Harmison's heroics, and India's opening conundrum

Perhaps numbers never do reveal the full story, but they tell a large part of it. Every Friday, The Numbers Game will take a look at statistics from the present and the past, busting myths and revealing hidden truths:

Hail Harmison
Stephen Fleming put it rather succinctly when he commented that the difference between his team and England was one man - Steve Harmison. It was a pretty accurate summation as well: Harmison scalped 21 wickets in three Tests, more than twice the number that Andy Flintoff, England's second-most successful bowler in the series, managed. Remove Harmison from the England line-up, and the rest of the bowlers managed 36 at an average of 36.66, hardly earthshattering figures.

New Zealand's lower order has been the bane of most opponents, but they all came unstuck against Harmison. In fact, they started off magnificently almost every time, reaching 150 for the loss of one wicket or less four times in six innings; yet, their average innings total on those four occasions was only 378.

As the table below shows, Harmison has outstanding figures against the top order in his last two series (against West Indies and New Zealand), while the tailenders have been quite helpless against him. However, it isn't as if Harmison fattened his wickets tally by feeding on the tail - 70% of his victims were top or middle-order batsmen (Nos. 1-7). Consider the number of overs he bowled per Test (44), and the splendid economy rate he maintained(2.61), and it's clear why Harmison was England's strike bowler and stock bowler rolled in one.

Early in his career, Harmison was branded a second-innings specialist: a performer who, like Andy Caddick, struggled to seize the initiative early in a Test. In these last two series, Harmison has gone some way towards changing that perception, with 23 wickets at 23.30. Thanks to those heroics, Harmison's career first-innings average, which once hovered around 40, has come down to far more acceptable levels.

The hunt for Veeru's partner
Aakash Chopra or Yuvraj Singh as opener? That's become a mandatory question asked of every Indian cricketer at every press conference over the last few weeks. Virender Sehwag himself has made his preference clear, and it isn't difficult to see why. The 15 innings he opened with Chopra were not only the most successful for him as a batsman, they also got the team off to excellent starts. Sehwag posted five fifty-plus scores during that period, while India's opening stand yielded a healthy 57.

If the argument not to tinker around with a successful opening pair is a sound one, then there are enough takers for the argument that Yuvraj deserves a place in the team, even if it means moving him up to a relatively unfamiliar position. After all, it won't be the first time that a middle-order batsman is chosen for the opener's role, and, as the table below indicates, there are enough players who have made a success of the job to suggest that Ganguly's move might pay off too.

Giles finds his groove
Ashley Giles has often struggled to justify the England management's faith in him, but over the last few months he has done enough to suggest that his cricketing obituary would have to wait a little longer yet. On the tour to Sri Lanka last year, Giles returned 18 wickets from three Tests at less than 30 apiece. After a disappointing tour of the West Indies, he returned to the fore in the home series against New Zealand, striking crucial blows with both bat and ball. (Click here for Giles's series-wise bowling average.) In the process, he also upstaged the more accomplished left-arm spinner in the series, Daniel Vettori, whose four wickets in two matches came at 51.25 apiece. As the table below indicates, Giles is in the midst of a golden run in the last quarter of his Test career, taking his wickets at a better strike rate than ever before.

S Rajesh is assistant editor of Wisden Cricinfo.