Brian Lara records that no other cricketer has achieved
The former West Indies captain and legendary batsman Brian Lara is now 54 years old. Presently he is the head coach of the Indian Premier League (IPL) team Sunrisers Hyderabad. He retired a long time back, but he continues to play in exhibition matches and also the Road Safety World Series for the West Indies Legends team.
During his legendary international career, Brian Lara played 131 Test matches and 299 ODIs for the West Indies cricket team. He aggregated 11,953 runs in Tests, with his batting average being 52.89. Besides, he also scored 34 hundred, 9 double hundreds, and 48 half-centuries in the longest format of the game. He played his last international match on 21st April 2007. 16 years have passed since he retired from the game, here is a list of four such records of Brian which are yet to be broken.
1 Highest Individual Score in Test Cricket– He achieved this feat twice in his career, first he scored 375 runs beating Sir Garfield Sobers’ record of 365 runs. After that Australian Mathew Hayden scored 380 runs, he again got the record back in his name by scoring 400 not out, and thus becoming the only player in Test history to score 400 runs in Test innings.
2 Highest Individual Score in First Class Matches– He is the only player to score 500 runs in a single innings of the first class match. His highest is 501 not out, in First Class cricket.
3 Number 1 ODI Batter for 5 Years– It is the dream of every batter to remain at the top of the ICC Rankings for one month, but Brian remained at the helm of the ICC ODI rankings for batters for five consecutive years. His streak lasted from 1993-1997.
4 Highest Percentage of Team’s Runs Scored– The first two records would have clarified that Lara was a specialist in playing marathon knocks. He also owns the record for the highest percentage of team’s runs scored in Test matches, having scored 18.87% runs for West Indies during his career.
Friends, can you think of any modern-day batsman achieving even one of these feats?
Waiting for your views on this blog.
Anil Malik
Mumbai, India
6th May 2023