November 12, 2002

Name: Yashvant Dengle
Question: What is the standard size of the cricket ground? In case of a new ground ...what is the recommended size of the ground,any technical data or site wherein I could gather this information pls.

Answer 1: Unfortunately, the ICC has still not standarised the size of international grounds. Normally the size of the playing area varies from 80 yards to 60 yards from the pitch to the boundary.

Name: Ch V Kalyan
Question: Can you list down people with more than 75 catches and the no. of catches per match each of them has?

Answer 2: Among fielders who have taken more than 75 catches in Tests, the following fielders have the best record of most catches per match (only the top four are listed below).

	Ct	For	M	match
RB Simpson	110	Aus	62	1.77
MA Taylor	157	Aus	104	1.51
SP Fleming	107	NZ	71	1.51
AW Greig	87	Eng	58	1.50

Name: Tejas Brahmbhatt, MD
Question: Longest stretch of runs without any extra in Test match. I am following the 3rd Ind/WI Test match. Ind 157/4 without any extras.

Answer 3: India did not concede a single extras in Pakistan's total of 328 at Lahore in January 1955.

Name: Ananthanarayanan Subramanian
Question: Hi.. I was just reading an article about Narendar Hirwani's 16 wicket haul in Chennai against the West Indies. I was quite surprised that he was not named "Man of the Match" because there was no such award at that time. So who was the winner of the first ever Man of the Match" award in Test cricket?

Answer 4: This is not true. Narendra Hirwani did receive the man of the match award (the Charminar man of the match award) at Madras in January 1888 on his Test debut against the West Indies. Kapil Dev was awarded the man of the match award after the Lord's Test match in 1986. He is believed to be Test cricket's first "man of the match" recipient.

Name: Suman K
Question: Mr Menon, this question has only partly to do with statistics, but I hope you will answer that. Is it true that G.R.Vishwanath got out more often soon after a break (lunch/tea/drinks)? Critics hold that against him for being unable to concentrate too hard...

Answer 5: Being a stroke player GR Viswanath used to attack bowling and believed in scoring runs at a quick run-rate. Unlike his teammate Sunil Gavaskar, it may seem Viswanath may not be able to concentrate and play long innings. However Viswanath has played some big knocks for India.

See details below:

222 runs in 638 mins & 373 balls - vs England at Madras 1981-82
179 runs in 419 mins & 261 balls - v West Indies at Kanpur 1978-79
161* runs in 405 mins, 297 balls - v Australia at Bangalore 1979-80

Name: R Selvaraj
Question: Can you please let me know who is the first batsman to be out hit-wicket. And who claimed the wicket.

Answer 6: In Test cricket the unlucky batsman is Australian George Bonnor against England at Manchester way back in July, 1884. He was dismissed in this manner by England left arm spinner Ted Peate.

Name: Pavan S Rao
Question: Was there a Test match, before this recent Aus-Pak series in Lanka/Sharjah, held in a neutral venue?

Answer 7: Yes. Here's the list:

Start date	End date	Countries	Venue	Result
27th May 1912	28th May 1912	Aus v SA	Old Trafford	Aus inn & 88
15th Jul 1912	17th Jul 1912	Aus v SA	Lord's	Aus 10 wicket
5th Aug 1912	7th Aug 1912	Aus v SA	Trent Bridge	drawn
12th Mar 1999	15th Mar 1999	SL v Pak	Dhaka	Pak inn & 175
31st Jan 2002	4th Feb 2002	Pak v WI	Sharjah	Pak 170 runs
7th Feb 2002	10th Feb 2002	Pak v WI	Sharjah	Pak 244 runs

Name: Srinivas Vemuri
Question: I've couple of questions: 1. Which team has maximum number of changes in a year? 2. Which team has maximum number of debutants in a year? Regards, Srinivas Vemuri

Answer 8: In the year 1921 England had the services of 34 Test players. Ans also during the same year 21 English players made their respective Test debut.

Name: Ch V Kalyan
Question: With respect to people who have 75 and more Test catches, can you tell me the person who has the highest % catches from a single bowler (% of catches by Mark waugh in the bowling of warne against total tally).

Answer 9:The list below provides details of fielders with more than 30 catches from a single bowler.

Cts	For	fielder	bowler
51	Aus	MA Taylor	SK Warne
39	WI	GS Sobers	LR Gibbs
39	Aus	M Waugh	SK Warne
34	Aus	M Waugh	G McGrath
32	SL	M Jayawardene	M Muralitharan
30	WI	BC Lara	C Walsh

Name: Rajan Matoo
Question: Can you kindly inform me as to what is the highest score made by a team after being put into bat.

Answer 10: In Test cricket England's 653-4 decl is the highest such score. This was made against India at Lord's in 1990, when Mohammad Azharuddin put the opponents in after winning the toss.