Records of Gayle, Mccullum and Jaywardene
Chris Gayle, Brendon Mculum and Mahela Jayawardene are the proud owners of a extra ordinary batting record which even the great Sachin Tendulkar cannot boast of. The trio of Gayle, Mccullum and Jayawardene have a combined 80 international centuries to their credit which is lesser than Sachin's tally of 93 international hundreds, but then the trio are the only ones in international cricket to have scored a century in all the three formats of the game. Mc Cullum the dashing wicket keeper batsman from New Zealand holds an additional record as he is the only batsman in T20 internationals to have scored 1000 career runs. Mc Cullum has 1033 career runs in 37 matches at an average of 35.62 and a strike rate of 130.59. Englands Kevin Pietersen with 769 runs is a distant second.
As many as 167 T20 international matches have been played in which only 4 players have managed to score 100 or more in a innings. Chris Gayle was the first to achieve the feat on 11th September 2007 when he scored 117 against South Africa at Johannesburg on 11th September 2007. Gayle's 117 is also the highest in T20 internationals. Brendon Mc Cullum unbeaten 116 against Australia at Christchurch on 28th February 2010 is the second instance. Mc Cullum is the only person to have an unbeaten ton in T20 internationals and is the only wicket keeper to have achieved this feat. Suresh Raina on 2nd May 2010 and Jayawardene on 3rd May 2010 in the ongoing T20 World Cup became the third and fourth players to achieve the distinction. Jayawardene almost came close to becoming only the first player to score more than a century in all formats of the game when he scored an unbeaten 98 on 7th May 2010.
While it is no surprise that T20 matches have recorded very high totals as batsmen are under no pressure to last just 20 overs what is surprising is that only 4 hundreds have been recorded in as many as 167 matches. Considering the fact that batsmen are more physically stronger and aggressive in their instincts and mediocre bowling and shorter boundaries to help their cause more number of centuries should have been recorded. One reason could be the fact that batsmen do not believe that they are capable of getting a hundred in a 20 over game though then there have been many instances wherein batsmen have scored a century in one dayers in about 60 deliveries.
There was a time when openers after having batted the full quota of 50 overs in one dayers failed to score a century. Centuries in the T20 format of the game. however few it is goes to prove a point that anything is possible if you push hard.
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