Test milestones

And Virat and Warner. Warner started the Ashes ahead if Smith!

Most Test runs (active)

Root 7043
Smith 6973
Taylor 6839
Kohli 6749
Warner 6458
Williamson 6163
Azhar Ali 5669
Mathews 5641
Pujara 5486


Most Test wickets (active)

Anderson 575
Broad 467
Lyon 363
Ashwin 342
Sharma 278
Boult 254
Southee 251
Siddle 221
Starc 215
Philander 214

Who knew the team mascot would achieve such lofty feats?

Long may it continue.

one of the mascot's early appearances:

36.1 Anderson to Ponting, no run, A JAFFA! Full, swings late, Ponting lurches like an inebriated pensioner on a skateboard, somehow the ball evades bat, gloves, stumps and everything.
After 45 balls, Ponting's still not off the mark. And he's not likely to be any time soon if Anderson keeps bowling these cluster-bombs of high jaffery.
36.2 Anderson to Ponting, no run, A SNORTER!!! Straight out of Snortsville, Carolina, Ponting is left fumbling around for his reading glasses by a short ball that reared up like a gay ostrich and pecked at his grill. Anderson follows through with a few choice words. Lip readers among you might have made out "hermaphrodite".
36.3 Anderson to Ponting, no run, THE McGARNAGLE!!!! Oooh, Jimmy's delving deep into his box of tricks today! Ponting wrongly plays for the away swing and is left looking a real casserole of nonsense by the McGarnagle, which cuts him in half and then quarters and then just keeps on chopping until his mutilated corpse is nothing more than a squinty pulp. England appeal for something, but the umpire is too traumatised by what he's witnessed to react.
36.4 Anderson to Ponting, no run, AN ABSOLUTE CLINTON!!!!!! What is happening out there? Curves in awkwardly, almost at right angles, and Ponting wears it on the chest. Clinton residue all over his shirt. That'll never wash out. England still banging at the door, but so far, no cigar.
What an over this is from Anderson. Four balls. Four brutes. Four Weddings is on TV tonight, I noticed while reading the paper over breakfast. Slice of melon and gram of coke, in case you were wondering.
36.5 Anderson to Ponting, no run, A SCENTED PANDA HAMMER!!!!!!! WHOAHZERS!!!!! That seemed to swing in at least three directions. Is that even possible?! Ricky can't lay a bat on it and - oh, he's down! And up again! Staggering! And down again! And up! Completely bamboozled, he seems to not know where he is. OH MY GOD!! Ponting has taken off his shirt and one of his shoes and is just shambling around the field. Is he crying? Some of the England boys are trying to help him but he's thrashing his bat at them and growling. Hello, what's this? Ever the opportunist, Kevin Pietersen tries to take advantage of Ponting's walkabout by shying at the stumps but misses by three yards. And that's gone for four. But the umpires are signalling dead ball. It's chaos. The Aussie team doctor is on the pitch now, along with the physio and the mascot, Steve Smith. They seem to be calming Ponting down, showing him pictures of his family. Yes, there's some recognition there. His marbles are on the way back. WHOAHNNO, there they go again!! A picture of his kids has thrown him back over the edge like some kind of demented lifebelt. He's spinning on the spot (a nice homage to the Tasmanian Devil) furiously, screaming "little Ricky people!!!" from what I can make out on the stump mic. This is awkward. The team fertility consultant's on the field now. I guess he's about to explain where babies come from. This is going to get worse before it gets better...
The umpires call drinks.
And we're back. Apparently the website went down for the duration of what will surely be referred to in all the papers tomorrow as "The Incident", for which we apologise, but with Ian Bell having been taken into protective custody, the sacrificed lamb's blood mopped up from the square, the affected part of the Joe Mangle Stand quarantined and Dr. Susan something Greek-sounding now acting as Ponting's runner and/or life coach, James Anderson's at his mark ready to complete what has thus far been a very interesting over.
36.6 Anderson to Ponting, FOUR, BUM GRAVY. After all that, Jimmy loses his line and spaffs one miles down the leg side. Prior makes a valiant dive, but unfortunately in the wrong direction. Four byes, and a slightly anticlimaxtic end to the over.
Andrew is telling me that anticlimaxtic isn't a word. But he tried to slip refuddle past me in a game of strip Scrabble the other day, so our bond of trust isn't in the healthiest state at present. Anticlimaxtic a word? E:mails to the usual address. We'll get to the bottom of this by tea.

Still possibly the greatest ever Bails post.

How long ago was that now? Obviously Drunky was still playing, and Smith wasn’t yet any good (possibly still seen as more likely to be the next Warne than the next Bradman). 2011/2012 perhaps?

Just noticed three very close milestones for the Australian bowling group:

Starc needs 6 for 250 wickets
Hazlewood needs 5 for 200
Cummins needs 7 for 150

It's likely that at least one of these will occur v Bangladesh in June ... conceivably, all three could.

Surprisingly, Pattinson (the oldest) is still 19 away from 100 wickets, and may not get there at all.

Lyon needs just 10 wickets for 400; this could easily occur in Bangladesh as well.

On paper, Starc, Hazlewood, Cummins and Lyons is as good as any 4-man attack we've put on the park in the last 40 years.

GOAT attack?

Of course Warne and McGrath may get a weighting that denies such a claim, no matter who the other two bowlers were.

Too often they were lumbered with Lee, or (rather than another bowler) an all-rounder like Gillespie ...

lardbucket wrote:Too often they were lumbered with Lee, or (rather than another bowler) an all-rounder like Gillespie ...

Indeed. He was the weak link that made the 4 of the time simply GOAT x 2 + 2 others.

No new ones will be reached anytime soon.

lardbucket wrote:Just noticed three very close milestones for the Australian bowling group:

Starc needs 6 for 250 wickets
Hazlewood needs 5 for 200
Cummins needs 7 for 150

It's likely that at least one of these will occur v Bangladesh in June ... conceivably, all three could.

Surprisingly, Pattinson (the oldest) is still 19 away from 100 wickets, and may not get there at all.

Lyon needs just 10 wickets for 400; this could easily occur in Bangladesh as well.

... unchanged over the course of this year:

Lyon 390
Starc 243
Hazlewood 195
Cummins 143

Lyon's 390 Test wickets represents about 2/3 of his total FC wickets, which seems a high proportion ... can't imagine any of the English Test bowlers having a high ratio of Test to FC wickets given the volume and 'quality' of English FC cricket; perhaps some of the WI, Bangla and Sri Lankan champions have a high Test/FC wicket ratio. Stats men? Skully? Bueller?

Anderson: 600 of 975 (61.5%)
Broad: 514 of 808 (63.6%)

England players, bowlers in particular, rarely see red ball action for their counties once they establish themselves in the Test side. In the old days it would admittedly have been a lot lower.

Indeed beams. In the old days it would have been a case of the counties making them unavailable.

beamer wrote:Anderson: 600 of 975 (61.5%)
Broad: 514 of 808 (63.6%)

England players, bowlers in particular, rarely see red ball action for their counties once they establish themselves in the Test side. In the old days it would admittedly have been a lot lower.

FST 307 out of 2304

DKL 355 out of 882

SFB 189 out of 719

DU 297 out of 2465

Statham 252 of 2260.

SPD 0 of 124

MAT 1 of 2
RWM 0 of 1

I do enjoy watching stat fests from you fellas.

lardbucket wrote:

lardbucket wrote:Just noticed three very close milestones for the Australian bowling group:

Starc needs 6 for 250 wickets
Hazlewood needs 5 for 200
Cummins needs 7 for 150

It's likely that at least one of these will occur v Bangladesh in June ... conceivably, all three could.

Surprisingly, Pattinson (the oldest) is still 19 away from 100 wickets, and may not get there at all.

Lyon needs just 10 wickets for 400; this could easily occur in Bangladesh as well.

... unchanged over the course of this year:

Lyon 390
Starc 243
Hazlewood 195
Cummins 143

Lyon's 390 Test wickets represents about 2/3 of his total FC wickets, which seems a high proportion ... can't imagine any of the English Test bowlers having a high ratio of Test to FC wickets given the volume and 'quality' of English FC cricket; perhaps some of the WI, Bangla and Sri Lankan champions have a high Test/FC wicket ratio. Stats men? Skully? Bueller?

Boult and Southee. Boult has 70% of his wickets in tests. Southee 2/3rds. Shakib is similar, though i guess it might be hard for him to find time to play FC cricket in between his fixing, striking and generally being a dick.

Sharma slightly lower with around 64%

Anderson 15 for 700
Broad 24 for 600 (doubtful)
Lyon 18 for 500

Root 52 runs for 11000
Smith 208 runs for 9000
Stokes 288 for 6000
Khawaja 505 for 5000

[5000 is entry level for 'highest test runs' list on ESPN]