Stats Analysis

Australia suffer one of the worst collapses in Test history

Australia made their second-highest opening stand in Asia but the numbers after that weren't flattering

Bharath Seervi
09-Oct-2018
60 Runs for which Australia lost all their ten wickets after the openers had put on 142. The collapse is the third-worst for any side after a century opening stand. The two worst such collapses were India's 10 for 46 against England at Old Trafford in 1946, and New Zealand's 10 for 51 runs against Australia at Auckland in 1974.
42 Runs by Australia's last nine wickets are the fewest in their first innings in the last 50 years. After the openers, the highest individual score was Mitchell Marsh's 12, and only two others got into double-digits.
7 Number of times Australia have lost their 10 wickets for less than 100 runs since the start of 2016, the most by any team. England and Sri Lanka have had four such collapses and are joint-second on the list. Click here for the list such collapses for all teams in this period.
Instances of Australia losing ten wickets for less than 100 runs since 2016
Collapse from Collapse to Runs Against Venue Year
 77  160  83  Sri Lanka  Colombo (SSC)  2016
 158  244  86  South Africa  Perth  2016
 1  85  84  South Africa  Hobart  2016
 22  112  90  India  Bengaluru  2017
 57  107  50  South Africa  Cape Town  2018
 21  119  98  South Africa  Johannesburg  2018
 142  202  60  Pakistan  Dubai  2018
2 Number of better bowling figures on debut for Pakistan than Bilal Asif's 6 for 36. Mohammad Zahid's 7 for 66 and Mohammad Nazir's 7 for 99, both against New Zealand, in 1996 and 1969 respectively, are the top two debut figures for Pakistan. Bilal's figures are the best by any bowler making his Test debut against Australia. He bettered a record that stood for more than a 100 years, that of Fred Martin's 6 for 50 in 1890.
33y, 13d Bilal's age, at which he became the oldest to take a five-wicket haul on debut in the last 50 years. The previous oldest was also a Pakistan bowler: Tanvir Ahmed, at 31 years, 355 days, versus South Africa in 2010-11.
6 Instances of two debutants in the top-six batting positions making ducks in the same innings. Australia's Travis Head and Marnus Labuschagne got out for ducks to the debutant Bilal Asif in the same over. It was only the third instance when debutants at No. 5 and 6 got out for ducks.
142 The partnership between Aaron Finch and Usman Khawaja - the second-highest for Australia in Asia. Their only bigger stand in the subcontinent than this is of 176 runs between Mark Taylor and Michael Slater versus Pakistan in Rawalpindi in 1994-95. The Finch-Khawaja stand is also the second-highest by any team against Pakistan in UAE. It was also the first time Pakistan had to wait for more than 50 overs for the first wicket in UAE.
72.77 Percentage of runs by Australia's openers in their innings - 147 out of 202. There have been only seven innings in Test history where the openers had a higher contribution to the team's total. In the Port Elizabeth Test of 2014, Australia's openers had scored 173 runs out of their total of 216, which is 80.09% of runs, the highest in Test history.
280 Australia's deficit in the first innings, their fourth-highest against Pakistan when batting second. Pakistan did not enforce follow-on. Australia have been asked to follow on only once in the last 30 years even though the opposite teams had at least eight opportunities to enforce it.

Bharath Seervi is stats sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo. @SeerviBharath