Stump the Bearded Wonder No 101

Bill Frindall, aka the Bearded Wonder, is poised to solve your cricket queries and teasers.

The Test Match Special statistician will be busy answering your questions throughout the season's action.

Fill in the form on the right-hand side of the page to stump the Bearded Wonder.

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Matt, Great Britain

Which bowler has bowled most deliveries in Test cricket, and which batsman has faced the most balls?

Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne, Test cricket's leading wicket-taker with 583 dismissals, has bowled the most balls: 34,437. The other three members of the 30,000 Ball Club are Muthiah Muralitharan (31,125), Anil Kumble (30,324) and, the only pace bowler, Courtney Walsh (30,019). Not surprisingly they are the four leading Test wicket-takers.

As the recording of balls faced by batsmen has been standard practice only in recent times it is impossible to answer the batting element of your question. Probably Alan Border would be the leader as he has played most innings (265) and scored most runs (11,174).

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Jim, England

Plenty of players have taken hat-tricks, but has anyone ever taken 4 in 4, or even 5 in 5 (or even better!)? Further to that, what are the best figures any bowler has ever had in an innings?

At Test level no bowler has taken four wickets with successive balls - four in five is the best. To the end of the 2004 season there had been 34 instances of bowlers taking four wickets with consecutive balls in first-class cricket. Playing against Yorkshire at Bristol in his own benefit match on 10 August 1922, Gloucestershire's left-arm spinner, Charlie Parker, hit the stumps with five successive balls, but his second one was a no-ball. Off-break bowler Pat Pocock established two world first-class records when he took seven wickets in 11 balls, including six in nine, for Surrey v Sussex at Eastbourne on 15 August 1972.

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Mark, England

If a batsman deflects a ball that has been thrown from the outfield on to the stumps whilst he is running, and he is out of his ground when the stumps are broken, is he deemed out?

Yes, he is run out (Law 38), unless, having made his ground, he has subsequently left it to avoid being struck by the ball. Similarly, a non-striking batsman is out if he accidentally deflects a ball hit by his partner on to the bowler's wicket.

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Colin, England

Please name the nine England Test captains who were born outside England.

Which nine did you want, Colin? There have been 16! In alphabetical order, they are: G.O.B.Allen (Sydney, Australia), F.R.Brown (Lima, Peru), D.B.Carr (Wiesbaden, Germany), M.C.Cowdrey (Bangalore, India), M.H.Denness (Bellshill, Scotland), E.R.Dexter (Milan, Italy), F.L.Fane (Curragh Camp, Ireland), A.W.Greig (Queenstown, South Africa), Lord Harris (St Anne's, Trinidad), N.Hussain (Madras, India), D.R.Jardine (Bombay, India), A.J.Lamb (Langebaanweg, South Africa), A.R.Lewis (Swansea, Wales), T.C.O'Brien (Dublin, Ireland), C.F.Walters (Bedlinog, Wales), and P.F.Warner (Port-of-Spain, Trinidad).

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David Simpson, England

Which bowler has taken the most 5-fors in Test cricket history? My immediate thought would be Muthiah Muralitharan. But am I right?

Pat your self on the back, David. Muralitharan's tally of 532 wickets includes 44 five-wicket hauls, eight more than second-placed Richard Hadlee and 15 more than leading wicket-taker Shane Warne (583).

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Morgan Jeffels, England

I've heard it said that in a limited-overs match it is essential to bat out the allotted overs. So in a 40-overs match, if a side is dismissed in 35 overs do the unused five overs go to the side batting second so that they have in fact 45 overs in which to score the required runs?

Unused overs are not transferred to the opposition in any of the limited-overs competitions involving international of first-class national teams but they may be at club level in some competitions. The commentator you heard meant that, by batting for its full entitlement of overs, the team would make maximum use of its run-scoring resources.

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Akib, Canada

Shane Warne got his maiden first-class century in his 238th match. What is the most number of matches a player has taken to get his first century in first-class cricket?

England wicket-keeper R.W. ('Bob') Taylor established that record when he scored his only first-class hundred (100 for Derbyshire v Yorkshire at Sheffield in June 1981) in his 744th innings and 539th match. Incidentally, Michael Jones, was unhappy with my (correct) statement in AB 99: Bill, I think you must be Shane Warne's lucky mascot - as soon as you mention that he hasn't made a first-class century, he does so in the next match. Please keep very quiet about him for the rest of the summer!

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Ian, England

Further to Shane Warne's imminent 600th international wicket, which players has he dismissed most times and what is the profile of his wicket taking (e.g. how many bowled, lbw, etc.)?

The only four players Warne has dismissed more than eight times in Test matches all faced him in Ashes encounters: Alec Stewart (14), Nasser Hussain (11), Michael Atherton (10) and Graham Thorpe (9). In fact he has played more Tests (26) against England than any other opponent. The breakdown of his dismissals is: 343 caught (including 60 ct wkt and 20 ct & bowled), 115 lbw, 95 bowled and 30 stumped.

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Raj Hundal, Canada

I would like to know the highest and lowest team totals in first-class cricket. Thanks.

The highest is 1107 by Victoria against New South Wales at Melbourne Cricket Ground during a timeless Sheffield Shield match in December 1926. Victoria, who scored their runs in 633 minutes off 190.7 eight-ball overs, with three-figure contributions from W.M.Woodfull (133), W.H.Ponsford (352), H.S.T.L.Hendry (100) and J.Ryder (295), won by an innings and 656 runs on the fourth day. The lowest is 12 by Oxford University, batting one short, against MCC and Ground at Oxford in 1877, and 12 by Northamptonshire v Gloucestershire at Gloucester in 1907. Prior to 1815, when Great Matches were resumed after the Napoleonic Wars, the lowest total in an important match was 6 by The B's (with one B absent) against England at Lord's in 1810.

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Matthew Stratford, England

In a recent league game our keeper made two stumpings off the last two balls. This led to us wondering if there has ever been a Test or first-class hat-trick composed entirely of stumpings.

Not in a Test but there has been one instance in first-class matches. It occurred at Cheltenham on 15 August 1893 when Charles Townsend, a 16-year-old Clifton schoolboy representing Gloucestershire during his holidays, ended the Somerset innings with three stumpings by William Brain off successive balls. Tall and very slim, Townsend spun the ball sharply either way with a slow round-arm action. After his final term in 1895 he took 131 wickets at 13.94 apiece to head the national bowling averages. A useful left-handed batsman, he appeared in two Tests against the 1899 Australians.

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Richard Foster, England

Am I right in thinking that the great Don Bradman must be one of the quickest players to reach the 4000, 5000 and 6000 Test match runs? If not, who are the fastest to those totals?

You are indeed. The Don was fastest to 2000 and 3000 as well. He would have been fastest to 7000 too if he had scored just four runs in his final Test. The full list with number of innings in brackets is: 1000 runs - H.Sutcliffe and E.de C.Weekes (12); 2000 - D.G.Bradman (22); 3000 - D.G.Bradman (33); 4000 - D.G.Bradman (48); 5000 - D.G.Bradman (56); 6000 - D.G.Bradman (68); 7000 - W.R.Hammond (131), 8000 - S.R.Tendulkar (154), 9000 - B.C.Lara (177), 10,000 - B.C.Lara and S.R.Tendulkar (195), 11,000 - A.R.Border (259).

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Dipankar, Singapore

The recent drawn Kingston Test between West Indies and South Africa yielded eight centuries. Is this most number of centuries in a Test match?

Thank you Dipankar - and several others who posed similar questions. Yes, that Test did provide the first instance of teams sharing eight hundreds in a Test match. Incidentally, one of the three instances of seven in a match also occurred at Sabina Park, with Australia contributing a record five hundreds in their innings of 758 for 8 declared in June 1954.

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