An unhappy couple
A look at pairs
Making two ducks in a match is about as bad as it gets for a batter. The ‘pair’ may be cricket’s most unhappy couple. It is a well recorded and, I suspect, quite loved stat. Seeing first-class cricketers performing at a level that most of the rest of us would expect ourselves to do is somehow reassuring. Or is it just that it brings out stattos’ slightly more sadistic side? Jonathan Agnew used to wind up Geoffrey Boycott occasionally on this subject. He would say something along the lines of “You must be a really bad batter to get a pair. Did you get any Geoffrey?”. Boycott would then reply in great detail about how Norman Graham of Kent dismissed him twice for his only first-class pair at Bradford in 1967. After a while, Geoffrey would inevitably say “You were rubbish at batting. How many did you get?” Aggers, feigning ignorance, would say that he couldn’t remember and ask the statto to check. A quick look revealed no pairs in his 218-match first-class career; much to Aggers delight and Geoffrey’s annoyance. Ha, ha!
There have been 14 275 pairs in the 63 467 completed first-class matches to date. It is a one in roughly 4.5 matches occurrence. Who are the most prolific collectors and avoiders of the Unhappy Couple? Gloucestershire’s left-arm spinner, Cecil “Sam” Cook has the most pairs in first-class cricket, with 18. Of course, making pairs was not his primary cricketing ‘skill’. Cook had a cricket career which lasted from 1946 to 1986 and contained 506 first-class matches (including one Test) as a player and 297 as an umpire. His 1 782 first-class wickets are not too shabby and represents a nearly 100 to one “wickets to pairs” ratio. Boycott’s 609 first-class matches with just one pair puts him quite high on the leading pair-avoiders list, but this list is headed appropriately by two of the true all-time greats. WG Grace tops it with no pairs in 870 first-class matches and Jack Hobbs is second on 834. Charlie Knott (Hampshire 1938 to 1957) deserves a mention here. Despite averaging just 6.95 with the bat he avoided getting a pair in his 173 first-class matches. Chris Martin made seven pairs in his Test career. No one else made more than four, while Sachin Tendulkar, the most capped Test cricketer, did not collect a single pair in his 200 Tests.
47 men have collected pairs on their Test debut. While most of these are lower order batters, there are some quality players for whom it was an aberration. Four players who got a debut pair went on to make 4 000-plus runs: Graham Gooch (8900 at 42.58), Marvan Atapattu, who famously scored only one run in his first six innings, (5502 at 39.02), Dean Elgar (5347 at 37.92) and Saeed Anwar (4052 at 45.52). Two players have made a double-century in their second innings of a Test having come in on a pair: Dudley Nourse (231 for South Africa v Australia at Johannesburg in 1935) and Justin Greaves’ epic match saving 202* for West Indies v New Zealand at Christchurch in December last year; while the great New Zealand all-rounder John R Reid (not to be confused with fellow New Zealand Test cricketer, John F Reid) holds this record in first-class cricket with 283 for Wellington v Otago at Wellington 1952.
The king pair (out first ball in both innings) is the ‘elite’ pair. Or is it? Here is a look at this subset.
