If there is one form of entertainment that unites people from the entire country, cricket would definitely be it. Often revered as the religion for sports lovers in India, this game has had us glued to our TV screen and mobile phones for years now.
But beyond all the match highlights and regular season stats, there is a lot more to the gentleman’s game that is exciting and fun!
So, here’s us bringing you some of the lesser-known facts about cricket.
- Kapil Dev has never been run out in his cricketing career and that says a lot about his fitness.
- Adam Parore of New Zealand is the only cricketer to climb the Mount Everest.
- Bert Vance of Wellington conceded 77 runs of a single over against Canterbury. However, many do not know that it was a well thought out strategy to encourage the batting team to take more risks and get all out.
- Adam Gilchrist holds the record of playing 96 matches since his Test debut on 5th November 1999 without being dropped for a single match.
- Indian spinner Bapu Nadkarani holds the record for the lowest economy rate of 0.15 for any bowler having bowled 10 or more overs. He had bowled 21 back-to-back maidens against England in Chennai.
- Sourav Ganguly and Rohit Sharma hold the record of being the only Indian players to have scored a 100 in the elimination stages of the World Cup.
- From 2009 to 2019, Virat Kohli has helped India chase down 10 300+ scores having scored 7 centuries and 1 fifty in these matches.
- Mahela Jayawardene holds the record for being the only player to have scored centuries in a World Cup semifinal and final.
- Rohit Sharma holds the record for most centuries in a single World Cup (5) and most number of centuries in World Cups (6). He shares the latter with Sachin Tendulkar.
- The Australian Team had an undefeated streak of 27 games in the World Cup from 1999 to 2011. Oddly enough, the Australian squad lost to Pakistan on 23rd May 1999 before going on their streak which was also broken by the same country on March 19th 2011!
- Mohinder Amarnath won the Man of the Match award in the Semifinal and Final games of the 1983 World Cup.
- Sourav Ganguly is the only player to have won 4 consecutive ODI Man of the Match awards.
- Shahid Afridi’s 37 ball century was played with Sachin Tendulkar’s bat.
- Iftikhar Ali Khan Pataudi is the only player to have played for the national teams of England and India.
- India won their first-ever test at Lords 3 years after winning the 1983 World Cup in 1986.
Got some exciting cricket trivia you would like to share?
