Lara's runs, and West Indian ruins
Perhaps numbers never do reveal the full story, but they tell a large part of it
Throughout West Indies' four-Test series in South Africa, Brian Lara was involved in a familiar pastime - scoring plenty of runs while the rest of the team floundered. Lara piled up 531 runs at 66.37. The 202 he scored in a losing cause in the first Test at Johannesburg made him the only player to score two double-centuries in defeats: he had earlier notched up 221 against Sri Lanka in 2001-02. Thanks to the inept West Indian team, Lara is the owner of a record that other batsmen will find rather difficult to break - the highest aggregate in lost Tests. Among the top six in that list, only one - Sachin Tendulkar - is still playing, and given India's improved performances of late, even Tendulkar will have little chance of catching up with Lara.
Tests | Runs | Ave | |
Lara | 44 | 3748 | 42.59 |
Stewart | 54 | 2993 | 29.92 |
Border | 46 | 2771 | 33.39 |
A Flower | 34 | 2713 | 43.06 |
Gower | 42 | 2581 | 32.26 |
Tendulkar | 32 | 2481 | 38.77 |
Tests | Runs | Ave | |
Bradman | 24 | 3147 | 101.52 |
Smith | 13 | 1275 | 60.71 |
Lara | 30 | 3089 | 59.40 |
Sobers | 39 | 3528 | 58.80 |
Gooch | 34 | 3582 | 58.72 |
G Chappell | 48 | 4209 | 55.38 |
Runs | Balls | Dismissed | Ave | Strike rate | |
Nel | 94 | 219 | 5 | 18.8 | 2.85 |
Hall | 41 | 66 | 1 | 41 | 2.49 |
Pollock | 67 | 188 | 1 | 67 | 2.13 |
Ntini | 141 | 184 | 1 | 141 | 4.82 |
Kallis | 91 | 158 | 0 | - | 3.46 |
Adams | 40 | 72 | 0 | - | 3.33 |
Peterson | 43 | 25 | 0 | - | 10.32 |
In only 18 Tests when they have opened together, Herschelle Gibbs and Graeme Smith have already racked up an awesome record: the 301 they added in the fourth Test against West Indies was their third triple-hundred partnership, making them the only opening pair to achieve the feat three times. No other first-wicket combination has managed it more than once.
P'ship | Against | Venue & year |
368 | Pakistan | Cape Town, 2002-03 |
338 | England | Edgbaston, 2003 |
301 | West Indies | Centurion, 2003-04 |
Inns | Runs | Ave | 100s/50s | |
Hobbs & Sutcliffe | 38 | 3249 | 87.81 | 15/10 |
Gibbs & Smith | 28 | 2169 | 83.42 | 5/6 |
Rae & Stollmeyer | 21 | 1349 | 71.00 | 5/3 |
Hayden & Langer | 49 | 2964 | 61.75 | 10/9 |
Hobbs & Rhodes | 36 | 2146 | 61.31 | 8/5 |
Nowhere is the decline in bowling standards more apparent than in West Indies' woeful slide from the most devastating pace attack to a pathetic bunch of trundlers. In the four Tests in South Africa, the West Indian bowlers' stats made for awful reading: Adam Sanford averaged almost 49 per wicket, which was the best of the crop. Fidel Edwards (81), Merv Dillon (89.75) and Vasbert Drakes (91.80) all ended up with shocking figures. It's hardly surprising, then, that the South African batsmen mostly converted their starts into big scores: they scored 12 hundreds - with Jacques Kallis getting one in each of the four Tests - and only four fifties.
Runs | Wkts | Ave | Strike rate | |
South African seamers (Ntini, Pollock, Nel) |
1594 | 67 | 23.79 | 47.27 |
West Indian seamers (Sanford, Dillon, Edwards, Drakes, Collymore) |
2074 | 28 | 74.07 | 115.5 |