Most Test runs in a calendar year: How many more runs will Joe Root have to score to break Mohammad Yousuf’s record?

Dixit Bhargav | 30/08/2021
Most Test runs in a calendar year: How many more runs will Joe Root have to score to break Mohammad Yousuf's record?

Most Test runs in a calendar year: The English captain has a realistic chance of going past former Pakistani batsman’s world record.

Having scored 1,398 runs in 11 Tests at an average of 69.90 with the help of six centuries and a half-century, England Test captain Joe Root is in the middle of a phenomenal run as a batsman.

Root, who has scored more than three times the Test runs scored by England’s second-highest run-scorer in the last 12 months, still has five Tests (including two home Tests) to play this year and it would be disappointing if the right-hand batsman doesn’t break the record for Most Test runs in a calendar year.

It is worth mentioning that the aforementioned record currently lies with former Pakistan batsman Mohammad Yousuf, who had scored 1,788 runs in just 11 Tests at a mind-blowing average of 99.33. Having achieved the feat one and a half decade ago in 2006, Yousuf had scored nine centuries and three half-centuries back in the day.

While Root needs 391 more runs to go past Yousuf, he first needs 80 more runs to break his own record of 2016. Given Root’s remarkable form, it might seem that this is his best-ever year in Test cricket but it isn’t the case as he had amassed 1,477 runs in 17 Tests at an average of 49.23 including three centuries and 10 half-centuries half-a-decade ago.

Another four runs will aid Root in becoming the highest Test run-scorer in a calendar year among English batsmen as he will surpass former England captain Michael Vaughan’s record (1,481 runs at an average of 61.70) set in 2002.

Most Test runs in a calendar year

Player Year Matches Innings Runs HS Average SR 100 50
Mohammad Yousuf 2006 11 19 1,788 202 99.33 62.64 9 3
Sir Vivian Richards 1976 11 19 1,710 291 90 72.85* 7 5
Graeme Smith 2008 15 25 1,656 232 72 65.81 6 6
Michael Clarke 2012 11 11 1,595 329* 106.33 65.96 5 3
Sachin Tendulkar 2010 14 23 1,562 214 78.1 55.9 7 5
Sunil Gavaskar 1979 18 27 1,555 221 59.8 47.43* 5 8
Ricky Ponting 2005 15 28 1,544 207 67.13 61.31 6 6
Ricky Ponting 2003 11 18 1,503 257 100.2 60.26 6 4
Kumar Sangakkara 2014 12 22 1,493 319 71.09 55.15 4 9
Michael Vaughan 2002 14 26 1,481 197 61.7 61.14 6 2
Post Edited By: Dixit Bhargav
England India India tour of England 2021 Joe Root Mohammad Yousuf

About the author

Dixit Bhargav

Born and brought up in Pathankot, Dixit Bhargav is an engineering and sports management graduate who works as a Cricket Editor at The SportsRush. Having written more than 10,000 articles across more than five years at TSR, his first cricketing memory dates back to 2002 when former India captain Sourav Ganguly had waved his jersey at the historic Lord’s balcony. What followed for an 8-year-old was an instant adulation for both Ganguly and the sport. The optimist in him is waiting for the day when Punjab Kings will win their maiden Indian Premier League title. When not watching cricket, he is mostly found in a cinema hall watching a Punjabi movie.

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