5 most interesting co-incidents and facts in the history of cricket which will shock you to the core as all the moments seem bizarre.
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Cricket is a sport of surprises but sometimes it takes a leap to the next level to absolutely surprise you. Moreover, cricket is also known as a game of co-incidents.
But in the list below, you may call them as the mother of all co-incidents, as these are one of the bizarre yet glorious records and facts in the history of cricket.
Moreover, the accuracy of numbers involved in it might give you a strange feeling, but they are too good to be achieved or happen anytime sooner, or even if they, it will further add its bizarreness.
1. Double tons by Indians
Before 2010, many cricketers were close to hitting the 200-mark in the ODI cricket format, and Sachin Tendulkar was obviously one of them. Many Indian fans wanted the master blaster to be the first cricketer to reach that score.
And surely he became the one, but after Tendulkar, two more Indians followed him to breach the 2000mark. Thus, the first three players who broke the mark of 200 runs were Indians.
But along with Indians being the first ones to score double tons in 2010, 2011 and 2014, each time the three players scored a double ton, the highest individual score by a batsman in ODIs was broken. But another interesting fact was India won each of those matches by a margin of 153 runs.
Sachin did it against South Africa in Gwalior in 2010. About 18 months later, Virender Sehwag followed his compatriot’s footsteps as he became the second man to do it ODI cricket when he smoked 219 against West Indies in Indore also becoming the highest scorer in an ODI game.
A year in 2013, Rohit Sharma also added himself into the list by scoring a double ton against Australia, and soon became the first man to score two double tons in ODIs after knocking down Sri Lanka by hitting 264 runs at Eden Gardens in November 2014.
With this, he also broke Sehwag’s highest score mark in an ODI game.
2. Indian captains’ love with 183
183 seems to be a special number, as this following might make it a big superstition that if you want to be a successful captain, you have to make 183 as your career-best score.
India’s 3 stalwart captains Sourav Ganguly, MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli, all three have their career-best score as 183, Kohli may outnumber his personal best in future.
But the fact is even more bizarre, as all three of them became the Indian captain soon-after making that score. In the 1999 World Cup, Sourav Ganguly gave a stellar performance by hitting Sri Lanka for 183 runs off 159 balls.
With spot-fixing controversy coming out, Ganguly was given the responsibility of the Indian team, who soon went onto become one of the decorated captains of India.
While Ganguly was the captain of the team, the young MS Dhoni made announced himself to the world by smashing unbeaten 183 runs in a chase of 299 against Sri Lanka in Jaipur.
In that match, Dhoni came onto the pitch as number 3, and showed how explosive he can be. A couple of years later when most of the seniors opted out of the T20 World Cup in 2007, Dhoni was made the captain.
With India’s unexpected success in the tournament, he ascended to the ODI captaincy as well but had to wait for a year to reach the helm in Test cricket.
Soon, In 2012, during an Asia Cup game against Pakistan, India were chasing 330. Kohli stroked a fine 183 to lead the ‘Men in Blue’ to a win. A year later, he made his captaincy debut and in December 2014 when Dhoni retired from Test cricket, the Delhi lad took over the captaincy in the longest format. In January 2017, he became captain of all formats.
3. It takes Michael Clarke and Alistair Cook to match Sachin Tendulkar
Sachin Tendulkar was rightly hailed as the ‘God of the Cricket’ as his glorious stats advocate him to be the greatest batsman of all time. He has scored 15921 runs in Test cricket and 18426 runs in ODIs. He even has the most hundreds in both formats as well.
Sachin retired from all formats of cricket after playing his last Test match at the Wankhede stadium in 2013 with exactly 200 Test matches to his name.
However, in December 2013, a bizarre stat surfaced while Australia and England were playing the Ashes series. Michael Clarke and Alastair Cook played their 100th Test match together. It was the third Test match of the series.
After the first innings of that Test match, Cook had amassed 7955 runs in his Test career with 25 Test hundreds. Whereas, Clarke had fetched 7964 runs with 26 Test tons.
When you add them up, it comes up to 15,919 Test runs and 51 Test hundreds. Tendulkar had 15,921 runs and 51 centuries in Test cricket. Showcasing how good Sachin Tendulkar was.
4. Nelson’s love with 11
The first Test between South Africa and Australia in November 2011 which took place at the Newlands in Cape Town was a peculiar and a very interesting one.
It broke multiple records. We are used to seeing two innings on a single day of a Test match. But in this Test, all four innings were a part of a single day’s play (Day two of the Test match).
Australia were 214/8 at the start of the second day. They were bowled out for 284 before lunch. However, South Africa collapsed and was dismissed for 96.
All it took Australia was 24.3 overs. Meanwhile, Australia in their third innings suffered a worse collapse. They were shot out for a mere 47 and the innings lasted only 18 overs. Hence, South Africa batted for 18 more overs in the second innings and ended the day on 81/1.
While a manic 23-day wicket day two entered the record books, a very interesting yet bizarre incident occurred on day three. ‘Nelson (111)’ struck from all corners.
South Africa needed 111 runs to win at exactly 11:11 on the 11th day of the 11th month in 2011 (date was 11/11/11, time was 11:11). Cricket South Africa asked its fans in the stadium to stand on one leg. In fact, umpire Ian Gould also was in good spirits.
5. 1st and 100th year, history repeats
Australia and England played their first test match on 1877, at the Melbourne cricket ground, 100 years later both rivals met once again to celebrate the 100th year of their combined Test history.
Both the test matches were dramatic from start till end, but surprisingly similar verdict happened even though it had a gap of 100 years between them.
In both games, the result went in Australia’s favour but the surprise is that on both occasions they won the games by 45 runs.
