Martin zeroes in on records

Chris Martin further enhanced his already considerable reputation as the classic tailender with a near-perfect game at the Wanderers: played eight balls (which, some might argue, was six more than necessary), scored 0 runs, out twice. His 19 Test ducks mean he is fast moving up the all-time list, and is already in the top 15, after a mere 34 matches.

As Mathew Varghese pointed out in his post-match stats piece after the Johannesburg Test, Martin is already the proud holder of three records - the most number of pairs in Tests, the most zeroes in Tests between South Africa and New Zealand, and in Tests at the Wanderers.

The table below shows just how far ahead of the rest of the pack Martin is: in 25 completed innings, he has failed to get off the mark 19 times. Taking a cut-off of 20 dismissals in Tests, Martin is far ahead of his nearest competitor, Danish Kaneria. If he continues at his current rate of a duck every 1.79 Test, Martin will get his 44th - and go past Courtney Walsh's world record - in his 79th match.

Meanwhile, here's a response to the queries about genuine batsmen with the most propensity to score ducks. Taking a cut-off of 50 Test innings, and an average of at least 30, India's Pankaj Roy comes out on top. Among specialist batsmen, Marvan Atapattu and Steve Waugh have the most number of ducks - 22 - but while Atapattu makes it to the list below, Waugh's zeroes came over 260 innings, which means his percentage was only 8.46.