MushtaqAhmed :  65.4

The best third bowler for the Wasim/Waqar duo was Mushtaq Ahmed. He supported them well and these three raked in 431 wickets. All of them, especially Wasim performed very well in this combination.

Hadlee, Cairns & Chatfield

P12.  Total: 197 @ 25.53
Hadlee  80 @ 21.54, Cairns  57 @ 29.82, Chatfield  60 @ 26.78
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Hadlee      : 0710(1973)-1147(1990)  80 @ 21.54 (357 @ 22.35)  96.4%
Cairns      : 0730(1974)-1031(1985)  57 @ 29.82 ( 73 @ 36.15)  82.5%
Chatfield   : 0757(1975)-1116(1989)  60 @ 26.78 ( 64 @ 37.47)  71.5%
Trio Career:  0798(1977) to 1031(1985)
All matches:            71 Wins:  16 (22.5%)
Trio matches:           17 Wins:   7 (41.2%)
Trio Home matches:      10 Wins:   5 (50.0%)
Trio Away matches:       7 Wins:   2 (28.6%)
Non-Trio matches:       54 Wins:   9 (16.7%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  26 Wins:   6 (23.1%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  28 Wins:   3 (10.7%)
Team Wkts:  249 @ 28.09  Team WpT: 14.65   Trio WpT: 11.59 (79.1%)
Balls: 17343 Trio %: 71.0
Hadlee %: 25.2 Cairns %: 22.7 Chatfield %: 23.1
Wkts:    249 Trio %: 79.1
Hadlee %: 32.1 Cairns %: 22.9 Chatfield %: 24.1
S/R:    69.7 Trio :  62.5
Hadlee :  54.6 Cairns :  69.0 Chatfield :  66.7

Like the England trios, the Kiwis seem to have bowled very well together. Nearly 80% of the team wickets too.

Donald, Pollock & Kallis

P13.  Total: 415 @ 22.80
Donald 175 @ 21.85, Pollock 163 @ 21.36, Kallis  77 @ 28.04
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Donald      : 1188(1992)-1590(2002) 175 @ 21.85 (155 @ 22.72)  96.2%
Pollock     : 1312(1995)-1860(2008) 163 @ 21.36 (258 @ 24.23)  88.1%
Kallis      : 1318(1995)-2061(2012)  77 @ 28.04 (205 @ 34.28)  81.8%
Trio Career:  1318(1995) to 1582(2002)
All matches:            92 Wins:  41 (44.6%)
Trio matches:           40 Wins:  20 (50.0%)
Trio Home matches:      22 Wins:  15 (68.2%)
Trio Away matches:      18 Wins:   5 (27.8%)
Non-Trio matches:       51 Wins:  21 (41.2%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  24 Wins:  10 (41.7%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  27 Wins:  11 (40.7%)
Team Wkts:  652 @ 26.23  Team WpT: 16.30   Trio WpT: 10.38 (63.7%)
Balls: 39954 Trio %: 56.1
Donald %: 20.4 Pollock %: 23.1 Kallis %: 12.7
Wkts:    652 Trio %: 63.7
Donald %: 26.8 Pollock %: 25.0 Kallis %: 11.8
S/R:    61.3 Trio :  54.0
Donald :  46.5 Pollock :  56.6 Kallis :  65.7

It is Kallis who has given a good support to Donald and Pollock instead of Ntini. But the somewhat low win % is surprising.

Muralitharan, Vaas & Fernando

P14.  Total: 248 @ 28.81
Muralitharan 128 @ 23.32, Vaas  60 @ 33.75, Fernando  60 @ 35.60
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Muralitharan: 1195(1992)-1964(2010) 128 @ 23.32 (672 @ 22.61) 103.1%
Vaas        : 1267(1994)-1927(2009)  60 @ 33.75 (295 @ 28.73) 117.5%
Fernando    : 1499(2000)-2048(2012)  60 @ 35.60 ( 40 @ 41.20)  86.4%
Trio Career:  1499(2000) to 1909(2009)
All matches:           149 Wins:  56 (37.6%)
Trio matches:           23 Wins:  10 (43.5%)
Trio Home matches:      13 Wins:   9 (69.2%)
Trio Away matches:      10 Wins:   1 (10.0%)
Non-Trio matches:      124 Wins:  46 (37.1%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  65 Wins:  29 (44.6%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  59 Wins:  17 (28.8%)
Team Wkts:  335 @ 30.34  Team WpT: 14.57   Trio WpT: 10.78 (74.0%)
Balls: 21783 Trio %: 71.8
Muralitharan %: 34.5 Vaas %: 20.5 Fernando %: 16.9
Wkts:    335 Trio %: 74.0
Muralitharan %: 38.2 Vaas %: 17.9 Fernando %: 17.9
S/R:    65.0 Trio :  63.1
Muralitharan :  58.7 Vaas :  74.3 Fernando :  61.2

Murali and Vaas achieved so much that the the third bowler was just a support bowler. However it must be said that these three bowlers played together in 23 Tests only and Fernando Fernando kept pace with Vaas.

Flintoff, Hoggard & Harmison

P15.  Total: 383 @ 29.38
Flintoff 123 @ 28.62, Hoggard 133 @ 28.51, Harmison 127 @ 31.02
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Flintoff    : 1421(1998)-1931(2009) 123 @ 28.62 (103 @ 37.77)  75.8%
Hoggard     : 1503(2000)-1866(2008) 133 @ 28.51 (115 @ 32.80)  86.9%
Harmison    : 1612(2002)-1931(2009) 127 @ 31.02 ( 99 @ 32.85)  94.4%
Trio Career:  1612(2002) to 1824(2006)
All matches:           119 Wins:  49 (41.2%)
Trio matches:           33 Wins:  16 (48.5%)
Trio Home matches:      15 Wins:  11 (73.3%)
Trio Away matches:      18 Wins:   5 (27.8%)
Non-Trio matches:       86 Wins:  33 (38.4%)
Non-Trio Home matches:  48 Wins:  23 (47.9%)
Non-Trio Away matches:  38 Wins:  10 (26.3%)
Team Wkts:  545 @ 33.66  Team WpT: 16.52   Trio WpT: 11.61 (70.3%)
Balls: 32762 Trio %: 63.1
Flintoff %: 20.3 Hoggard %: 20.1 Harmison %: 22.7
Wkts:    545 Trio %: 70.3
Flintoff %: 22.6 Hoggard %: 24.4 Harmison %: 23.3
S/R:    60.1 Trio :  53.9
Flintoff :  54.1 Hoggard :  49.5 Harmison :  58.4
A worthwhile new addition. The numbers are very balanced and good. These three are also like the current English trio, excelling together. Thanks to Zulik and Paul.

The most successful trio of all time is the one of Warne, McGrath and Lee, even if the other trio of Warne, McGrath and Gillespie gathered more wickets. Probably the next best bowling trio honour should be given to the current English trio of Anderson, Broad and Swann. I would rate Holding, Garner and Marshall next. Wasim, Waqar and Mushtaq would be competing for these two places.

Let me remind the readers that I would be closing the entries for the all-time XV around 10 December. Click here to view the article. The wrap up article will appear around 17 December. I will not be doing any articles in January to get my shoulders back in shape.

Full post
The fifteen that Gods would stop to watch

A stats-based selection of an all-time XV evaluating mutliple batting and bowling parameters

Important schedule change announced at the end

This article has been on the anvil for some time and despite my weak shoulder, I have hammered it through. My selection is just a starting point to get a comprehensive user response to determine an all-time World team.

I have selected a team of 15 players. I have also made an attempt to select eleven players for the 8 locations that I expect or would like Test matches to be played at.

I have taken the major decision that this will be a team of specialists. No all-rounder, however great he is, will be considered for his all-round skills. They will be evaluated on their specialist skills and if they qualify, and in this case let me add that two qualify, they will be selected. This may be at variance with other strategies and I am ready to stand by my decision because I believe that specialists win matches.

My fifteen consists of 7 batsmen, 1 wicket-keeper and 7 bowlers. For the playing XI, I expect to select 6 out of the 7 batsmen; the keeper stays on everywhere and 4 from the 7 bowlers. This will give me the flexibility to select suitable bowlers based on the expected conditions and the way the bowlers performed in these locations in their careers. I need more flexibility in the bowler selections than batsmen selection.

I am willing to compromise on batting positions in order to maintain the team balance. I also believe that a top quality early middle order player would be good enough to open. And a great no.3 would bat equally well at no.6. I will not be a slave to preconceived notions and dogmas.

I have selected my XV. The reader may not agree with that set of players. That is democracy at work. Instead of raking me over the coals for my (non-)selections, the readers can now have their voice heard by giving their own fifteen. All of us have a single vote each and this will be truly Vox populi.

My seven batsmen, and the chosen wicket-keeper, are shown below, in alphabetical order.

Batsmen and wicketkeeper in top fifteen © Anantha Narayanan

Bradman, Gavaskar, Hobbs, Lara, Richards, Sobers, Tendulkar, Gilchrist

The qualities I have looked for have been listed below. All of them would walk into their own Team XVs. Let me also confirm that Sobers has been considered purely as a batsman and his bowling skills would be a bonus. Any more details are not necessary at this stage. More than 72000 runs at display here at 60+ average.

- Team balance (3 left-handers)
- Defensive skills (Hobbs and Bradman)
- Attacking potential (The middle order)
- The ability to play long innings (Lara, Bradman, Sobers)
- Match winning ability (Gilchrist at no.7)
- Match-saving ability (rarely for this team) and
- No clearly identified weakness.

The wicket-keeper position was very easy. There was only one candidate: Adam Gilchrist. As my recent article on wicket-keepers showed, he is head and shoulders above the others. A great keeper, no weaknesses and a truly match-winning batsman. If there is a keeper or two ahead of him on keeping ability, again an unproven purely subjective view, the run difference per innings would be of the order of 25.

The seven bowlers are shown below, again in alphabetical order.

Bowlers in top fifteen © Anantha Narayanan

Ambrose, Hadlee, Marshall, McGrath, Muralitharan, Warne, Wasim Akram

Again I have looked for qualities listed below. These have been considered as individual bowlers and their ability to bowl together as a pair has not come in for consideration. Again, let me confirm that Hadlee has been considered purely as a bowler and his batting skills would be a bonus. There is no need to provide any justifications for these selections. 3700+ Test wickets at an average of 22 is enough justification.

- Variety (Pace, seam usage, left-handed swing, spin options)
- Match-winning ability
- Top strike rates (Even spinners below 60)
- Injury-free careers
- Ability to bowl tightly, when needed (Ambrose, Hadlee, McGrath)
- Ability to defend a total of 100 in the fourth innings and
- Ability to dismiss a team for a sub-100 total on the opening day.

I have done a Team rating which is

Average of Batting averages of the top-six batsmen
+
12.5% of The wicket-keeper index as outlined in my recent article
(Based on Dismissals, Dismissals per Test, Byes conceded per Test,
Runs scored and Runs per innings)
+
80.0-(Average of Bowling averages of the four specialist bowlers)
The only table which will be presented indicates the selection of the playing XI in the selected 8 countries.

Location Avg / IdxAusEngIndNzlPakSafSlkWin
           
Bradman899.94BradmanBradmanBradmanBradmanBradmanBradmanBradmanBradman
Hobbs856.95HobbsHobbsHobbsHobbsHobbsHobbsHobbsHobbs
Lara852.89LaraLaraLaraLaraLaraLaraLaraLara
Sobers857.78SobersSobersSobersSobersSobersSobersSobersSobers
Richards650.24 RichardsRichardsRichards  RichardsRichardsRichards
Tendulkar655.08TendulkarTendulkarTendulkarTendulkarTendulkar Tendulkar 
Gavaskar451.12Gavaskar    GavaskarGavaskar Gavaskar
.
Gilchrist882.50GilchristGilchristGilchristGilchristGilchristGilchristGilchristGilchrist
.
McGrath821.64McGrathMcGrathMcGrathMcGrathMcGrathMcGrathMcGrathMcGrath
Ambrose520.99AmbroseAmbrose   AmbroseAmbroseAmbrose
Marshall520.95  MarshallMarshall MarshallMarshall Marshall
Akram423.62  AkramAkramAkram Akram 
Murali422.72  MuraliMurali  MuraliMurali
Warne425.42WarneWarne  WarneWarne  
Hadlee222.30Hadlee  Hadlee    
 88
Batting  62.2962.1562.1562.1562.2962.1562.2962.15
W-K  10.3110.3110.3110.3110.3110.3110.3110.31
Bowling  57.4157.7557.7757.4357.0957.7557.7658.43
 
Team  130.02130.21130.23129.89129.70130.21130.36130.88

Bradman, Hobbs, Lara and Sobers are the batsmen who have been selected for all the 8 locations.
Gilchrist is the wicket-keeper in all the teams.
McGrath is the only automatic selection amongst all bowlers.
Gavaskar has been selected in countries where he has done well and there is need for his skill-sets. He will, of course, open in these matches.
Tendulkar will open in the 4 locations where Gavaskar is not playing. He has impeccable technique and I am sure he would do an excellent job opening the innings.

Readers can give their selections by following these guidelines.

- You can select 11 to 15 players.
- 16th and onwards players will be rejected.
- If you select 10 or fewer players or there is no wicket-keeper, the entry will be rejected.
- I have included a few sample comments. I will be pragmatic about it since the content is more important than form.
- However my task will become easier if you maintain format especially because I have to do some cut-and-paste operations to index these submissions.
- Reader identity is desirable but not mandatory. Suppose your selection matches the all-Readers XV, "James Thompson" would sound much better than "Lord-of-Lords".
- In general any selection should be acceptable. My general comment is that your selected players should have a very good chance of selection to their own country XVs.
- I will have no problems if you select Boycott or Bedi but if you select Blewett or Boje, two randomly picked names, I would conclude that you are mocking the selection process.
- If you do not select Bradman, fine, that is your choice. But then you may find your bowlers bowling at him!!!
- If you give duplicate entries, the latest one, if it passes the above criteria, will replace the earlier one.
- Do not give two XVs. I am asking for ONE XV and not two equal strength XIs to play matches between these teams. No problems if you give a First XV/XI and a second XV/XI and ask me take the First one.
- Do not restrict yourself to any period. Your selection will not be accepted.
- Please read all comments. At least read all my responses since the answer to your question might be there.

Justification on your selection, comments on my selections, comments on other readers' selections et al will be fine but not essential. These will be published as received. In general most comments will be published with least amount of response from me. This is the perfect article for that much-needed luxury for me.

Your comments containing the selections should reach me on or before 31 December, 2012. Further analysis articles will appear during December. I will refer to this article in those ones too. I will process your comments and come out with a final wrap-up summary article on or around 15 January, 2013. The Readers' XV, based on an analysis of the readers' selections, will also be posted in that article in which I will also come out with a second XV/XI.

The suggested formats for giving your entry are

Selection of Anantha Narayanan
Gavaskar
Hobbs
Bradman
Lara
Richards
Sobers
Tendulkar
Gilchrist
Ambrose
Marshall
Wasim Akram
McGrath
Muralitharan
Gavaskar
Hadlee
Warne.
Full post
Influence of wides and no balls on Test bowler averages

A stats analysis to determine the effect of wides and no-balls on the bowling averages in Tests

The previous article was a huge data-rich one involving bowler-pairs. Even understanding the significance of data presented there would have taken some time. This is also a bowler-centric article but much simpler to read and understand, if not in analysis. I must thank Arijit Dasgupta for this suggestion.

A few days after India won the World Cup during 1983, it was decided that the wides and no balls would be debited to the bowler analysis. It was a simple idea but had significant problems in execution and it took more than 2 years for the first scorecards to be rolled out with the wides/no balls information shown against the bowler's analysis. It is possible that the bowlers and wides were debited to the bowlers from Test # 961 onwards (India-Pakistan match played at Bangalore during September 1983). However the debited numbers were not shown against the bowler analysis until Test # 1029 (Australia-New Zealand Test match at Brisbane starting on 8 November 1985).

So this is our real cut-off Test. So one can say that the cut-off is data-driven than law-implementation-driven especially as the 1983-87 period is a grey area. Milind's query to MCC on this has resulted in a vague unclear answer. The only assumption, and a valid one, is that where wides/no balls have been shown against a bowler analysis, these are included in the bowling analysis runs.

Arijit's idea was that this single law change had a profound influence on the Bowling averages of bowlers over the past 25 plus years and that I should study this in depth. This seemed an excellent idea and I have been working on it for the past month. It turned out to be a complex exercise, because of the reasons outlined below.

This analysis concentrates almost totally on the post-1985 period, or more correctly the post-T1029 period. For the pre-T1029 period, I will present a single summary of the wides/no balls which would have been debited to the bowlers. This will give an idea of the possible increase in bowling averages.

For the first 1028 Tests the total number of wides/no balls stands at 15353 and the number of bowler wickets at 31727. This leads to a notional increase of 0.48 runs per wicket. For the next 1027 Tests the total number of wides/no balls stands at 29118 and the number of bowler wickets at 31449. This has led to an increase of 0.93 runs per wicket. This clearly shows a doubling of the number of wides/no balls post-T1029. This may be due to the stricter interpretation of extras-related rules, stricter handling of short balls, significant law changes and the increase in declaring a ball wide owing to the influence of ODIs.

Before anything, let me be clear that the overriding consideration in all these adjustments is simply that Team wides/no balls are king. These would remain sacrosanct. All adjustments will be done only with the bowler level wides/no balls. With this guiding principle I have ensured that the Team scores remain untouched. The salient points of this analysis are outlined below.

1. All scorecards, including the Cricinfo ones, do not include full information about the number of deliveries that were declared wide/no ball and how many runs were scored off these deliveries. When 5 wides are conceded, 5 runs are added properly to the team score, extras total, no balls tally in the team extras line and bowler runs conceded. However, somewhat inconsistently, this is shown as only 1 wide delivery against the bowler. Same is true for the rare case where 5 runs are scored off a no ball. As an example, please peruse the very last innings scorecard. Test # 2055, India-New Zealand Test at Bangalore. In the Indian second innings, Southee bowled a 5-ball wide in the team's second over. The extras shows 5 wides, team total and bowler runs are increased by 5 runs but only 1 wide is shown against Southee in the bowling analysis.

2. Even after Test # 1029, there are matches in which no wides and no balls are shown against the bowler analysis even though there are team wides and no balls. Nothing can be done about these and such Test matches are kept out of these calculations.

3. There are matches in which the team wides/no balls are less than the sum of the bowler wides/no balls. The adjustment here is simple. Reduce the bowler wides/no balls proportionately to match the team wides/no balls. Very logical and correct. If there is something wrongly done, I would rather assume that all mistakes are restricted to the bowler figures rather than the team numbers.

4. Now comes the difficult part. The team wides/no balls are higher than the sum of the bowler wides/no balls. This is a highly nuanced situation. There are many types of differences so I had to use a different method for each adjustment.

  • Situations such as team line showing 5/6/7/8... wides/no balls and only one bowler 's analysis showing 1/2/3/4... wide/no ball. No problems since these are similar to the Southee situation. Just make the specific bowler's wides/no balls as 5 or 6 or whatever. Could as well be team showing 10 wides and bowler showing 2 wides. The key is an exact difference of multiple of 4 wides/no balls.
  • Situations where the difference is x wides but more than one bowler has bowled the wides. I have taken a logical, if not the most accurate approach that the difference will be attributed to the bowler who has bowled most wides. For instance, if the team has 5 wides and two bowlers have bowled 1 and 2 wides, the additional 2 wides are allotted to the bowler who has captured 2 wides. May not be perfect but there is a good chance that it is correct.
  • Sometimes there is no pattern. Team has been debited 8 wides and the bowler total is 3 wides. Nothing can be done about it and it is left as it is.
  • For recent matches there was the option of perusing the commentary. However it is a thankless option and there is no way I could have done it because of the difficulty and the time required. 130 overs are shown in three screens and perusal of each delivery was needed. Browser search of wide is useless because of the "wide of point" type of commentary.
  • In a few cases I have perused the scorecards and taken an intuitive and informed decision. By now I had got a clear idea of the bowler characteristics.
5. At the end of about a week's tough work, I had improved the bowler level byes/no balls availability from about 21000 to just over 22800. This works to about 78% of the total tally of wides/no balls for this period of 29000+ and represents a major successful move forward. The overall impact might only be a reasonably small figure but the impact on individual bowlers sometimes goes as high as 7%. The analysis from this point onwards is a simple one and my tables indicate the current average, adjusted average and the % difference. Multiple tables are shown so that we can get different insights.

In view of my own physical condition, I am not going to offer detailed comments on the tables. I will present all the tables and at the end, summarise what I perceive are the key points. Readers can always contribute their bit and make this a discussion forum. Let me also say that I will publish many more comments without any response from me. I have to necessarily cut the amount of work I do. More often than not, I have to let my silence speak.

Since it is not possible to identify the wides/no balls conceded by the pre-T1029 bowlers, it is not possible to increase their averages. So the only fair method of comparison will be a notional reduction of the post-T1029 bowlers' averages.

75+ wickets bowlers ordered by reduction % of bowling average

BowlerTypeCtryStartEndMatsWktsAvgeWDsNBsTotalAdjAvge% chg
             
Malinga L.SRFMSlk200420103010133.163522926430.547.88%
Reiffel P.RRFMAus199219983510426.96519820325.017.24%
Collins P.TLFMWin199920063210634.621223524732.296.73%
Edwards F.HRFWin200320125415838.386933840735.806.71%
Lee BRFAus199920087631030.825358764028.756.70%
Pollock S.MRFMSaf1995200810842123.122860263021.626.47%
FernandoRFMSlk200020124010037.843421024435.406.45%
KasprowiczRFMAus199620063811332.88321922230.915.98%
Morkel MRFSaf200620124215030.375221526728.595.86%
Roach K.A.JRFWin20092012218227.702011313326.075.86%
Flintoff ARFMEng199820097922632.793536640131.015.41%
ShoaibAkhtarRFPak199720074617825.691722724424.325.34%
Mohd SamiRFPak20012012368552.743020923949.935.33%
AmbroseRFWin198820009840520.99642242819.935.04%
Abdur RazzaqRFMPak199920064610036.931017518535.085.01%
Srinath JRFMInd199120026723630.473130733829.044.70%

200+ wickets bowlers with over 2.0% reduction % of bowling average

BowlerTypeCtryStartEndMatsWktsAvgeWDsNBsTotalAdjAvge% chg
 
Lee BRFAus199920087631030.825358764028.756.70%
Pollock S.MRFMSaf1995200810842123.122860263021.626.47%
Flintoff ARFMEng199820097922632.793536640131.015.41%
AmbroseRFWin198820009840520.99642242819.935.04%
Srinath JRFMInd199120026723630.473130733829.044.70%
Vaas WPUJCLFMSlk1994200911135529.582042044028.344.19%
Wasim AkramLFMPak1985200210441423.62939140022.654.09%
Gough DRFEng199420035822928.401924426327.254.04%
Zaheer KhanLFMInd200020128529132.076730537230.793.99%
McDermottRFAus198419967129128.63430530927.573.71%
McGrath G.DRFMAus1993200712456321.642636439020.953.20%
Walsh C.ARFWin1984200113251924.441239240423.663.19%
Hoggard M.JRFMEng200020086724830.502521624129.533.19%
Caddick A.RRFMEng199320036223429.91621522128.973.16%
Cairns C.LRFMNzl198920046221829.402217519728.503.07%

Top bowlers in order of wickets

BowlerTypeCtryStartEndMatsWktsAvgeWDsNBsTotalAdjAvge% chg
             
MuralitharanrobSlk1992201013380022.73238839022.242.15%
Warne S.KrlbAus1992200714570825.422316318625.151.03%
Kumble ArlbInd1990200813261929.651027028029.201.53%
McGrath G.DRFMAus1993200712456321.642636439020.953.20%
Walsh C.ARFWin1984200113251924.441239240423.663.19%
Kapil Dev NRFMInd1978199413143429.653202329.590.18%
Hadlee R.JRFMNzl197319908643122.3002222.290.02%
Pollock S.MRFMSaf1995200810842123.122860263021.626.47%
Wasim AkramLFMPak1985200210441423.62939140022.654.09%
HarbhajanrobInd199820119840632.226152132.170.16%
AmbroseRFWin198820009840520.99642242819.935.04%
Ntini MRFSaf1998200910139028.834513017528.381.56%
Botham I.TRFMEng1977199210238328.4000028.400.00%
MarshallRFWin197819918137620.958536120.780.77%
Waqar YounisRFMPak198920038737323.567455223.420.59%
Imran KhanRFPak197119928836222.8100022.810.00%
Vettori D.LlspNzl1997201211236034.42412112534.081.01%
Lillee D.KRFAus197119847035523.9200023.920.00%
Vaas WPUJCLFMSlk1994200911135529.582042044028.344.19%
Donald A.ARFSaf199220027233022.25629115321.792.08%
WillisRFEng197119849032525.2000025.200.00%
Lee BRFAus199920087631030.825358764028.756.70%
Gibbs L.RrobWin195819767930929.0900029.090.00%
Trueman F.SRFEng195219656730721.5800021.580.00%

Bowlers who have conceded most wides/no balls per Test

BowlerTypeCtryStartEndMatsWktsAvgeWDsNBsTotalWdNb/Test
            
Malinga L.SRFMSlk200420103010133.16352292648.80
Lee BRFAus199920087631030.82535876408.42
Collins P.TLFMWin199920063210634.62122352477.72
Edwards F.HRFWin200320125415838.38693384077.54
Mohd SamiRFPak20012012368552.74302092396.64
Morkel MRFSaf200620124215030.37522152676.36
Roach K.A.JRFWin20092012218227.70201131336.33
FernandoRFMSlk200020124010037.84342102446.10
KasprowiczRFMAus199620063811332.8832192225.84
Pollock S.MRFMSaf1995200810842123.12286026305.83
Reiffel P.RRFMAus199219983510426.9651982035.80
ShoaibAkhtarRFPak199720074617825.69172272445.30
Flintoff ARFMEng199820097922632.79353664015.08
Srinath JRFMInd199120026723630.47313073385.04
.....
Swann G.SrobEng200820124619229.595050.11

General Comments

1. Probably the most significant bowling average change is one for Curtly Ambrose. The already very low average of this great bowler has been further reduced to below-20.0, 19.93 to be exact, making comparisons with Syd Barnes possible.

2. The next two significant reductions are for two very dissimilar bowlers, Brett Lee and Shaun Pollock. Their bowling averages have been reduced by over 6%. Pollock's average has been reduced to a wonderful figure of 21.62. They have bowled over 600 wides/no balls. What may be the reason for an accurate bowler like bowling so many no balls?

3. Similarly two totally dissimilar bowlers head the % reduction: Malinga and Reiffel. A real paradox. One a tear-away slinger and the other, a seemingly accurate medium-pacer.

4. Look at Swann's tally of wides/no balls. He has bowled a single wide in his 5 year career. That was in the 2011 Birmingham Test against India. That must have been a momentous occasion. And the icing on the cake: these were 5 wides.

5. If Swann is so accurate, how does one explain Muralitharan's 388 no balls? Warne, on the other hand, seems to have bowled only 163 no balls.

6. Not just Murali. Why do so many top bowlers bowl so many no balls. Surely some of these resulted in loss of a wicket.

7. Look at Waqar Younis' accuracy, only 52 wides/no balls and compare the same with Wasim Akram's 400 wides/no balls. The faster bowler has far fewer wides/no balls.In fact Waqar Younis has the lowest wides/no balls per Test amongst the top pace bowlers.

8. Saqlain Mushtaq and Muralitharan have the highest average of wides/no balls per Test, for spinners, either side of 3.0. If we conclude that unconventional off-spin is the reason, then Harbhajan seems to have excellent control with only 0.22 wides/no balls per Test.

9. Now for the maximum number of wides and no balls bowled by a bowler in an innings. These are either from the raw unadjusted scorecard data or where the changes are 100% correct (1 wide in analysis line for a single bowler and 5 wides in team extras line).

  • No Balls: Unusually high numbers are present. Wasim Akram, in Test # 1283 against South Africa (1995), conceded 21 No balls. Ambrose's analysis in Test # 1363 shows 21 No balls, but this is wrong since the bowler total is in excess of the Team totals. Hence only Wasim Akram's is the correct figure indisputably.
  • Wides: There are two candidates. In Test # 1809 Pak against Eng (2006), Umar Gul conceded either 10 or 14 wides but not very clear. In Test # 1836 against Eng (2007), Collymore conceded either 10 or 14 wides but not very clear. I could peruse the commentaries to sort this out but it would amount to too much work for very little gains.
  • Total WDs/NBs: There are two 22s and 23s each but in unclear situations. Hence the total high must be allotted to Wasim Akram, with 21 No balls and Vaas, in Test 1592 against Pak (2002) who conceded 1 wide and 20 no balls.

10. Cannot resist this comment. I read a report wherein Kohli has mentioned that England and India gave India flat tracks for practice matches and green tops for Tests. If this is true, then how did England score 474/8, 269/6, 221, 544, 710/7 and 591/6. Around 60 Runs per wicket. Green tops? And Australia scored 330, 240, 659/4, 369, 604/7 and 167/5. RpW is around 51.5. India has the right to select any team, no spinners or 11 batsmen or 11 bowlers or 11 Zonal players for the practice match. Why make the silliest of statements to support it?

One final summary. I have given below the top-10 of the current Bowling average tables, for bowlers who have captured more than 150 wickets.

Barnes, Davidson, Marshall, Garner, Ambrose, Laker, Trueman, McGrath, Donald, Hadlee.

Now the same table with the wides/no balls removed for post-T1029 bowlers.

Barnes, Ambrose, Davidson, Marshall, McGrath, Garner, Laker, Trueman, Pollock, Donald.

The most significant change is Shaun Pollock moving from no.15 to no.9. Ambrose moves from 5 to 2. McGrath moves from 8 to 5. Muralitharan remains at no.11 in both tables.

To download the complete bowler tables and match summaries, please CLICK HERE.

Finally my thanks once again to Arijit.

Full post
Top bowling pairs at work: a fresh look

A detailed analysis of various performance aspects of the top bowling pairs in Tests

A few years back I had taken an across-the-years look at the Test bowling pairs. I had analysed all the pairs and came out with a series of tables. That article merely set the stage. I have taken the next significant step in this article. Using that type of analysis as the base, I have selected 10 top bowling pairs and analysed these individually and as a pair. I am confident that the selected pairs would include most of the top bowlers though there may be other top bowlers who operated alone or in combination with these pairs. This has been a very difficult article for me to compile and it would be equally difficult for the readers to go through and grasp all details. Hence I request the readers to kindly take time. Do not rush.

How did I select these pairs? Using the re-created tables, barring two exceptions, I have selected the top pair for each of the top 8 countries based on number of wickets captured. In all cases it is required that operating as a pair, each bowler must have taken at least 100 wickets. This leaves us with the following pairs, in order of total wickets captured:

Warne & McGrath            1001 wkts
Muralitharan & Vaas         895
Walsh & Ambrose             762
Wasim Akram & Waqar Younis  559
Willis & Botham             476
Donald & Pollock            397
Chandrasekhar & Bedi        368
Hadlee & B Cairns           337.

I have used my discretion only in two cases: South Africa and India. Pollock and Kallis have captured more wickets than Donald & Pollock. However I felt that I needed a real top quality bowling pair and have opted for the latter combination. Pollock & Ntini was another possibility. But I have gone with my heart in this selection as well as that of the Indian pair.

As far as India is concerned, I have not plumped for Kumble & Harbhajan against Chandrasekhar and Bedi even though the former pair has captured well over 100 wickets more. This is both nostalgia and a recognition, that these bowlers turned India into a force for the first time, albeit only at home. I am sure no reader would have any serious objections to the selection of this wonderful duo. My apologies to Kumble & Harbhajan.

Now for the two remaining pairs.

I decided that I would select an additional pair each from the two most successful bowling countries in history, viz., West Indies and Australia. For West Indies, I wanted a pair from the eighties even though Sobers & Gibbs are second, in terms of wickets. Ignoring repeats, the next best was Holding & Garner. But I bit the bullet and went for Garner & Marshall since I cannot think of any bowler analysis without Marshall. Anyhow Garner & Marshall have captured 322 wickets between them as against Holding & Garner, with 331.

Australia presented a few problems. Combinations involving Warne or McGrath were ruled out automatically. That presented me with two pairs: Benaud & Davidson with 346 and Miller & Lindwall with 345. It was an easy decision to select Miller & Lindwall, the pair from late-40s. That completes the top-10 bowling pairs.

Lillee, Thomson, Grimmett, O'Reilly et al did not meet the 100-wkts criterion. There was a case for Kumble & Harbhajan or Prasanna & Bedi or Pollock & Ntini, but the reasons have already been given. Imran & Qadir had 332 wickets but were way behind the great W-pair. Holding and Davidson just missed out.

I have considered each pair separately and presented a huge collection of data elements. It is going to be impossible to comment on all. I will only make comments on the special characteristics of each pair. The readers should download the huge table and do their own sub-analysis. I am sure there would be a comment or two that all these are available in Cricinfo and there is nothing new. That is fine.

Whoever made the debut earlier is named as the first bowler in each pair. All Tests between that debut and the retirement Test of latter constitute the overall range for various analyses. For the pair level analyses the range is strictly between the first and last Tests the pair operated together and only those in which they played together. Each pair has one graph and an exhaustive table. I have also distributed the comments across the pairs.

I have introduced two new concepts here. It is better that I explain these two now before moving on to the Pair details. Like the Form-Dip in the Lara article, these are the starting points and can be refined as we go on. Comments on these two will be very valuable to will fine-tune the ideas.

The first one is an analysis of the Pair-successes. I have considered only those innings in which the team captured 5 or more wickets. I consider that the pair has succeeded if they capture 50% or more of the team wickets. Examples are 3+ out of 5 & 6, 4+ out of 7 & 8 and 5+ out of 9 & 10. The idea is that since these were the premier pairs in their respective teams, they are expected to contribute at least 50% of the team wickets. Fairly subjective I agree, but there are some interesting results. The bar is set quite high but that is the way it should be.

The second is how the individuals performed within these pairs. For this analysis, I have considered only those innings in which the pair captured 5 or more wickets. The dominant bowler within the pair is identified as the one who leads 4-1 (and obviously 5-0) when 5 wickets are captured by the pair. Similarly, in case of 6 wickets captured by the pair, the dominant bowler is the one with 4-2 split (and the wider gaps).

This can be extended to 5-2 (and wider) for 7, 6-2 (and wider) for 8, 6-3 (and wider) for 9 and 7-3 (and wider) for 10 wickets. Again early days. But the idea is worth exploring.

The % of top-order wickets (1 to 6) is very close for all pairs and oscillates on either side of 60%. It is amazing that the % of top order wickets (1-6) is around 60% which is 6/10. I expected this figure to be around the 65% mark. Let me finish this discussion here itself. Only two pairs have this % figure around 66%: Donald & Pollock and Miller & Lindwall. However the big surprise is that Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis have a figure of 57.2%, the lowest amongst these pairs. Seems quite intriguing.

Similarly I will complete the discussion on the team against which the pairs captured their highest number of wickets at this point. Barring two pairs, the other eight pairs have captured their highest number of Tests against England, indicating the frequency of Tests played against England. Warne & McGrath lead with 267 wickets against England. The two other pairs are Akram and Younis, who reserved their best against West Indies and Willis & Botham, who, for some strange reason I cannot comprehend, failed to capture a single wicket against England, reserving their best for Australia.

The graphs, 10 in all, cannot be too big and show all information. Hence I have concentrated on showing relative average values and wins, especially away from home.

Warne & McGrath

P01. Warne 513 @ 24.88 & McGrath 488 @ 21.38 Total: 1001 @ 23.17
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Warne       : 1181(1992)-1826(2007) 513 @ 24.88 (195 @ 26.83) 92.7%
McGrath     : 1235(1993)-1826(2007) 488 @ 21.38 ( 75 @ 23.35) 91.6%
Pair Career:  1235(1993) to 1826(2007)
All matches:          177      Wins: 111 (62.7 %)
Pair matches:         104      Wins:  71 (68.3 %)
Pair Home matches:     54      Wins:  43 (79.6 %)
Pair Away matches:     50      Wins:  28 (56.0 %)
Non-Pair matches:      73      Wins:  40 (54.8 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 43      Wins:  25 (58.1 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 30      Wins:  15 (50.0 %)
Matches on their own  Warne: 41  McGrath: 20
Pair   Home wkts:  504 @ 24.40  Away wkts:  497 @ 21.93
Others Home wkts:  472 @ 27.24  Away wkts:  340 @ 32.29
Team Wkts:        1813 @ 25.94  WpT: 9.62  Pair %: 55.2
TeamPeerWkts:      812 @ 29.35
AllPeerWkts:     14765 @ 31.22
Top Order Wkts:    597 (59.6%)  Low Order Wkts:  221 (22.1%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 308 (61.1%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 289 (58.1%)
Highest vs England:  263 @ 21.97
Team wkts-5+: 183  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 118 (64.5%)
Pair wkts-5+: 118 Shared: 74 Warne-dominant: 23 McGrath-dominant: 21

Most figures are self-explanatory. Let me explain Warne's "513 @ 24.88 (195 @ 26.83) 92.7%" further. Warne captured 513 wickets at 24.88 when playing with McGrath and 195 wkts @ 26.83 without him. 92.7%, i.e. a figure below 100%, indicates that Warne's average improves when he plays with McGrath.

The pair-successes % stands at 64. A perusal of the remaining pairs shows that there are other pairs with better figures. That is understandable since those pairs might have constituted over 75% of the bowling strength of their respective teams, which is not true of Warne & McGrath. They also seem to have been fairly similar in the bowler-dominance numbers.

As expected this pair has highs in the overall win % and wickets per Test. Both of them have performed similarly, at just over 90%, when operating individually, indicating the good support available elsewhere. It is also surprising, but not unexpected, that the pair has performed better away than at home. They have also out-performed their own team-mates by well over 50%, away from Australia.

It is indeed very surprising that in their illustrious career Warne & McGrath have never captured all 10 wickets in an innings. Their best innings performance has been Test # 1590 against South Africa at Wanderers during 2002 when they captured 9 for 65 (4 for 44 & 5 for 21). Their best match performance has been 18 wickets (11 and 7) in Test # 1558 against England at Oval during 2001.

Conundrum of Test # 1313. I know there is a story behind it. There are a few instances of Miller not bowling a single ball in a Test when playing with Lindwall and that is understandable. But how does one explain the Hobart Test against Pakistan during 1995. In a match in which Australia bowled 150 overs, Warne did not bowl a single ball. Mark Waugh bowled 20 overs. Is it possible that Warne was injured since he did not bat in the second innings?

Summary of bowling career of Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath
© Anantha Narayanan

Muralitharan & Vaas

P02. Muralitharan 586 @ 22.05 & Vaas 309 @ 28.01 Total: 895 @ 24.11
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Muralitharan: 1195(1992)-1964(2010) 586 @ 22.05 (209 @ 24.40) 90.4%
Vaas        : 1267(1994)-1927(2009) 309 @ 28.01 ( 46 @ 40.11) 69.8%
Pair Career:  1270(1994) to 1909(2009)
All matches:          155      Wins:  59 (38.1 %)
Pair matches:          94      Wins:  41 (43.6 %)
Pair Home matches:     50      Wins:  27 (54.0 %)
Pair Away matches:     44      Wins:  14 (31.8 %)
Non-Pair matches:      59      Wins:  18 (30.5 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 25      Wins:   5 (20.0 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 34      Wins:  13 (38.2 %)
Matches on their own  Muralitharan: 36  Vaas: 16
Pair   Home wkts:  534 @ 20.97  Away wkts:  361 @ 28.76
Others Home wkts:  317 @ 35.86  Away wkts:  226 @ 44.92
Team Wkts:        1438 @ 29.97  WpT: 9.52  Pair %: 62.2
TeamPeerWkts:      543 @ 39.63
AllPeerWkts:     16239 @ 31.40
Top Order Wkts:    544 (60.8%)  Low Order Wkts:  187 (20.9%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 310 (58.1%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 234 (64.8%)
Highest vs England:  139 @ 23.22
Team wkts-5+: 145  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 115 (79.3%)
Pair wkts-5+: 116 Shared: 69 Muralitharan-dominant: 40 Vaas-dominant: 7

As expected, this is a pair with wide differences, especially in bowling averages. Muralitharan has dominated their successful innings in a big manner: 40-7. But as a pair they have succeeded a huge 79% of the times, the highest in this analysis.

Readers can see how much they have out-performed their own team bowlers in almost every measure. The bowling averages show a 60% difference. The win % drops substantially. As a pair, they captured 62% of the team wickets: the highest in this analysis. But here the story also is also about how dependent was Vaas on Muralitharan. With Murali, he averaged 28 and without Murali the average went up to 40. Murali himself seems to have gone his own merry way, with or without Vaas, with averages of 22 and 24.

Murali & Vaas have captured all 10 wickets in the innings no fewer than 4 times. Their best innings performance has been Test # 1755 against West Indies at SSC during 2005 when they captured 10 for 51 (6 for 36 & 4 for 15). Their best match performance has been 17 wickets (11 and 6) in Test # 1567 against West Indies at Gale during 2001. They also captured 17 wickets (3 and 14) in Test # 1572 against West Indies at SSC during 2001. Both Tests were played during the series with the unlikely combination of 3-0 and 688 losing runs. The series is also a special one in a way: almost the only series in which Vaas out-performed Muralitharan.

Summary of bowling career of Muttiah Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas
© Anantha Narayanan

Walsh & Ambrose

P03. Walsh 373 @ 24.29 & Ambrose 389 @ 21.12 Total: 762 @ 22.67
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Walsh       : 0997(1984)-1544(2001) 373 @ 24.29 (146 @ 24.82) 97.9%
Ambrose     : 1095(1988)-1509(2000) 389 @ 21.12 ( 16 @ 17.88) 118.1%
Pair Career:  1095(1988) to 1509(2000)
All matches:          142      Wins:  59 (41.5 %)
Pair matches:          95      Wins:  42 (44.2 %)
Pair Home matches:     50      Wins:  24 (48.0 %)
Pair Away matches:     45      Wins:  18 (40.0 %)
Non-Pair matches:      47      Wins:  17 (36.2 %)
Non-Pair Home matches:  8      Wins:   3 (37.5 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 39      Wins:  14 (35.9 %)
Matches on their own  Walsh: 37  Ambrose: 3
Pair   Home wkts:  379 @ 23.06  Away wkts:  383 @ 22.29
Others Home wkts:  400 @ 31.41  Away wkts:  329 @ 32.53
Team Wkts:        1491 @ 27.19  WpT: 8.02  Pair %: 51.1
TeamPeerWkts:      729 @ 31.91
AllPeerWkts:     10257 @ 30.32
Highest vs England:  287 @ 21.92
Top Order Wkts:    474 (62.2%)  Low Order Wkts:  153 (20.1%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 233 (61.5%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 241 (62.9%)
Team wkts-5+: 147  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 87 (59.2%)
Pair wkts-5+: 90 Shared: 56 Walsh-dominant: 14 Ambrose-dominant: 20

This is not necessarily the most successful West Indian pair. However they did capture over 750 wickets.

Ambrose has dominated the pair slightly, as shown by the 20-14 division in the dominance analysis. They have also succeeded nearly 60% of the times, indicating a lack of great bowling support.

That they bowled during the waning period for West Indies is shown by the win % values, which are all in the 40+ region. However as a pair they averaged 22.67 which is the third best in this analysis. Ambrose picked almost all wickets, barring 17, while bowling with Walsh. Their WpT is a not-too-great 8 and they have captured around half the team wickets.

Walsh & Ambrose have captured all 10 wickets in the innings once. This was in Test # 1188 against South Africa at Bridgetown at Wanderer's during 1992 when they captured for 10 for 65 (6 for 31 & 6 for 34). Their best match performance has been 16 wickets (5 & 11) in Test # 1257 against England at POS during 1994.

Summary of bowling career of Courtney Walsh and Curtly Ambrose
© Anantha Narayanan

Akram & Younis

P04. Akram 282 @ 21.33 & Younis 277 @ 22.93 Total: 559 @ 22.12
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Akram       : 1010(1985)-1584(2002) 282 @ 21.33 (132 @ 28.51) 74.8%
Younis      : 1127(1989)-1637(2003) 277 @ 22.93 ( 96 @ 25.39) 90.3%
Pair Career:  1127(1989) to 1584(2002)
All matches:          143      Wins:  54 (37.8 %)
Pair matches:          60      Wins:  28 (46.7 %)
Pair Home matches:     22      Wins:  10 (45.5 %)
Pair Away matches:     38      Wins:  18 (47.4 %)
Non-Pair matches:      82      Wins:  26 (31.7 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 22      Wins:   7 (31.8 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 60      Wins:  19 (31.7 %)
Matches on their own  Akram: 43  Younis: 26
Pair   Home wkts:  223 @ 20.27  Away wkts:  336 @ 23.35
Others Home wkts:  142 @ 32.46  Away wkts:  272 @ 32.68
Team Wkts:         973 @ 26.58  WpT: 9.32  Pair %: 57.5
TeamPeerWkts:      414 @ 32.60
AllPeerWkts:     11463 @ 30.37
Top Order Wkts:    320 (57.2%)  Low Order Wkts:  145 (25.9%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 130 (58.3%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 190 (56.5%)
Highest vs West Indies:  104 @ 21.22
Team wkts-5+:  96  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 67 (69.8%)
Pair wkts-5+: 66 Shared: 45 Akram-dominant: 12 Younis-dominant: 9

Ah we now come to probably the most colourful bowling pair which ever took the red cherry. Two totally different individuals and bowlers, yet together they became arguably the most fearsome and feared bowling pair ever.

The first thing that strikes is the difference in the two bowlers when they bowled together and separately. Waqar was quite effective bowling alone, operating at around 90%. However Wasim was lost without Waqar. Most of these matches were during the early years. Wasim was acting at only around 75% of his pair averages when he was bowling alone. In fact it can be seen that this is by far the lowest figure amongst all pairs for one bowler.

The pair captured had a success rate of nearly 70%. Akram was slightly more dominant than Younis by a 12-9 margin. Their win %s were all below 50. They had an excellent WpT figure of well over 9 together.

Akram and Younis have captured all 10 wickets in the innings twice. Their best innings performance has been Test # 1257 against Sri Lanka at Kandy during 1994 when they bowled unchanged on the opening day and captured 10 for 66 (4 for 32 & 6 for 34). Their best match performance has been 17 wickets (8 & 9) in Test # 1207 against New Zealand at Hamilton during 1993. In addition, they have captured 16 wickets thrice and 15 wickets 6 times. Imagine: 15 or more wickets in a match captured an astonishing 10 times!

Summary of bowling career of Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis
© Anantha Narayanan

Willis & Botham

P05. Willis 222 @ 24.63 & Botham 254 @ 25.67 Total: 476 @ 25.18
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Willis      : 0676(1971)-0991(1984) 222 @ 24.63 (103 @ 26.44) 93.2%
Botham      : 0806(1977)-1190(1992) 254 @ 25.67 (129 @ 33.78) 76.0%
Pair Career:  0806(1977) to 0991(1984)
All matches:          223      Wins:  61 (27.4 %)
Pair matches:          60      Wins:  25 (41.7 %)
Pair Home matches:     33      Wins:  17 (51.5 %)
Pair Away matches:     27      Wins:   8 (29.6 %)
Non-Pair matches:     162      Wins:  36 (22.2 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 91      Wins:  16 (17.6 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 71      Wins:  20 (28.2 %)
Matches on their own  Willis: 30  Botham: 41
Pair   Home wkts:  288 @ 23.43  Away wkts:  188 @ 27.87
Others Home wkts:  227 @ 29.69  Away wkts:  224 @ 29.03
Team Wkts:         927 @ 27.22  WpT: 7.93  Pair %: 51.3
TeamPeerWkts:      451 @ 29.36
AllPeerWkts:      4559 @ 30.16
Top Order Wkts:    299 (62.8%)  Low Order Wkts:   93 (19.5%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 180 (62.5%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 119 (63.3%)
Highest vs Australia:  183 @ 25.24
Team wkts-5+:  92  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 55 (59.8%)
Pair wkts-5+: 55 Shared: 28 Willis-dominant: 9 Botham-dominant: 18

Unlike Akram, Willis' figures do not drop off at the start of the career possibly because he had a good set of bowlers bowling with him, led by Snow during his early years. However Botham, without Willis at the other end, was as spent a force as Akram. His average increases by over 30%. Their pair-success value is around 60. The RpT value is below 8. However Botham was the more dominant bowler by a big margin of 18-9 in those situations where they succeeded.

Willis & Botham have captured all 10 wickets in the innings no fewer than three times. Their best innings performance has been Test # 826 against Pakistan at Lord's during 1978 when they captured 10 for 60 (2 for 26 & 8 for 34). Their best match performance has been 16 wickets (5 and 11) in Test # 830 against New Zealand at Lord's during 1978.

Summary of bowling career of Bob Willis and Ian Botham
© Anantha Narayanan

Donald & Pollock

P06. Donald 208 @ 22.02 & Pollock 189 @ 21.66 Total: 397 @ 21.85
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Donald      : 1188(1992)-1590(2002) 208 @ 22.02 (122 @ 22.66) 97.2%
Pollock     : 1312(1995)-1860(2008) 189 @ 21.66 (232 @ 24.31) 89.1%
Pair Career:  1312(1995) to 1582(2002)
All matches:          155      Wins:  72 (46.5 %)
Pair matches:          47      Wins:  23 (48.9 %)
Pair Home matches:     28      Wins:  17 (60.7 %)
Pair Away matches:     19      Wins:   6 (31.6 %)
Non-Pair matches:     107      Wins:  49 (45.8 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 30      Wins:  13 (43.3 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 77      Wins:  36 (46.8 %)
Matches on their own  Donald: 25  Pollock: 60
Pair   Home wkts:  242 @ 20.79  Away wkts:  155 @ 23.49
Others Home wkts:  217 @ 29.14  Away wkts:  148 @ 34.64
Team Wkts:         762 @ 26.41  WpT: 8.45  Pair %: 52.1
TeamPeerWkts:      365 @ 31.37
AllPeerWkts:      6800 @ 30.22
Top Order Wkts:    265 (66.8%)  Low Order Wkts:   80 (20.2%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 163 (67.4%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 102 (65.8%)
Highest vs England:  116 @ 22.76
Team wkts-5+:  78  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 46 (59.0%)
Pair wkts-5+: 44 Shared: 36 Donald-dominant: 3 Pollock-dominant: 5

Look at how close Donald's and Pollock's figures are. The averages are all around 22, the best in this analysis. Donald bowled as effectively without Pollock while Pollock needed the pace of Donald a bit more. Pollock has played many more matches without Donald than any other bowler in this 20 bowler collection. Look at the dominance analysis. They have the highest shared % of all pairs. Very few innings in which either bowler has dominated: only 3-5. A very high level of top order batsmen scalps. And very impressive away averages for the pair.

Donald & Pollock have captured all 10 wickets in the innings twice. Their best innings performance has been Test # 1471 against England at Wanderer's during 1999 when they captured 10 for 69 (6 for 53 and 4 for 16). Their best match performance has been an unprecedented 19 wickets (10 and 9) in the same Test. This is the only instance of one of these pairs capturing 19 wickets in a match.

Summary of bowling career of Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock
© Anantha Narayanan

Chandrasekhar & Bedi

P07. Chandrasekhar 184 @ 28.71 & Bedi 184 @ 27.22 Total: 368 @ 27.96
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Chandrasekhar: 0552(1964)-0851(1979) 184 @ 28.71 ( 58 @ 33.05) 86.9%
Bedi        :  0612(1967)-0854(1979) 184 @ 27.22 ( 82 @ 32.05) 84.9%
Pair Career:   0612(1967) to 0837(1978)
All matches:           87      Wins:  21 (24.1 %)
Pair matches:          42      Wins:  11 (26.2 %)
Pair Home matches:     20      Wins:   7 (35.0 %)
Pair Away matches:     22      Wins:   4 (18.2 %)
Non-Pair matches:      45      Wins:  10 (22.2 %)
Non-Pair Home matches:  9      Wins:   2 (22.2 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 36      Wins:   8 (22.2 %)
Matches on their own  Chandrasekhar: 16  Bedi: 25
Pair   Home wkts:  191 @ 25.09  Away wkts:  177 @ 31.07
Others Home wkts:  109 @ 36.02  Away wkts:  123 @ 47.26
Team Wkts:         600 @ 33.38  WpT: 8.76  Pair %: 61.3
TeamPeerWkts:      232 @ 41.98
AllPeerWkts:      5835 @ 30.23
Top Order Wkts:    224 (60.9%)  Low Order Wkts:   77 (20.9%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 111 (58.1%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 113 (63.8%)
Highest vs England:  162 @ 26.40
Team wkts-5+:  60  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 46 (76.7%)
Pair wkts-5+: 45 Shared: 33 Chandrasekhar-dominant: 7 Bedi-dominant: 5

The romantic era of the 60s-70s when spin was king, queen and everything else.

Indian wins were not too many during this era and this pair did well, especially at home. They both bowled very well together and fell off by 15% when bowling separately. Look at their very decent away performance: an average of 31. And look at the awful away figures of the other bowlers even though there was one Prasanna in that group. And when India captured 5 wickets, these two were successful a huge 75%. They also seem to have shared the wickets fairly equitably amongst themselves.

Each was lost without the other. In three matches, Bedi had figures of 1 for 163, 1 for 152 and 1 for 146 without Chandra. He did quite well when Chandra joined him in between.. In between the latter two expensive 1-wicket hauls, this time Chandra on his own, captured 2 for 102.

Chandra & Bedi have captured all 10 wickets in the innings no fewer than three times. Their best innings performance has been Test # 812 against Australia at MCG during 1978 when they captured 10 for 110 (6 for 52 & 4 for 58). In the same match they also captured 18 wickets (12 and 6).

Summary of bowling career of Bishen Singh Bedi and BS Chandrasekhar
© Anantha Narayanan

Hadlee & Cairns

P08. Hadlee 207 @ 22.02 & Cairns 130 @ 32.58 Total: 337 @ 26.10
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Hadlee      : 0710(1973)-1147(1990) 207 @ 22.02 (224 @ 22.55) 97.7%
Cairns      : 0730(1974)-1031(1985) 130 @ 32.58 (  0 @  0.00)  0.0%
Pair Career:  0730(1974) to 1031(1985)
All matches:          100      Wins:  22 (22.0 %)
Pair matches:          42      Wins:  12 (28.6 %)
Pair Home matches:     23      Wins:   9 (39.1 %)
Pair Away matches:     19      Wins:   3 (15.8 %)
Non-Pair matches:      58      Wins:  10 (17.2 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 11      Wins:   1 ( 9.1 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 47      Wins:   9 (19.1 %)
Matches on their own  Hadlee: 44  Cairns: 1
Pair   Home wkts:  188 @ 23.48  Away wkts:  149 @ 29.40
Others Home wkts:  137 @ 32.07  Away wkts:  127 @ 39.46
Team Wkts:         601 @ 30.28  WpT: 8.02  Pair %: 56.1
TeamPeerWkts:      264 @ 35.63
AllPeerWkts:      7911 @ 30.35
Top Order Wkts:    204 (60.5%)  Low Order Wkts:   71 (21.1%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 118 (62.8%)  Top Order Away Wkts:  86 (57.7%)
Highest vs England:   72 @ 27.76
Team wkts-5+:  59  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 38 (64.4%)
Pair wkts-5+: 38 Shared: 22 Hadlee-dominant: 14 Cairns-dominant: 2

This is the only pair in which one bowler, Cairns, has got all his wickets, bowling with the other bowler. He bowled, by himself, in one match (#758) and got 0 for 44. As expected Hadlee dominates by a huge factor of 14-2. I myself am interested in knowing about those two occasions. In match # 958, Cairns took 7 for 74 and Hadlee 0 for 44. A few matches later Cairns captured 7 for 143 and Hadlee, 2 for 97. That is all.

They did quite well at home and held their own away from home. There is no doubt Hadlee was the mainstay but Cairns played the supporting role very effectively.

Hadlee & Cairns have never captured all 10 wickets in an innings. Their best innings performance has been Test # 875 against West Indies at Christchurch during 1980 when they captured 9 for 143 (3 for 58 & 6 for 85). Their best match performance has been 14 wickets (11 and 3) in the earlier match of that series, Test # 873 at Dunedin. A rare win for New Zealand over the mighty West Indies.

Summary of bowling career of Richard Hadlee and Lance Cairns
© Anantha Narayanan

Garner & Marshall

P09. Garner 152 @ 21.38 & Marshall 170 @ 22.02 Total: 322 @ 21.72
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Garner      : 0797(1977)-1072(1987) 152 @ 21.38 (107 @ 20.40) 104.8%
Marshall    : 0837(1978)-1175(1991) 170 @ 22.02 (206 @ 20.06) 109.8%
Pair Career:  0880(1980) to 1072(1987)
All matches:          117      Wins:  56 (47.9 %)
Pair matches:          36      Wins:  20 (55.6 %)
Pair Home matches:     18      Wins:  12 (66.7 %)
Pair Away matches:     18      Wins:   8 (44.4 %)
Non-Pair matches:      81      Wins:  36 (44.4 %)
Non-Pair Home matches: 14      Wins:   5 (35.7 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 67      Wins:  31 (46.3 %)
Matches on their own  Garner: 22  Marshall: 45
Pair   Home wkts:  161 @ 21.09  Away wkts:  161 @ 22.35
Others Home wkts:  149 @ 27.46  Away wkts:  140 @ 27.13
Team Wkts:         611 @ 24.36  WpT: 8.94  Pair %: 52.7
TeamPeerWkts:      289 @ 27.30
AllPeerWkts:      4687 @ 31.27
Top Order Wkts:    192 (59.6%)  Low Order Wkts:   69 (21.4%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 102 (63.4%)  Top Order Away Wkts:  90 (55.9%)
Highest vs England:  141 @ 19.30
Team wkts-5+:  60  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 39 (65.0%)
Pair wkts-5+: 38 Shared: 25 Garner-dominant: 5 Marshall-dominant: 8

The first of the two special selections. These two greats might very well have warranted the top selection on their own. Look at their numbers. All pair values are around the 22 mark, almost the same as Donald & Pollock. The surprise is the overall win % mark. I would have expected a slightly higher figure, somewhere around the 60-65% mark. But does not matter. A wonderful away average and an out-of-the-world performance against England mark this pair's achievements.

As expected, Garner & Marshall have never captured all 10 wickets in an innings. Their best innings performance has been Test # 991 against England at Leeds during 1984 when they captured 9 for 90 (2 for 32 and 7 for 53). Their best match performance has been 13 wickets (5 and 8) in Test # 988 against Australia at Kingston during 1984.

Summary of bowling career of Joel Garner and Malcolm Marshall
© Anantha Narayanan

Miller & Lindwall

P10. Miller 150 @ 23.69 & Lindwall 195 @ 22.48 Total: 345 @ 23.00
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Miller      : 0275(1946)-0430(1956) 150 @ 23.69 ( 20 @ 17.65) 134.2%
Lindwall    : 0275(1946)-0487(1960) 195 @ 22.48 ( 33 @ 26.30) 85.5%
Pair Career:  0275(1946) to 0430(1956)
All matches:           78      Wins:  44 (56.4 %)
Pair matches:          51      Wins:  28 (54.9 %)
Pair Home matches:     26      Wins:  17 (65.4 %)
Pair Away matches:     25      Wins:  11 (44.0 %)
Non-Pair matches:      27      Wins:  16 (59.3 %)
Non-Pair Home matches:  4      Wins:   1 (25.0 %)
Non-Pair Away matches: 23      Wins:  15 (65.2 %)
Matches on their own  Miller: 4  Lindwall: 10
Pair   Home wkts:  180 @ 20.84  Away wkts:  165 @ 25.36
Others Home wkts:  278 @ 26.02  Away wkts:  218 @ 30.72
Team Wkts:         841 @ 26.00  WpT: 6.76  Pair %: 41.0
TeamPeerWkts:      496 @ 28.08
AllPeerWkts:      3406 @ 29.41
Top Order Wkts:    229 (66.4%)  Low Order Wkts:   63 (18.3%)
Top Order Home Wkts: 119 (66.1%)  Top Order Away Wkts: 110 (66.7%)
Highest vs England:  174 @ 22.39
Team wkts-5+:  85  Pair-Successes (50% of Team or more): 33 (38.8%)
Pair wkts-5+: 32 Shared: 17 Miller-dominant: 4 Lindwall-dominant: 11

Lindwall & Miller have very good figures but these were good years for bowling. Good win % values indicate the superiority of Australia during the 1946-55 period. Their Wickets per Test is the lowest amongst these pairs and does not even reach 7. This is also reflected in the low % of pair successes. They have always been quite consistent at home or away.

Since Miller & Lindwall were never the dominating bowling pair in the attack, they have never captured all 10 wickets in an innings. Their best innings performance has been Test # 408 against West Indies at Kingston during 1955 when they captured 8 for 171 (6 for 107 & 2 for 64). Their best match performance has been 14 wickets (7 and 7) in Test # 341 against West Indies at SCG during 1952.

Summary of bowling career of Ray Lindwall and Keith Miller
© Anantha Narayanan

Please peruse the following few lines. This is worthy of a special comment. Two wonderful bowlers, almost working like Siamese twins together. I wish I had got them in. At least I have given them a belated salute.

Statham 141 @ 25.72 & Trueman 143 @ 25.76 Total: 284 @ 25.74
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Statham    : 0332(1951)-0596(1965) 141 @ 25.72 (111 @ 23.74) 108.3%
Trueman    : 0351(1952)-0592(1965) 143 @ 25.76 (164 @ 17.93) 143.7%
Pair Career: 0380(1954) to 0547(1963)
Pair wkts-5+: 34 Shared: 28 Statham-dominant: 3 Trueman-dominant: 3

The summary table with key data elements is displayed here. No special comments are needed.

Bowler 1WktsAvgeBowler 2WktsAvgeP-WktsP-AvgeTestsWins% WinsP>=50%
           Twkts>4
Warne51324.88McGrath48821.38100123.171047168.364.5
Muralitharan58622.05Vaas30928.0189524.11944143.679.3
Walsh37324.29Ambrose38921.1276222.67954244.259.2
Akram28221.33Younis27722.9355922.12602846.769.8
Willis22224.63Botham25425.6747625.18602541.759.8
Donald20822.02Pollock18921.6639721.85472348.959.0
Chandrasekhar18428.71Bedi18427.2236827.96421126.276.7
Hadlee20722.02Cairns13032.5833726.10421228.664.4
Garner15221.38Marshall17022.0232221.72362055.665.0
Miller15023.69Lindwall19522.4834523.00512854.938.8
Statham14125.72Trueman14325.7628425.74351337.163.5

To download the complete table, the widest Excel sheet I have seen for a long time (75 columns!), please CLICK HERE.

Finally, let me confess that I might have missed many more but here is a list of stand outs revealed by this analysis:

1. The absence of a big gap between Warne & McGrath and other peer bowlers indicating the abundance of quality. The near-70% success rate of Warne & McGrath.
2. The impact Murali at the other end had on Vaas' bowling.
3. The astounding level of success Murali & Vaas had when their team captured 5 wickets or more.
4. The extent of dependency Wasim Akram had on the support given by Waqar Younis.
5. The unbelievable 10 occasions when Wasim and Waqar captured 15 or more wickets in a match.
6. The closeness of numbers between Donald & Pollock confirming the extent of under-estimating of Pollock.
7. Their unique 19-wickets capture in this elite group. I know that there have been 20-wickets captured in a match by a pair (Trumble/Noble, Hirst/Blythe, Faulkner/Vogler, Laker/Lock, Massie/Lillee et al), but those bowlers are outside this group.
8. The extraordinary variation in the pair's away performance and other bowlers' away performance for Murali & Vaas and Chandra & Bedi.
9. The closeness of Home/Away performances for the two West Indian pairs. In fact it is unbelievable that Walsh & Ambrose have performed better away than at home.
10.The confirmation that Botham was three-fourth the bowler he was when Willis was absent.
11. The 22 level averages for the two West Indian pairs and Donald & Pollock.

Finally my usual request. Give respect to this wonderful collection of great bowlers. The only way this can be done is to dedicate your comments to the bowlers and let them take centre stage. Do not bring in frivolous comparisons, using vague numbers that batsman A played P&Q better than B or that C was shaking/shaky against X&Y or that S&T were ineffective against batsman D. I will be ruthless and cut off such comments right at the beginning. There is so much data provided here and I have just skimmed the top. Look for hidden gems here instead of indulging in fantasies.

Let me add that I have set up the Bowling pair analysis program such that I have a dummy pair which can be replaced by any duo and this pair can be analysed instantly. So you are welcome to ask summary details for any meaningful pair. Of course, if you ask for Hirwani & Arshad Ayub or Cuffy & Ramnarine or Allott & Pocock, it is unlikely that I would oblige.

Thank you.

Full post
Lara's theme: a caribbean rhapsody

Analysing the highs, lows and various other performance aspects in Brian Lara's Test-batting career

I cannot think of a better title for this article than the wonderful music of Maurice Jarre which has stood tall for 50 years. Brian Charles Lara entertained millions across the world for many years, exasperated his followers often, but there was never a dull moment while he was at the crease. He has alternated broken notes and the greatest of symphonies in his exciting career. His followers go far beyond the shores of Trinidad. I may be wrong, but Lara, amongst all modern players, must have had the greatest number of followers from outside his own country. I am sure Freddie Mercury would not mind my borrowing part of the title of another classic: to embellish this one.

This, I confess, comes from someone, who thinks Lara is the most exciting cricketer ever. I may not have Lara bat for me if my life depended on a batsman, am I sure about this? (Sri Lanka 2001!!!), but at all other times, it will be Lara all the way. But as my enthusiastic set of readers would have noted, analysis is different from admiration and I have never allowed my heart to rule over my mind in analytical matters. So this tribute will be as much a look into the numerous successes of Lara as his failures.

I have also used this tribute to strengthen my single player analysis program. There are newer insights and analysis areas. Such insights do not require graphs.

Career summary

Matches: 131
Innings: 232
Not Outs:  6 (2.6%)
Runs: 11953
Average: 52.89
100-50: 34-48
Frequency of 100s: 6.8 Inns/100
Avge value of 100s: 173.2.
Form-dips : 3

Just a recap of well-known facts. Lara is the only batsman to reach 400 in Tests. Also the only batsman to reach 500 in First Class cricket. One of four players to have crossed 300 twice in their Test careers. Only player to have gained the Test high-score record, lost it and regained it, all within the span of 10 years. Lara's nine double-hundreds are second only to Bradman's tally of 12 double-hundreds. Finally a query from Arijit Dasgupta which I have not been able to confirm but which probably is true. "Does Lara have the highest number of 20-plus overs? I can recall three straightaway: 28 off Peterson (2003), 26 off Kaneria (2006) and 22 off Adam Dale (1999)".

The eye-catcher is the average value of 100 which is a very high 173.2, indicating that Lara is a big-hundred player. He is fourth in this table, behind Bradman, Zaheer Abbas and Sehwag. The frequency of hundreds is a reasonable 6.8: nothing great. Quite a few batsmen have better frequency values.

But the real eye-opener is the Not out percentage. This stands at an incredibly low 2.6% and explains why Lara's average is on the lower side. This value of 2.6 is the lowest amongst the batsmen who have crossed 5000 runs: a list of 100 top batsmen. It is indicative of the way Lara played. His not out innings are 400*, 153*, 80*, 48*, 14* and 13*. Two historic innings lead this list.

I have developed a new measure called Form-dip. A form-dip is a sequence of 4 consecutive single-digit dismissals. Not outs break the sequence. I am sure readers would agree with me that this represents a real dip in form since it represents non-contribution for a minimum of 2 Tests. I also tightened the rules in deciding that a sequence of 4, 8, 0, 5, 1 will convert to two form-dips and so on. This is understandable since the form moves down alarmingly with each failure past 4.

What do we have here? A real surprise. I have done this work only for about 20 odd top batsmen. But the patterns are clear. The Form-dip table is headed by the two batsmen competing for the best contemporary batsman tag. Tendulkar has had 4 such failure streaks and Lara, 3. Most of the older batsmen, and Kallis/Jayawardene/Sangakkara do not appear in the list whereas Ponting, Dravid, Laxman and Sehwag all have a single instance. Some unexpected names here.

Balls faced information

Balls faced: 19753
Scoring rate: 60.5
Balls faced per inns: 85.1.

Amongst the top batsmen, only Sehwag, Richards and Pietersen are ahead of Lara in the scoring rate measure. The average balls faced per innings is, as expected, on the lower side.

Top 5 innings analysis

Top 5 inns (Runs) : 400 375 277 226 221 Total: 1499 Avge: 299.8

These small analytical segments bring new insights. The first is the average of the top-5 innings played by the concerned batsman. Lara's average of almost 300 is the highest of all batsmen. Next comes Bradman with 292.2 and then comes Sehwag, with 275.2. This confirms Lara's penchant for playing huge innings.

Top 5 inns (Balls): 582 538 372 360 354 Total: 2206 Avge: 441.2
The next one is to look at the top 5 innings in terms of balls faced. The balls played data is available even for many older players. But this is not a complete analysis. Notwithstanding his attacking play, Lara has genuinely played many long innings. His average for the top-5 innings is a huge 441. The leader in this regards is Hutton with 588, followed by Hammond, with 566. Amongst modern batsmen, Jayawardene leads with 463 and Lara comes next. Dravid's average is 438.

Lara as the highest scorer

HS Inns:    65
% of inns: 28.0
HS Runs total: 7613
HS Next Best:  3623
% of Lara's total: 47.6

This is a new piece of analysis. I have determined the number of innings in which Lara was the leading scorer in the innings and worked out this as a % of total innings. More importantly, to get a handle on the level of support, I have added the next highest scores and determined this total as a % of the total of Lara's innings. The numbers are very illuminative.

Lara has top-scored in 28.0% of the innings he played in. His is the highest amongst modern batsmen. Only Gavaskar matches this number. Of course, many old timers have figures in excess of 30, Bradman leading with 37.5%. The matching with Gavaskar indicates how often Lara carried his team.

The next one is an even more enlightening one. This defines the support received. Lara received the least support amongst all batsmen. The next best batsmen have totalled 47.6% of Lara's aggregate, below even half-way stage. He is the only batsman to have received below 50% support. Sehwag is next with 53.5% and then comes Hutton with 53.7%. Just as a comparison, the number for Tendulkar is 65.4% and for Ponting, 64.9%. This is a clear confirmation of how often Lara carried the burden.

Innings break-down

Sub-10 innings: No- 62 % of total-26.7%
Sub-25 innings: No-100 % of total-43.1%
Sub-50 innings: No-147 % of total-63.4%

In this new analysis I look at the pattern of low scores. Lara has had 26.7% of single-digit scores, 43% of scores below 25 and a huge 63.4% of sub-50 scores. This indicates that Lara was not a great starter. I have not looked at all batsmen but Michael Clarke (27.5%) has a higher single-digit component. The older batsmen all have figures below 15%. Sangakkara has a below-20% tally.

Team runs/balls analysis

Runs added with late order batsmen (7-11) : 1487 (25)
Avge runs added with late order batsmen   : 59.5
Team runs while at crease       : 21448
Batsman's % Runs contribution   :  55.7%
Team balls while  at crease     : 38562
% of balls faced while at crease:  51.2%
Total team runs                 : 63049
Batsman Runs %                  :  19.0%

The runs added with late order batsmen are not very high. Lara's average is around 60. Tendulkar is much higher at 69.6. But let me say that 100% data is not available for the batsmen who started the career before 1992 or so.

Lara's overall runs contribution to his team total is a reasonably high 19%. Bradman has contributed 25%. Most batsmen contribute between 15 and 17%. It is understandable that Lara scores 55% of runs while at crease. He outscored his fellow batsmen often.

Innings analysis

Description    T   I  N  Runs   Avge 100  50 Freq Team-Runs %
Inns 1 58 1 4000 70.18 12 12 4.8 18111 22.1% Inns 2 72 0 4249 59.01 13 21 5.5 23053 18.4% Inns 3 56 0 2264 40.43 7 8 8.0 12704 17.8% Inns 4 46 5 1440 35.12 2 7 23.0 9181 15.7%

The innings runs and averages follow a similar pattern. Most batsmen have high-first, high-second, reasonable-third and average-fourth innings values. Lara is no exception. There are many other top batsmen who have better third and fourth innings figures. Kallis has a third innings average of 68.8 and Gavaskar, a fourth innings average of 58.7.

Home/Away analysis

Home          65 111  5  6217  58.65  17  26  6.5 32020 19.4%
Away          66 121  1  5736  47.80  17  22  7.1 31029 18.5%

This again has the same pattern as most batsmen. Lara has averaged 20% better at home. There are batsmen who have done 30-40% better at home. On the flip side, Cook averages 43.5 at home and 54.3 away. Dravid also averages better away. However no one can beat Barrington who averages 51.2 and 68.9. It is clear that Lara has not set the foreign grounds alight, barring probably Sri Lankan.

Result based analysis

Won           32  52  4  2929  61.02   8  16  6.5 15645 18.7%
Drawn         36  54  2  3708  71.31  12  10  4.5 18400 20.2%
Lost          63 126  0  5316  42.19  14  22  9.0 29004 18.3%

This is a dicey area. The common tendency is only to talk about performances in won matches only. That is very nice in strong teams. However in weaker teams it is essential to look at how the player has performed in drawn and lost matches. Anyhow when your team only has won only 25% of matches you have played in, there is no other alternative. This point was also emphasized by in a comment made recently.

Lara's average of 42 in lost matches is the highest amongst all contemporary batsmen. Similarly the % of team runs scored in lost matches is a very high 18.3%, the highest amongst all modern batsmen. His performance in drawn matches is also very good and is matched only by Kallis.

Probably the more important factor is that Lara has maintained his contributions to the team runs at an even keel whether the matches are won, drawn or lost. This is a trait most batsmen lack in and most followers do not understand and appreciate. The emphasis is on winning.

Analysis by country faced

Australia     31  58  2  2856  51.00   9  11  6.4 13963 20.5%
Bangladesh     2   2  0   173  86.50   1   1  2.0   911 19.0%
England       30  51  3  2983  62.15   7  11  7.3 13918 21.4%
India         17  29  0  1002  34.55   2   6 14.5  8908 11.2%
New Zealand   11  17  0   704  41.41   1   5 17.0  5080 13.9%
Pakistan      12  22  0  1173  53.32   4   3  5.5  6109 19.2%
South Africa  18  35  0  1715  49.00   4   9  8.8  9432 18.2%
Sri Lanka      8  14  1  1125  86.54   5   2  2.8  3577 31.5%
Zimbabwe       2   4  0   222  55.50   1   0  4.0  1151 19.3%

It is clear that Lara met his match against the Indian bowlers. Any talk about weakness against spin should be killed at birth because of his performance against Sri Lanka. New Zealand was another team which troubled him. But bring on England and Sri Lanka, he was on song. The average against Australia might not look great but let us not forget the quality of Australian bowling he faced. He played only 4 Tests against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe and probably did not care much about accumulating runs. It is amazing that Lara has scored nearly a third of the team runs scored against Sri Lanka. And over 20% of the team runs scored against Australia and England.

Batting position analysis

Bat-Pos  1         1  0    20  20.00   0   0  0.0
Bat-Pos  2         1  0    91  91.00   0   1  0.0
Bat-Pos  3        66  4  3749  60.47   9  13  7.3
Bat-Pos  4       148  1  7535  51.26  24  31  6.2
Bat-Pos  5        14  1   536  41.23   1   3 14.0
Bat-Pos  6         1  0     8   8.00   0   0  0.0
Bat-Pos  8         1  0    14  14.00   0   0  0.0
Avge Batting Position:  3.78
Like Tendulkar, no.4 was his favourite batting position. However unlike his fellow not-so-tall-legend, he batted at no.3 often. He averaged over 60 at no.3 and above 50 at no.4. These were his bread-and-butter positions and he performed very well there. Incidentally the sole no.5 century was the most famous of all: the Bridgetown classic of 153*.

Analysis by year

1990           1   2  0    49  24.50   0   0  0.0
1991           0   0  0     0   0.00   0   0  0.0
1992           3   6  0   195  32.50   0   3  0.0
1993           7  10  0   586  58.60   1   3 10.0
1994           8  14  0   996  71.14   2   4  7.0
1995          12  20  2  1222  67.89   4   6  5.0
1996           5   9  0   226  25.11   0   1  0.0
1997          12  21  0   859  40.90   3   3  7.0
1998           9  15  1   608  43.43   0   5  0.0
1999           8  15  1   832  59.43   3   4  5.0
2000           9  17  0   497  29.24   2   1  8.5
2001           9  18  0  1151  63.94   3   4  6.0
2002           7  10  0   351  35.10   0   3  0.0
2003          10  19  1  1344  74.67   5   5  3.8
2004          12  21  1  1178  58.90   3   4  7.0
2005           9  17  0  1110  65.29   5   0  3.4
2006          10  18  0   749  41.61   3   2  6.0

Ignoring the starting years, Lara probably had three bad years, 1996, 2000 and 2002. The spreading of these years also was responsible for Lara comfortably maintaining averages of well over 50 over multi-year spans. He made up for his small scores with huge scores.

Peer comparisons

Peer-All-T7  232 11953 52.89 14372 523291 36.41 1.45
Peer-Team-T7 232 11953 52.89  1268  40252 31.74 1.67

Lara out-performed his peers by a margin of 45% and his team-mates by 67%. While there are others who have out-performed their peers by higher margins, Kallis by 52%, there is no one even close in the team-mates comparisons. He was head-and-shoulders above them.

The 165 to 400 progression

Charles Bannerman scored 165 on the opening day of Test cricket (okay 126 and then on to 165 on the next day). Since then the individual batting record has been improved by 9 batsmen a total of 10 times. The progression is interesting and can be seen in Cricinfo. A few interesting trivia on this progression are presented here.

The biggest move upwards happened when RE Foster scored 287 in his debut Test and went past Murdoch's 211 by 76 runs. The lowest was by Sobers' single run when he declared once he went past Hutton.

The longest standing record was Sobers' 365 which stood for 13198 days before Lara went past that mark. On the flip side, Sandham's 325 did not last for 100 days. Hayden was the undisputed king for 184 days before Lara regained his record. Bradman's 334 just fell short of 1000 days. The current record of Lara has gone past 3100 days and counting.

The slowest amongst these innings was Hutton's 364 which consumed 847 balls. Imagine one batsman batting past 140 overs. The fastest must have been Hammond's 336 against the New Zealand part-timers. I could extrapolate to around 400 balls. My feeling is that this would be below Hayden's 437 balls. Interesting that both hit 10 and 11 sixes respectively.

The breaking of this record has happened at The Oval twice and St.John's twice. The record-breakers group comprises of 4 Australian, 4 English and 3 West Indian batsmen.

For all the difficulty in reaching 400 runs, I expect that there is a better chance of this record being broken than another 10-wicket haul. What it requires is a flat pitch, a free-scoring batsman at the top, with a penchant for big innings, a series situation which allows the captain to bat for two plus days et al. A better bet would be if such a team bats second and has dismissed the other team for a low total.

The high notes of Lara

The Bridgetown classic of 153 remains, for me, the best Test innings ever played. I watched every ball of that epic, dying a few hundred deaths, in a few hours. Against a top class bowling attack, West Indies had a formidable target of over 300 and were 78 for 3 when Lara walked in. Soon Hooper was dismissed and the score was 105 for 5. Adams stuck in admirably and Lara added 133 with him, outscoring him 2 to 1. Then McGrath struck and dismissed Adams, Jacobs and Perry. The score was 248 for 8 and suddenly the writing appeared on the wall: a 50-run loss perhaps. Ambrose played the most important 38 balls of his life and helped Lara add 54 for the ninth wicket. He was dismissed at 302 when 9 were still needed. Walsh, in turn, hung on for 5 more balls and Lara won the match with a cover-drive to reach 153 and complete one of the greatest of wins, himself playing one of the greatest innings ever. My prose is woefully short to describe this innings.

Lara himself, while referring to Wisden's top placement of 153, has anointed the 213 as his best innings. Makes a lot of sense since he was involved in both and knows the scenarios, within the match, in the team and in the series, inside out. He alone felt the impact of the disastrous 51 and knew the value of the stupendous 213. The 213 was also the technically better innings and would grace anyone's top-20 Test innings of all time. But for me, it is the second best.

The 277 announced Lara's genius to the world in no uncertain terms. It was his first hundred and showed the world that he was going to play high innings at a good pace. The 277 was scored in 372 balls. A reasonable Australian attack and a flat pitch but it was a path-breaker.

400 was an important innings. I have talked about this innings elsewhere. His record set a couple of years back was lost but Lara regained the same within a short period. The highest score amongst 70000 odd innings played cannot be dismissed as irrelevant.

The earlier 375 was equally important. A 36 year milestone was crossed and deserves the same recognition as the other momentous landmarks, such as the 10-wkt performances. When two bowlers have captured all 10 wickets in an innings in a Test history of 135 years, recognition is a must. As for the 350+ performances.

The recent 120 against India was a defensive classic. West Indies followed on 370 runs behind and Lara played a 7-hour back-to-the-wall innings which saved the Test, by the skin of the teeth. But for Lara's innings, West Indies would have lost by an innings and plenty.

91 is an innings which remains fresh in my memory. At the end of an indifferent tour to India in 1994, Lara played fluently and reached 91 when he feathered a catch to Mongia. No one, including the umpires, heard the snick (Venkat confirms this), but Lara walked. I am not sure many would have. Justice was served with a West Indian victory.

Lara's 132 at Perth in 1997 was a magnificent innings on a tough pitch, as evidenced by the two Australian totals of 243 and 194. His match-winning 132 was scored out of 208 runs added while Lara was at the crease.

The Pakistan attack in 2005 was nothing great. However Lara played one of his fastest innings to help West Indies win the Barbados Test. On the opening day, Lara scored 130 in 120 balls and Pakistan never recovered from this onslaught.

The Adelaide Test towards end of 2005 was Lara's last Test against Australia, his toughest and most favourite opponent. Against a top-class bowling attack, Lara scored an exceptional innings of 226 in 298 balls. That West Indies lost was a testament to the lack of support for Lara.

Sri Lanka scored 627 and West Indies barely managed to cross this in their two innings at SSC, Colombo in 2001. Lara scores 221 and 130 out of the 650 scored by West Indies: 55% of the team runs against a very potent Sri Lankan attack. Lara blunted Muralitharan but the rest fell prey to Vaas.

Two out of three ODI innings of Lara's which stand out are huge 150+ innings. The first is the Sharjah classic of 153 in 143 balls. Pakistan scored an imposing 284, aided by a blitz from Basit Ali of 127 in 79 balls. Lara's wonderful innings, while opening the batting, helped West Indies complete an easy win. Again Sharjah, a few years later. Lara's top-drawer 169 in 129 balls helped West Indies reach 333. Sri Lanka batted spiritedly and lost by 4 runs, increasing the value of Lara's innings. The third was a wonderfully constructed 94-ball 111 in the 1996 World Cup quarter final against South Africa. The win was a close one and it was probably the most important ODI innings played by Lara.

Two niggles cleared

Let me set two records straight. First the uninformed and biased criticism of 400 as not in the team's interest. First, the facts. West Indies are 595 for 5 and Lara is on 313, at the end of the second day. Lara continues on the third day, completes his 400 and declares at 751 for 5. The immense scoreboard pressure is on, even on the flattest of tracks. England is dismissed for 285 and follows on. The pitch continues to be as flat as a highway. They save the match, scoring 422 for 5, still in arrears. West Indies might very well have won by an innings had Lara not dropped Vaughan at 27. Let me emphasize the following points:
- Only way for West Indies to win was by batting once and winning by an innings.
- Scoreboard pressure was the only way to win. And you are not going to create the same without putting up a huge total.
- This was not Melbourne or Eden Gardens or Lord's. This was Antigua, vying with Faisalabad or Premadasa on their flatness quotients.
- West Indies came close to winning. England were still in arrears at the end of the Test.
- Finally blame Lara the fielder for not winning the match: not Lara, the captain or batsman.

If scoring 400 was a selfish act, then I would say that almost every high score is a selfish act. Be it a 200 or 300 or 400. Michael Clarke could have gone to cross 400 and still won. But he would have looked selfish if India had held on. He would certainly have needed the rest of the day to reach 400. He accounted for one day of rain and gave up a personal milestone in the process. These situations are totally different.

The second is the truth of the statement that Lara was certainly hounded out when he still had two years of Test cricket in him. His Test average during 2006 was 41, not earth-shattering but still higher than many top batsman's recent 12-month averages. The following is the sequence of events.
- After an average WC as batsman and captain, Lara announces his retirement from ODIs. Seems the perfect time.
- He also says that he would look at his Test career after the England tour. Nothing seems to be wrong there. He has always done well against England.
- Then the West Indian selectors, prompted by vested interests, come out with a statement that there was no certainly that Lara would be selected for the England tour. This, while discussing the team's best batsman and with no great assets at their disposal.
- What does Lara do? The proud man that he is, he announces his retirement from all forms of cricket. Mission accomplished, for certain people. Who lost out in the end? West Indian Cricket certainly.
- It is surprising that the great Test player that Lara was, he played 16 ODI matches after his last Test!!!

I wait to be corrected.

In the light of what has been detailed above, maybe a more appropriate add-on to the title of the article might have been "The Unfinished Symphony": borrowed from Schubert rather than "Bohemian Rhapsody" from Queen.

Concluding words

Lara has never been involved in any incident on field. In this matter he is exactly like his close friend, the one who, at last measurement was three inches shorter and a few Test runs richer!!! His fracas with the WICB on payments was something he did on behalf of himself and his team-mates.

Where is Lara placed in the pantheon of batting greats? On numbers, nowhere, as do many of the other modern greats. However if we strictly rely on numbers, Lohmann and Barrington are certainties in any selection. There are many other factors. Many batsmen compete for the coveted second spot amongst Test batsmen. Sobers, Hobbs, Tendulkar, Lara, Richards, Hutton and Ponting form a reasonably populated group from which to pick one. I would not question anyone whose selection varies from mine. But as far as I am concerned, Lara is the candidate for this coveted position. If I have to justify this with numbers, a string of numbers would do: 153, 213, 688, 400, 375, 277 and 226.

If I sit down to select an all-time best eleven (or fifteen) I would immediately write down the following three names. Then go for a cup of coffee, put my feet up and think, refer to my database (why? I probably have all the relevant numbers in my head) and then fill the other names over a day. This I say, implying no disrespect to any of the other greats who would eventually find their way into the team.

Bradman
Lara
Gilchrist

Sir (!) Brian Lara, hope the Queen reads this, many thanks for the lovely memories. How I wish you had played for couple of more years. I am sure there was a superlative innings of 212 or 232 in the horizon. But does not matter. You have played enough masterpieces, to be savoured and treasured by all your followers.
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Test players: a look into their best decades

Performance analysis of Test batting and bowling careers of players by decade

In a passing comment, Sarosh Nayyar requested that I do an analysis of the best decade for a player and compare the results across the players. It seemed a very intriguing request. I realized that this had the makings of a, hitherto not attempted, unique analysis, when I started looking at it deeply. The possibilities were immense. There was a scenario in which we could get a batsman-decade which was closer than the 40% gap between Bradman and Sutcliffe, which itself was a great incentive.

And ten years is a long enough period to draw conclusions with sufficient weight. We also agreed that the raw numbers had to be adjusted for the specific decade's peer numbers, during our exchange of views. The complex mechanism to determine the peer averages between any two Tests was already in place. It is indeed a tricky exercise and I have been working on-and-off for nearly a month now. The complexities are summarised below.

1. How does one handle the six-year voids which were caused by the two World Wars? The careers of some great players like Barnes and Verity were curtailed and the careers of top players such as Hobbs, Bradman, Hammond, Hutton, Compton et al got disrupted. I had to find a satisfactory methodology which handled this effectively.

2. This is predominantly a performance analysis: hence the decade has to be strictly defined. At the same time the careers of Pietersen (Twitter-gaffes notwithstanding), Cook, Gambhir et al, which might fall short of the qualifying ten-year periods, have to be recognized.

3. The peer adjustment has to be crisp and clear and has to make a telling impact. While the bowling comparisons have to be across the board, the batting peer comparisons have to be restricted to the Top-7 batsmen.

Keeping these in mind, I have worked on the following criteria and methodology.

1. The decade is strictly and exactly defined, match to match. There are very few exceptions to the 10-year requirement which are explained below.

2. The war-years, as far this analysis is concerned, are just wiped off. How I wish I could move the clock back and do it in real life. Millions of lives could have been saved!!! Enough of this wishful thinking. Tests 134 and 135 are, in real life, around six-plus years apart. As do the Tests 274 and 275. But this period is reduced to nothing as far as this analysis is concerned. In other words, the period 1908-1922 becomes eight years or thereabout. Similarly 1938-1954 is equivalent to ten years.

3. S.F.Barnes played his last Test during 1914 and did not play thereafter. And his best years were between 1907 and 1914. Hence the period of seven years has been accepted for him. Verity played his last Test in 1939 and then died on the battle-fields. His entire career lasted eight years from 1931 to 1939. Hence this has been considered valid. Note the subtle differences between the careers of these two great bowlers.

4. It was indeed fortunate that Bradman's best decade was between 1929 and 1939. So no problems. However the best years for Hobbs, Hammond and Hutton, spanned the wars and their "decades" are allowed to go past 10 years.

5. For the best performance analysis, no concession is given to anyone else, including the recent players. However for the total runs/wickets analysis it really does not matter if the career has lasted below 10 years.

6. The Top-7 Batting average for the specific range of Tests is considered for peer comparisons. This is compared to the all-time Top-7 Batting average of 35.92 and then adjusted. Couple of examples will explain this.

The average for Kallis is a very high 66.13, between 2001 and 2011, when the T7-Avge for all players, other than Kallis, was 39.03. So his average is adjusted to 60.86 (66.13 x 35.92 / 39.03). On the other side, Harvey averaged 54.40 between 1948 and 1958 when the T7-Avge for all players, except Harvey, was 33.80. So his average is adjusted to 57.82 (54.40 x 35.92 / 33.80).

7. For peer comparisons the all-inclusive Bowling average for the specific range of Tests is taken. This is compared to the all-time all-inclusive Bowling average which is 32.0. This is necessary because the wickets are captured across all batting positions.

Harbhajan's best decade average was a somewhat high 29.92 between 1999 and 2009 when the Bowling Avge for all bowlers, sans Harbhajan, was at a higher level of 34.08. So his average is adjusted to 28.09 (29.92 x 32.0 / 34.08). On the other hand, Laker averaged 18.56 at his peak between 1949 and 1959, a bowler-dominated decade, during which the Bowling Avge for all bowlers, other than Laker, was a low 29.4. So his average is adjusted to 20.20 (18.56 x 32.0 / 29.4)

Batsman best decade analysis: Based on adjusted average

Batsman Adjust <<<< Best Decade >>>> # of Inns NO Runs Avge Peer Values
Name Avge StMat StYear EndMat EnYear Yrs T7-Avg T7-Oth
 
Bradman D.G 103.93 180 1929 271 1939 10 51 5 4785 104.02 37.37 35.95
Sobers 73.75 450 1958 631 1968 10 78 12 4821 73.04 35.97 35.57
Hobbs J.B 70.65 117 1912 167 1926 14 55 4 3326 65.21 34.47 33.15
Walcott C.L 66.43 304 1948 458 1958 10 64 6 3581 61.74 33.75 33.38
EdeC Weekes 64.97 297 1948 451 1958 10 73 4 4222 61.18 34.30 33.83
Tendulkar 63.19 1201 1992 1628 2002 10 138 14 7744 62.45 35.75 35.50
Barrington 61.81 409 1955 592 1965 10 90 11 4710 59.62 34.94 34.65
Sutcliffe H 61.60 153 1924 233 1934 10 76 8 4235 62.27 37.01 36.31
Hutton L 61.25 263 1938 387 1954 16 119 15 6538 62.86 37.46 36.86
Kallis J.H 60.86 1562 2001 2006 2011 10 165 29 8995 66.13 39.18 39.03
Ponting R.T 60.13 1426 1998 1887 2008 10 172 25 9192 62.53 37.53 37.35
Richards 59.39 768 1976 1034 1986 10 97 5 5372 58.39 35.62 35.31
Hammond W.R 58.77 244 1935 284 1947 12 54 7 3025 64.36 40.07 39.34
Waugh S.R 58.13 1236 1993 1669 2003 10 163 30 7697 57.87 35.84 35.76
Dravid R 58.08 1344 1996 1820 2006 10 168 22 8710 59.65 37.06 36.89
Hayden M.L 57.96 1252 1994 1684 2004 10 85 8 4489 58.29 36.24 36.12
Harvey R.N 57.82 295 1948 448 1958 10 85 6 4298 54.40 34.16 33.80
Boycott G 57.78 627 1968 815 1978 10 74 10 3737 58.39 36.46 36.30
Simpson R.B 57.69 553 1964 729 1974 10 50 3 2768 58.89 36.88 36.67
Hill C 57.39 53 1897 96 1907 10 57 2 2411 43.83 28.21 27.43
Chappell 56.41 679 1971 895 1981 10 113 14 5571 56.27 36.04 35.83
Compton 55.71 282 1947 436 1957 10 105 10 5029 52.93 34.45 34.13
Border A.R 55.48 944 1983 1209 1993 10 147 27 6733 56.10 36.40 36.32
Mohd Yousuf 55.43 1502 2000 1962 2010 10 111 10 6037 59.77 38.87 38.74
J Miandad 55.42 937 1982 1196 1992 10 101 8 5205 55.96 36.50 36.27
Hendren E.H 55.22 153 1924 233 1934 10 57 8 2771 56.55 37.01 36.78
Sangakkara 54.88 1537 2001 1991 2011 10 142 12 7756 59.66 39.22 39.05
Worrell 54.77 296 1948 449 1958 10 57 5 2691 51.75 34.11 33.94
Gavaskar 54.10 683 1971 898 1981 10 123 8 6180 53.73 35.99 35.68
Crowe M.D 54.01 1003 1984 1278 1994 10 97 10 4756 54.66 36.50 36.35

Bradman's best decade was between 1929 and 1939, as expected. The adjusted batting average is 103.93 (unadjusted avge 104.02), which is around 4% above his career batting average. This indicates that virtually any decade of Bradman is likely to produce a number around 100. Sobers, whose adjusted average is a magnificent 73.75 (73.04), between 1958 and 1968 is in second place. It is the first time a player, over a long period of 10 years, comes within 30% of Bradman. Hobbs, with a best decade spread across the WW1 (1912 to 1926) is next with 70.65 (65.21). Walcott and Weekes follow, with adjusted averages either side of 65.

Tendulkar, with a best decade of 1992 to 2002, appears next in the list with 63.19 (62.45), followed by the old-timers, Barrington, Sutcliffe and Hutton, comfortably in excess of 60. Jacques Kallis rounds off the top-10 with an adjusted average of 60.86, between 2001 and 2011, seriously adjusted downwards from 66.13. He is in fact third in the unadjusted table. This confirms the significant impact of adjusting against peer values.

Bowler best decade analysis: Based on adjusted average

Batsman Adjust <<<< Best Decade >>>> # of Wkts Runs Avge Peer Values
Name Avge StMat StYear EndMat EnYear Yrs Avg Oth
 
Imran Khan 18.26 861 1979 1127 1989 10 250 4593 18.37 31.74 32.20
Barnes S.F 18.57 96 1907 133 1914 7 163 2684 16.46 26.73 28.36
Muralitharan 18.60 1376 1997 1842 2007 10 575 11231 19.53 33.02 33.60
Hadlee R.J 19.07 848 1979 1115 1989 10 293 5618 19.17 31.66 32.16
Marshall 19.09 884 1980 1148 1990 10 316 6194 19.60 32.29 32.86
McGrath G.D 19.53 1313 1995 1771 2005 10 484 9792 20.23 32.69 33.15
Ambrose 20.04 1142 1990 1490 2000 10 316 6273 19.85 31.33 31.69
O'Reilly 20.04 233 1934 275 1946 12 110 2356 21.41 33.01 34.19
Laker J.C 20.20 317 1949 468 1959 10 166 3081 18.56 28.99 29.40
Garner J 20.66 803 1977 1072 1987 10 238 4874 20.47 31.35 31.70
Wasim Akram 20.90 1086 1987 1391 1997 10 271 5747 21.20 32.12 32.47
Pollock S.M 21.20 1318 1995 1776 2005 10 371 8122 21.89 32.74 33.04
Waqar Younis 21.32 1137 1990 1483 2000 10 270 5724 21.20 31.54 31.82
Davidson 21.83 375 1953 539 1963 10 181 3692 20.39 29.54 29.90
Holding M.A 21.98 775 1976 1044 1986 10 230 4955 21.54 31.07 31.36
Lindwall 22.02 275 1946 424 1956 10 192 4197 21.85 31.31 31.75
Donald A.A 22.14 1206 1992 1590 2002 10 318 7010 22.04 31.58 31.86
Trueman F.S 22.32 386 1954 560 1964 10 247 5220 21.13 29.85 30.30
Lock G.A.R 22.70 412 1955 595 1965 10 139 3067 22.06 30.87 31.10
Miller K.R 23.29 275 1946 424 1956 10 147 3381 23.00 31.31 31.60
Walsh C.A 23.63 1016 1985 1297 1995 10 262 6316 24.10 32.35 32.63
Lillee D.K 23.66 698 1972 927 1982 10 320 7369 23.02 30.76 31.14
Underwood 23.77 622 1967 806 1977 10 263 6310 23.99 31.90 32.29
Gibbs L.R 23.86 448 1958 628 1968 10 154 3692 23.97 31.91 32.15
ShoaibAkhtar 24.10 1389 1997 1849 2007 10 175 4377 25.01 33.10 33.20
Verity H 24.12 210 1931 272 1939 8 144 3510 24.37 31.69 32.33
Willis 24.43 739 1974 988 1984 10 296 7052 23.82 30.90 31.20
Grimmett 24.98 167 1926 251 1936 10 197 4917 24.95 31.39 31.96
Warne S.K 24.99 1215 1993 1637 2003 10 477 11925 25.00 31.74 32.01
Statham J.B 25.19 332 1951 506 1961 10 196 4514 23.03 29.02 29.26

For obvious reasons I have ignored Lohmann who had a best decade with 100+ wickets at 10+. These were days about which we really cannot come to a decision and are not comparable with later periods. Hence the cut-off is 1900.

There is a real, real surprise at the top. This should make people sit up and take notice. Imran Khan, between 1979 and 1989 had an adjusted bowling average of 18.37 (18.26). He gained almost nothing through peer adjustment. Who could have imagined that Imran Khan would have leapt over many other fancied bowlers? He captured 250 wickets during this period and improved his bowling average from 31.72 to 22.21. That single sentence is sufficient.

Barnes comes in second with an average of 18.57 (16.46). There was a significant adjustment for the period. Readers should note that the period for Barnes has been accepted at seven years owing to the WW1 intervention. Muralitharan, between 1997 and 2007, captured 575 wickets at 18.60 (19.53). Hadlee, who captured 293 wickets at 19.07 (19.17) between 1979 and 1989 follows next. Marshall completes the top-5 with 316 wickets at 19.09.

The next five bowlers represent the very best bowling talent that ever played the game - McGrath, Ambrose, O'Reilly, Laker and Garner. These 10 are probably on anyone's list of the top dozen bowlers. Laker's average has had a major downward adjustment. Wasim and Waqar follow in 11th and 13th positions.

Batsmen best decade analysis: Top Run-scorers in a decade

Batsman Career Yrs NO <<<< Best Decade >>>> # of Runs Runs/Yr
Name St End Yrs StMat StYear EndMat EnYear Yrs
 
Ponting R.T 1995 2012 17 1523 2000 1983 2010 10 10058 1005.8
Kallis J.H 1995 2012 17 1528 2001 1988 2011 10 9318 931.8
Dravid R 1996 2012 16 1589 2002 2031 2012 10 9031 903.1
Lara B.C 1990 2006 16 1340 1996 1816 2006 10 8707 870.7
Sangakkara 2000 2012 12 1567 2001 2016 2011 10 8384 838.4
Hayden M.L 1994 2009 15 1493 2000 1904 2009 9 8365 929.4
Tendulkar 1989 2012 23 1531 2001 1991 2011 10 8276 827.6
Jayawardene 1997 2012 15 1473 1999 1936 2009 10 8248 824.8
Smith G.C 2002 2012 10 1619 2002 2053 2012 10 8201 820.1
Sehwag V 2001 2012 11 1591 2002 2034 2012 10 7943 794.3
Waugh S.R 1985 2004 19 1208 1993 1637 2003 10 7873 787.3
Border A.R 1979 1994 15 855 1979 1126 1989 10 7851 785.1
Gavaskar 1971 1987 16 769 1976 1034 1986 10 7725 772.5
Taylor M.A 1989 1999 10 1113 1989 1439 1999 10 7525 752.5
Langer J.L 1993 2007 14 1352 1997 1826 2007 10 7443 744.3
Waugh M.E 1991 2002 11 1202 1992 1620 2002 10 7331 733.1
Laxman 1996 2012 16 1589 2002 2031 2012 10 7078 707.8
Pietersen 2005 2012 7 1756 2005 2051 2012 7 7076 1010.9
Strauss A.J 2004 2012 8 1700 2004 2053 2012 8 7037 879.6
Kirsten G 1993 2004 11 1243 1994 1681 2004 10 7013 701.3
Boon D.C 1984 1996 12 1017 1985 1298 1995 10 6979 697.9
Chanderpaul 1994 2012 18 1601 2002 2042 2012 10 6913 691.3
Gower D.I 1978 1992 14 828 1978 1101 1988 10 6847 684.7
Stewart A.J 1990 2003 13 1176 1991 1557 2001 10 6798 679.8
Mohd Yousuf 1998 2010 12 1403 1998 1864 2008 10 6770 677.0
Barrington 1955 1968 13 474 1959 640 1968 9 6754 750.4
Atherton 1989 2001 12 1191 1992 1558 2001 9 6562 729.1
Cook A.N 2006 2012 6 1785 2006 2053 2012 6 6555 1092.5
Hutton L 1937 1955 18 263 1938 387 1954 16 6538 408.6
Inzamam 1992 2007 15 1366 1997 1830 2007 10 6431 643.1

This is a simple run-based analysis. As such there are no restrictions and the current players also qualify. After all if Cook accumulates over 6000 runs in 6 years and counting, why should he not get ahead of Gooch who accumulated nearly as many runs in 10 years?

Ponting is the only batsman in history to accumulate over 10000 runs in 10 years. This is a stand-out achievement and has to be recognized. He did this between 2000 and 2010. Kallis accumulated 9318 runs between 2001 and 2011. Dravid, Lara and Sangakkara amassed either side of 9000 runs in 10 years.

Hayden accumulated 8365 runs, but in 9 years. This was after his break and return. Hence 9 years is fine. Then Tendulkar and Jayawardene follow.

Cook leads in the matter of Runs per year, having accumulated 6555 runs in 6 years at an average of 1092. Pietersen is the only other batsman to average more than 1000 runs per year along with Ponting.

Readers should realize the difficulty in maintaining a 1000 runs per year average over 10 years. Mohammad Yousuf had the greatest of years during 2006 when he scored 1788 runs but could accumulate only 5000 runs during the other 9 years of his best decade. In three years, 2003, 2005 and 2006, Ponting accumulated nearly 4500 runs, but had to bat outstandingly well to compile 5500 runs in 7 years.

Bowler best decade analysis: Top Wicket-takers in a decade

Batsman Career Yrs # of <<<< Best Decade >>>> # of Wkts Wkts/Yr
Name St End Yrs StMat StYear EndMat EnYear Yrs
 
Muralitharan 1992 2010 18 1394 1998 1859 2008 10 588 58.8
Warne S.K 1992 2007 15 1346 1996 1825 2006 10 488 48.8
McGrath G.D 1993 2007 14 1313 1995 1771 2005 10 484 48.4
Kumble A 1990 2008 18 1405 1998 1866 2008 10 430 43.0
Pollock S.M 1995 2008 13 1356 1997 1830 2007 10 390 39.0
Ntini M 1998 2009 11 1504 2000 1944 2009 9 380 42.2
Harbhajan 1998 2011 13 1531 2001 1991 2011 10 372 37.2
Walsh C.A 1984 2001 17 1169 1991 1544 2001 10 372 37.2
Botham I.T 1977 1992 15 806 1977 1078 1987 10 370 37.0
Marshall 1978 1991 13 949 1983 1175 1991 8 342 42.8
Ambrose 1988 2000 12 1095 1988 1414 1998 10 337 33.7
Donald A.A 1992 2002 10 1188 1992 1590 2002 10 330 33.0
Kapil Dev N 1978 1994 16 851 1979 1123 1989 10 323 32.3
Lillee D.K 1971 1984 13 698 1972 927 1982 10 320 32.0
Hadlee R.J 1973 1990 17 817 1978 1090 1988 10 312 31.2
Lee B 1999 2008 9 1479 1999 1902 2008 9 310 34.4
Wasim Akram 1985 2002 17 1127 1989 1468 1999 10 304 30.4
Waqar Younis 1989 2003 14 1151 1990 1511 2000 10 298 29.8
Willis 1971 1984 13 732 1974 977 1984 10 298 29.8
Steyn D.W 2004 2012 8 1728 2004 2053 2012 8 287 35.9
Anderson 2003 2012 9 1646 2003 2053 2012 9 276 30.7
Imran Khan 1971 1992 21 831 1978 1106 1988 10 272 27.2
Vaas WPUJC 1994 2009 15 1445 1999 1909 2009 10 271 27.1
Zaheer Khan 2000 2012 12 1535 2001 1991 2011 10 266 26.6
Trueman F.S 1952 1965 13 409 1955 592 1965 10 265 26.5
Underwood 1966 1982 16 622 1967 806 1977 10 263 26.3
D Kaneria 2000 2010 10 1518 2000 1967 2010 10 261 26.1
McDermott 1984 1996 12 1017 1985 1298 1995 10 260 26.0
Gillespie 1996 2006 10 1343 1996 1799 2006 10 259 25.9
Garner J 1977 1987 10 801 1977 1072 1987 10 249 24.9

Muralitharan had a golden decade from 1998 and 2008 during which he accumulated 588 wickets at an average of over 58 per year. He is followed by the wonderful bowling pair of Warne and McGrath who accumulated 480 odd wickets between around 1995 and 2005. Kumble is next with 430 wickets in the decade beginning 1998. Pollock, Ntini and Harbhajan appear next in this list. Botham is the only non-modern bowler, indicating the recent profusion of Test matches.

Let us think for a second. In a period of 10 years, Muralitharan captured nearly 600 wickets in 10 years. Only 42 bowlers in 135 years have captured more than Muralitharan's average of 58.8 wickets per year. The highest tally is by Warne, during 2005, with 96 wickets, followed by Muralitharan, with 90 wickets in 2006.

The top batsmen in a decade

Graph of adjusted averages for batsmen (best decade)
© Anantha Narayanan

The graphs are self-explanatory. The idea is not to show the relative position of the averages but rather the positioning across the years. The 1950s-60s seem to be the golden years of batting since there are four batsmen present in the top-10 with high averages.

The top bowlers in a decade

Graph of adjusted averages for bowlers (best decade)
© Anantha Narayanan

It must be remembered that the Y-axis is not really to exact scale in view of the close bunching of players with similar values. The bowling decades are the 1980s-90s.

To download/view the comprehensive Excel sheet containing all the tables related to Test Decades analysis, please CLICK HERE.

Thanks, Sarosh, for providing a good spark.

The stars of this special analysis are Sobers and Hobbs, whose batting average exceeded 70 during their best decades and Imran Khan and Muralitharan who had bowling averages around 18 during their respective best decades.

When I heard that Lara was going to be inducted into the ICC Hall-of-Fame, I almost shelved this article, post-editing, to be replaced by a tribute to Lara. Then I decided not to rush the same. Since ICC have taken their own time, let me take a few more days to come out with a well-rounded tribute to the batting genius, in the process fine-tuning the single-player analysis program. I will close this with Milind's telling comment.

Sometimes a talent requires the recognition of being an awardee. Then there are cases when the award needs the prestige by associating itself with a talent that transcends awards.

Well said, Milind.

Full post
Test wicketkeepers: Everything you wanted to know about

A comprehensive statistical analysis of the Test careers of top wicketkeepers

Test wicketkeepers: inarguably the players with the toughest task in cricket. They have to be on their toes for hours on end, go down and up a million times a day, cannot afford to relax even for a minute, always have an eye on what is happening to the ball and nowadays are expected to bat for hours and/or score runs quickly. And some of these keepers are expected to captain their teams and/or open the batting. Why would anyone take up this tough task? This article is a homage to those tough men.

This is one long article and has taken nearly two weeks. Please take time to peruse all tables and come back with your comments. The effort I have put in would be nullified if readers do not give this the time it deserves. And please, no comments that all this information is available in StatsGuru. All the information is not available, would require many queries to get the information, the information would not be in the form of readable tables, there is no ratings work done and so on.

In order to get a reasonable number into the analysis set, I lowered my initial qualification criterion of 100 dismissals to 75. 48 keepers qualify and this seems to be a fair number. On an average this represents a lower limit of 20-30 Tests, which is a Test career between 3 and 5 years.

1. Total Dismissals (All tables current upto Test 2054 (Ind-Nzl First Test))

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests Dismissals
 
Boucher M.V Saf 1997 2012 147 555
Gilchrist Aus 1999 2008 96 416
Healy I.A Aus 1988 1999 119 395
Marsh R.W Aus 1970 1984 96 355
Dujon P.J.L Win 1981 1991 79 270
Knott A.P.E Eng 1967 1981 95 269
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 81 241
Wasim Bari Pak 1967 1984 80 228
Dhoni M.S Ind 2005 2012 67 220
Evans T.G Eng 1946 1959 91 219
Jacobs R.D Win 1998 2004 65 218
Kamran Akmal Pak 2002 2010 53 206
Parore A.C Nzl 1990 2002 67 200


This is the base table and is ordered on the number of Dismissals. This is not just a longevity based achievement. To play over 100 matches, as a top-flight keeper, is something incredible and has to be recognized. An important fact to be noted is that the number of Tests shown are the Tests in which the players played as wicketkeepers. For two players, Sangakkara and Alec Stewart, this distinction is significant since they have played a number of Tests as batsmen. Andy Flower and Parore have also played a few Tests as batsmen. This table lists the keepers who effected over 200 dismissals.

The table is topped by the peerless South African keeper, Boucher, and then come three top keepers from Australia. Dujon follows next and then Knott and Stewart. The top-10 is rounded off by Bari and Dhoni.

Readers are likely to come in with comments that the misses by keepers are not included. This is true because the data is not available. Cricinfo might have the data for the past few years or so but not for over 75% of the Tests. And I will not make any guess-work. My analysis is based 100% on the available verifiable data.

2. Dismissals per Test

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests C-St Dismissals/Test
 
Gilchrist Aus 1999 2008 96 416 4.33
Browne C.O Win 1995 2005 20 81 4.05
Jones G.O Eng 2004 2006 34 133 3.91
Kamran Akmal Pak 2002 2010 53 206 3.89
Haddin B.J Aus 2008 2012 43 164 3.81
Boucher M.V Saf 1997 2012 147 555 3.78
Langley Aus 1951 1956 26 98 3.77
Richardson Saf 1992 1998 41 152 3.71
Marsh R.W Aus 1970 1984 96 355 3.70
...
Ames L.E.G Eng 1929 1939 44 95 2.16
Khaled Mashud Bng 2000 2007 44 87 1.98
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 46 82 1.78


This is a performance measure. Dismissals per Test is a very important parameter to measure the keepers' contribution to the team. Only two keepers have effected more than 4 dismissals per Test, which works out an average of 30% of the team dismissals. Readers might argue that the bowlers create the opportunities for dismissals. However that is only partly true. The keepers have to gauge the bounce and stand in the correct position and posture. It is my belief that only one-in-three catches travel straight to the keepers. The other two have to be caught well. Anyhow 4+ dismissals per Test goes a long way in influencing the result in the team's favour. 3.06 is the overall average.

In the top-9 keepers, Langley, with a figure of 3.77 belongs to the 1950s and Marsh, with 3.70, belongs to the 1970s. The others all are current or recently retired. Why I wonder. More opportunities? Better techniques?

At the other end, we have Ames from way back, Khaled Mashud and Engineer. The last two have fewer than 2 dismissals per Test. Why should Engineer's numbers be so low, almost matching the numbers of top slip fielders. Possibly many of the spinners' wickets would have been effected through catches to close fielders, rather than keeper.

3. Dismissals as % of similar team dismissals

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests C-St Team CSt Dismissals %
 
Alexander Win 1957 1961 25 90 201 44.8
Kamran Akmal Pak 2002 2010 53 206 466 44.2
Langley Aus 1951 1956 26 98 239 41.0
Saleem Yousuf Pak 1982 1990 31 104 259 40.2
Browne C.O Win 1995 2005 20 81 206 39.3
Rashid Latif Pak 1992 2003 37 130 335 38.8
Richardson Saf 1992 1998 41 152 397 38.3
Gilchrist Aus 1999 2008 96 416 1115 37.3
Imtiaz Ahmed Pak 1952 1962 38 90 242 37.2
...
Ames L.E.G Eng 1929 1939 44 95 351 27.1
Kaluwitharana Slk 1992 2004 48 119 450 26.4
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 46 82 388 21.1


This is a nice-to-view table and is not used in any Ratings work. Alexander of West Indies had a hand in 44% of his team's similar dismissals. And look at Kamran Akmal: he has had a hand in over 44% of his team dismissals. That is something. Saleem Yousuf has a similar 40-plus % figure. Gilchrist makes it to the top-10, with an impressive figure of 37.2%. One-third seems to be the overall average.

At the other end, Engineer clocks in with a very low 21.1%, as expected.

4. Byes/Test

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests Byes Byes/Test
 
Downton P.R Eng 1981 1988 30 84 2.8
Richardson Saf 1992 1998 41 143 3.5
Khaled Mashud Bng 2000 2007 44 152 3.5
Smith I.D.S Nzl 1980 1992 63 257 4.1
Parore A.C Nzl 1990 2002 67 291 4.3
Knott A.P.E Eng 1967 1981 95 422 4.4
Flower A Zim 1992 2002 55 250 4.5
Jacobs R.D Win 1998 2004 65 297 4.6
Taylor R.W Eng 1971 1984 57 285 5.0
...
Murray D.L Win 1963 1980 62 653 10.5
Saleem Yousuf Pak 1982 1990 31 332 10.7
Ames L.E.G Eng 1929 1939 44 470 10.7


The Byes per Test is a measure of the keeping quality. Somewhat indirectly, would it also have a correlation with the chances missed? Downton is somewhere in the stratosphere with an average of only 2.8 byes per Test. Richardson, the current CEO of ICC, also has a very low figure of 3.5, matched by Khaled Mashud. A few other not-so-well-known keepers have low byes/Test figures of around 5.0. 7.0 byes/match seems to be an above average performance level. 6.9 byes/match is the overall average.

The last three have all conceded more than 10 byes per Test. Ames probably has a high figure because of the way England bowled during the 1930s.

5. Stumping %

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests C-St Stumpings St %
 
Oldfield Aus 1920 1937 53 130 52 40.0
Ames L.E.G Eng 1929 1939 44 95 23 24.2
Lilley Eng 1896 1909 35 92 22 23.9
Jayawardene Slk 2000 2012 46 117 27 23.1
Kaluwitharana Slk 1992 2004 48 119 26 21.8
Evans T.G Eng 1946 1959 91 219 46 21.0
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 46 82 16 19.5
Kirmani Ind 1976 1986 88 198 38 19.2
Imtiaz Ahmed Pak 1952 1962 38 90 16 17.8
...
Ramdin D Win 2005 2012 46 138 3 2.2
Dujon P.J.L Win 1981 1991 79 270 5 1.9
Richardson Saf 1992 1998 41 152 2 1.3


Number of stumpings and the % of total keeper-dismissals is another nice-to-have information. It really has no bearing on evaluation of a keeper performance: rather, reflects the way the bowling attacks were formed. Oldfield, keeping to Grimmett and O'Reilly, has got 40% of his dismissals as stumpings. No surprises there. Same with Ames. Lilley was a pre-WW1 keeper. Note Prasanna Jayawardene's high share of 23%, no doubt due to Muralitharan's presence and recently Herath. Two Indian keepers of old and Imtiaz come in afterwards.

At the other end are couple of West Indian keepers and the CEO of ICC. They probably did not keep to any quality spinner. Less than 2% means stumpings for these keepers were as rare as Haley's (or more aptly, here, Healy's) comet.

6. Total Runs

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests BPos Runs scored
 
Gilchrist Aus 1999 2008 96 6.7 5570
Boucher M.V Saf 1997 2012 147 7.2 5515
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 81 3.6 4542
Flower A Zim 1992 2002 55 5.0 4404
Knott A.P.E Eng 1967 1981 95 6.8 4389
Healy I.A Aus 1988 1999 119 7.1 4356
Marsh R.W Aus 1970 1984 96 6.9 3633
Dhoni M.S Ind 2005 2012 67 6.9 3582
Sangakkara Slk 2000 2012 49 3.0 3281
Dujon P.J.L Win 1981 1991 79 6.6 3146
Prior M.J Eng 2007 2012 58 6.9 3068
McCullum Nzl 2004 2012 50 5.5 2782


Now we come to the batting measures. First the simple measure of Runs scored. Readers should remember that these are only the runs scored when the player played as a keeper. So Sangakkara, Stewart et al will have lower figures. Gilchrist leads with a tally of 5570 runs, but in only 96 Tests. Boucher has a slightly lower figure, but in 51 more Tests. Stewart and Flower, the batsmen-keepers, are next. Knott follows afterwards. Dhoni is likely to accumulate quite a few runs and may very well usurp Gilchrist from the top spot before his career is over. Sangakkara is unlikely to add any runs since he is unlikely to resume wicket-keeping duties in tests. Prior and McCullum could add a few.

The average Batting position is also shown. As expected most keepers have this figure well in excess of 6, other than Stewart, Flower and Sangakkara. This indicates that they batted in positions 7 and higher. One reason why I have not done the compilation of the runs added by the keepers with the lower order. Since they seem to have batted at no.7 and afterwards, most of the runs scored would have been with the late-order batsmen.

7. Runs/Test

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests Runs Runs/Test
 
Flower A Zim 1992 2002 55 4404 80.1
Sangakkara Slk 2000 2012 49 3281 67.0
Gilchrist Aus 1999 2008 96 5570 58.0
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 46 2611 56.8
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 81 4542 56.1
McCullum Nzl 2004 2012 50 2782 55.6
Ames L.E.G Eng 1929 1939 44 2387 54.2
Imtiaz Ahmed Pak 1952 1962 38 2010 52.9
Prior M.J Eng 2007 2012 58 3068 52.9
...
Grout A.T.W Aus 1957 1966 51 890 17.5
Wasim Bari Pak 1967 1984 80 1366 17.1
Langley Aus 1951 1956 26 374 14.4


This is a great performance measure. I have gone on the less used Runs per Test measure than the Batting average since the latter figure is likely to be inflated seriously with many not outs since the keepers, traditionally, are late order batsmen. How many runs per Test, in addition to the dismissals, is a far more important measure of a wicketkeeper's quality than whether he remained not out. Andy Flower is the runaway leader in this regard, with 80 runs per Test, a figure in excess of many a specialist batsman. Sangakkara follows with 67. Then comes the explosive Gilchrist with 58 runs per Test, often in crunch late-order situations. Engineer, with an otherwise poor set of keeping numbers has a decent 56 runs per Test. The average is 38.7, indicating that any 40 plus figure should be considered above-average.

8. Opening Runs

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Opening Runs
 
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 1577
Imtiaz Ahmed Pak 1952 1962 979
Mongia N.R Ind 1994 2001 655
Waite J.H.B Saf 1951 1965 606
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 405
Kamran Akmal Pak 2002 2010 322


These are the runs scored by keepers in the opening positions. Engineer is the only keeper with a tally in excess of 1500 runs. No one else has even scored 1000. Imtiaz is the second and Mongia who opened for India in a few Tests, follows next. We have to recognize this facet of Engineer's career, especially as his wicket-keeping returns are below-average.

9. Keepers as Captain

Wicket Keeper Cty From To Tests played Tests captained
 
Dhoni M.S Ind 2005 2012 68 38
Alexander Win 1957 1961 25 18
Flower A Zim 1992 2002 55 16
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 81 12
Moin Khan Pak 1990 2004 65 12
KhaledMashud Bng 2000 2007 44 12


Dhoni is the leader in this measure, having captained India in well over half the Tests he has played. Alexander was the captain in most of the Tests. Then come Flower and Stewart.

10. Wicketkeeper Ratings

WicketKeeper Cty From To Ratings
     C-St C-St/Test ToW Bye Bat Capt OpBt Total
 
Gilchrist us 1999 2008 10.4 43.3 2.9 8.7 19.3 0.9 0.0 85.5
Boucher M.V Saf 1997 2012 13.9 37.8 2.4 8.4 12.5 0.6 0.0 75.6
Flower A Zim 1992 2002 3.7 26.9 1.9 10.5 26.7 2.4 0.0 72.0
Kamran Akmal Pak 2002 2010 5.2 38.9 2.6 7.4 16.6 0.0 0.6 71.4
Dhoni M.S Ind 2005 2012 5.5 32.5 2.2 7.1 17.5 5.7 0.0 70.6
Marsh R.W us 1970 1984 8.9 37.0 2.4 8.4 12.6 0.0 0.1 69.4
McCullum Nzl 2004 2012 4.3 34.4 2.1 9.6 18.5 0.0 0.0 69.0
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 6.0 29.8 2.0 9.3 18.7 1.8 0.8 68.3
Haddin B.J us 2008 2012 4.1 38.1 2.5 5.2 17.5 0.0 0.0 67.4
Healy I.A us 1988 1999 9.9 33.2 2.2 8.8 12.2 0.0 0.0 66.3
...
Evans T.G Eng 1946 1959 5.5 24.1 1.6 7.3 8.9 0.0 0.0 47.3
KhaledMashud Bng 2000 2007 2.2 19.8 1.3 11.5 10.7 1.8 0.0 47.2
Mongia N.R Ind 1994 2001 2.7 24.3 1.7 5.3 10.9 0.0 1.3 46.2
Oldfield us 1920 1937 3.2 24.5 1.5 6.7 9.0 0.0 0.1 45.0
Lilley Eng 1896 1909 2.3 26.3 1.5 4.5 8.6 0.0 0.0 43.2


Finally I have decided to do a Test Wicketkeeper Ratings work. This is fraught with pitfalls and I must be ready for the bouquets and brickbats to come in alternately. But I realize that if I do not venture out, I (and the readers) would not gain anything and here we go. I am sure readers would have their comments. My only request is for readers to note that this is a first attempt and fine tuning is always possible. The measures which would be used in Test WK_Ratings are explained below. These are detailed in the order of importance.

1. Number of Dismissals per Test: This is a pure performance measure and carries the maximum weight. 10 points are given per dismissal per Test. The overall weight is around 50%.
2. Number of Runs per Test: The second most important measure. The batting contributions are second only to the basic dismissals per Test measure. The value to the team, especially as the runs are normally scored in the late order, is undeniable. The points are determined by multiplying the Runs per test measure by 0.3333. The overall weight is around 22%.
3. Number of Byes per Test: This is an important measure since this indicates wicket-keeping quality. The overall weight is around 13%.
4. Number of Dismissals: This is the only longevity-based measure. It is very essential to reward the keepers who have maintained their fitness and skill levels for many years and Tests. The allocation is one Rating point per 40 dismissal so that the maximum is 15 points. The overall weight is around 8% but there are keepers who go above 15%.
5. Number of Top order dismissals per Test: Again a specialized performance measure. There is a clear separation amongst wicketkeepers and this has been included since it means that much more to the team. The overall weight is around 3.5%.
6. Number of Tests captained: The additional responsibility of captaining has to be incorporated in the Ratings. However it must be noted that keepers have captained their teams in around 5% of the Tests played. The final weight is only around 0.7%. But the concerned keepers get allocated much higher level of points: Dhoni gets around 8%.
7. Number of Test runs in opening position: This is to recognize the keepers who, in 10 minutes flat, changed their gloves and pads and started an equally difficult task. However let me add that this measure, like the Captaincy measure, also has an overall low weight of around 0.4%. Fewer than 4% of the runs scored by keepers are in the opening position. But the concerned keepers get allocated much higher level of points: Engineer gets around 6%.

The final ratings results are as expected.

Adam Gilchrist is the undisputed no.1. I am not sure whether anyone could dispute this honour, especially since the scoring rate has not even been factored in. He has achieved this through an outstanding keeping performances and above-average batting performances. Mark Boucher is in the second position. His is more due to the keeping abilities. Andy Flower, a top-flight batsman, very good keeper and a born leader, is in third position. Let us forget the poor Tests he might have had: Kamran Akmal's performances have been outstanding and he fully deserves his no.4 position. Dhoni, assisted strongly by the captaincy duties, completes the top-5. This is a reflection of the overall value to the team. Subjective factors such as quality of keeping, keeping stance, method of catching etc do not (and should not) come in. The legendary Marsh and Healy are in the top-10 positions.

11. A BCG Chart of Test wicketkeepers

BCG chart of wicketkeepers showing runs per Test and dismissals per Test
© Anantha Naryanan


Ah I am back to my favourite BCG charts. This is a perfect set of data elements to do a BCG chart and classify wicketkeepers into keeping-centric or batting-centric roles. The X-axis represents the more important measure: C-St per Test. The Y-axis represents the batting measure: Runs per Test. It can be seen that both are performance measures. Longevity does not come in. To make sure that we get in only players who have had a reasonably long career I have selected only keepers who cross the dual barrier of 100 dismissals and 1000 runs. 35 keepers qualify.

The top right quadrant contains the real top-fliers: those keepers who have done well both as keepers and batsmen. The quadrant is led by Gilchrist, followed by Kamran Akmal, Haddin, McCullum, Dhoni and Prior. All these are modern keepers and are here because they are all top quality batsmen.

The bottom-right quadrant is heavily populated and houses the top keepers who do not have great batting figures. This pack is led by Boucher and has Jones, Richardson amongst the modern players and Marsh, Dujon, Healy amongst the older players. Russell and Murray just about make it.

The top-left quadrant has the players who have batting figures comparable to any top batsmen but lag behind in keeping numbers. Andy Flower leads this group and other prominent players are Sangakkara, Stewart and Knott. The last is a surprise.

The bottom-left has a set of keepers who do not really make the cut. Average keeping returns and average batting returns. Kirmani, More, Oldfield, Evans, Mongia, Smith are in this lot.

Please note that the quadrant division is a subjective one and this graph is only a tool for visual separation. The Wicketkeeper Ratings table is far more in-depth one and incorporates all relevant measures.

12. 12 top innings played by Test wicketkeepers

Gilchrist - 149 (163) Pak 1469 1999 - Huge match-winning/saving stand with
Langer
Gilchrist - 144 (212) Bng 1797 2006 - Match saving/winning innings
Gilchrist - 138 (108) Saf 1593 2002 - Match-winning inns in close match
A Flower -  232*(444) Ind 1517 2000 - Possibly the best match-saving innings
in India
A Flower -  199*(470) Saf 1562 2001 - Another defensive classic
(142 in first innings)
Ian Smith - 173 (136) Ind 1139 1990 - Attacking match-saving inns
(from 131/7 to 391)
Rod Marsh - 110 (173) Eng 800 1977 - Priceless match-winning inns in
close centenary Test
K Akmal -   109 (154) Ind 1738 2005 - Match-saving away classic (from 243/6)
J Dujon -   139 (158) Aus 997 1984 - Match-winning first inns (From 186/6)
A Knott -   135 (210) Aus 806 1977 - Match-winning first inns (From 82/5)
N Mongia -  152 (366) Aus 1335 1996 - Match-winner while opening the innings
Imtiaz Ahd- 209 Nzl 414 1955 - All-time classic, coming in at 111/6 and
taking score to 561.


This has been presented in no particular order and based my own, often subjective, perusal of scorecards. I have also used the Hallmark-100 ratings numbers as a guideline. It was indeed tough to leave out Gilchrist's 102 in 59 balls, Engineer's 121, Sangakkara's 230, Healy's 161 et al. But let the readers come out with their suggestions.

13. A combined table of Test and ODI dismissals

WicketkeeperCty Tests  ODIs T20sTotal
  MatsCStAvgeMatsCStAvgeCStCSt
 
Boucher M.VSaf1475553.782954251.4419999
GilchristAus964164.332874741.6517907
Healy I.AAus1193953.321682331.39 628
SangakkaraSlk491462.983324091.2328583
Dhoni M.SInd682213.252112651.2618504
Marsh R.WAus963553.70921241.35 479
McCullumNzl651942.982032461.2137477
Dujon P.J.LWin792703.421692041.21 474
Moin KhanPak651472.262192851.30 432
Stewart A.JEng812412.981701741.02 415
Kamran AkmalPak532063.891371611.1845412
Jacobs R.DWin652183.351461871.28 405
Rashid LatifPak371303.511662191.32 349
KaluwitharanaSlk481192.481892071.10 326
Flower AZim551482.692131730.81 321
RichardsonSaf411523.711221651.35 317
HaddinAus431643.81931361.4616316
Ramdin DWin451332.96941311.3926290
Mongia N.RInd441072.431401541.10 261
Saleem YousufPak311043.35861031.20 207


One day Boucher might be quite happy to have stopped at 999 international dismissals since that is likely to be talked about more than if he had reached 1000, a la 99.94. One is a longevity based achievement and the other is performance-based one. It is unlikely that either achievement would ever be surpassed. Gilchrist follows closely with 900 plus dismissals and this mark is also almost unreachable. Healy follows, after a couple of miles, with 628 dismissals. This clearly shows the gap between the top-two and the rest.

Gilchrist leads both formats in the key CST per match measure. There is no combined CSt per match measure since the scale of the numbers is quite different for different formats.

At the end of this long article, I am as tired as the keepers might have been, after a tough 7-hour day in the office, except that they were baking in the sun. May their tribe flourish.

To download/view the comprehensive Excel sheet containing all the tables related to Test wicketkeepers, please CLICK HERE.

New table added.

Wicket keeper Balls kept analysis

        Balls / Match    
WicketKeeper Cty From To Pace Spin Pace% Spin%
Pace > 70%
Dujon P.J.L Win 1981 1991 788 166 82.6 17.4
Richardson Saf 1992 1998 862 192 81.8 18.2
Murray J.R Win 1993 2002 765 194 79.8 20.2
Boucher M.V Saf 1997 2012 771 205 79.0 21.0
Jones G.O Eng 2004 2006 774 251 75.5 24.5
Stewart A.J Eng 1990 2003 730 241 75.2 24.8
Russell R.C Eng 1988 1998 760 261 74.5 25.5
Browne C.O Win 1995 2005 788 272 74.4 25.6
Smith I.D.S Nzl 1980 1992 722 274 72.5 27.5
Ramdin D Win 2005 2012 719 278 72.1 27.9
Jacobs R.D Win 1998 2004 765 298 71.9 28.1
Marsh R.W Aus 1970 1984 760 318 70.5 29.5
Haddin B.J Aus 2008 2012 717 301 70.4 29.6
Spin > 50%
Engineer Ind 1961 1975 257 914 21.9 78.1
Kirmani Ind 1976 1986 383 660 36.7 63.3
Mongia N.R Ind 1994 2001 427 578 42.5 57.5
More K.S Ind 1986 1993 494 643 43.5 56.5
Sangakkara Slk 2000 2012 442 568 43.8 56.2
Kaluwitharna Slk 1992 2004 483 597 44.7 55.3
Oldfield Aus 1920 1937 599 692 46.4 53.6
Dhoni M.S Ind 2005 2012 504 546 48.0 52.0
Evans T.G Eng 1946 1959 544 550 49.7 50.3

The results are as expected. The West Indian keepers dominate the first part of the table which shows the keepers whose share of pace balls is greater than 70%. And India and Sri Lanka dominate the second half of the table which shows keepers whose share of spin deliveries is greater than 50%.

Based on comments of Biswa, Boll and Raghav, I have modified and posted the Excel sheet with the addl worksheet on a /Inns basis rather than /Test basis. All measures have been done on a per innings basis. Pl download and view the same. There is more churning than what i expected. In summary,

Kamran Akmal, Flower go down and Dhoni, Marsh, Dujon and Healy move up. The revised order is

Gilchrist
Boucher
Dhoni
Marsh
Healy
Dujon
Kamran Akmal
Richardson
McCullum
A Flower.

This, to me, seems a far more acceptable order in the top-10. All the top wicket-keepers are there at the top.

This article will be incomplete without a reference to Dennis Lindsay. He had, during 1966-67, against Australia, almost inarguably, the best series for an all-rounder (in the extended definition).

606 runs at 86.57, 24 dismissals and 6 byes (1.2 byes/Test). Unfortunately he played only 15 Tests. 61 dismissals and 1130 runs at 37+. So he had a truly wonderful series but no more than good otherwise. But a truly amazing byes/match value of 1.33. Many thanks to Gerry for poking me in the ribs about Lindsay.

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Laxman: the alternate word for elegance and grace

A look back at VVS Laxman's Test career analysing various aspects of his batting performance

I had planned to publish a comprehensive analysis on Test wicket-keepers next week. I am pleased to present this interim article now. The "wicket-keepers" article will appear within the next 10 days.

To define Laxman in numbers is like defining Federer in numbers. How can numbers define the languid grace, elegance, poetry in motion and pure pleasure these two brought to their respective arenas? 17, 281, 96, 292 are ordinary numbers but acquire an aura when associated with these gentlemen. However it is necessary to do a numbers-based analysis, if only to enable us to live through those instances of fantasy we were all privileged to witness.

Team runs while at crease : 18859 Batsman's % Runs contribution : 46.6% Balls faced while at crease : 17788 Team balls while Laxman was at crease : 36133 % of balls faced while at crease: 49.2% Average balls per innings faced : 81.2 Team-Run-Share: 8781 out of 72578 - 12.1%

Batting in difficult situations most of the times prevented Laxman from having a better scoring rate than around 50. Laxman's conversion rate of 50 to 100 is quite poor: understandable since he batted often with the late order. Not a high balls per innings: again indicative of conditions batted in.

I have since done the work on runs added with late order batsmen also. This cannot be a complete analysis since quite a bit of data is unavailable. We all know when a batsman came in but "when he got out" is the information available only over the past 15-20 years. So for batsmen like Lara and Tendulkar complete data is not available. The other important factor is that I know when the sixth wicket fell. But I would not know what the concerned batsman's score was at taht time. Similarly I would know when the concerned batsman got out. But not what the other batsman's score was. So I have presented below only concrete facts, which are stated below.

These represent only the team runs added from the fall of the sixth wicket to the time the concerned batsman was dismissed. Of course, if he remained not out, there is no problem. I have given below the data for six top current batsmen. It shows clearly that Kallis and Laxman are the leaders. It is possible that Lara might have better figures. But not certain.

Batsman   Num Runs  R/P
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