The Expert replies: How many father-son pairs have played vs India

If you have a question relating to cricket and did not know who to ask, bounce them off to Rajneesh Gupta. Each week he will pick questions readers send him and provide answers. Your queries should be addressed to: Ask Rajneesh on Facebook or askrajneesh@rediffmail.com

Rajneesh's answers some questions he received from readers last week:

How many father-son pairs have played against India, like Geoff and Shaun Marsh? - Rohit Raman

Geoff and Shaun Marsh are the 11th father-son pair to play against India. Geoff played 10 Tests against India between 1985 and 1992, while Shaun appeared in two.

Interestingly, Geoff's first and last Test series were against India. Geoff had a rather forgettable first outing against India -- scoring 5 & 2 at Adelaide in December 1985. At Melbourne his son got a duck on his first appearance against India.

Father-son pairs to appear against India:

England:

Alan & Mark Butcher (1 & 7)

Colin & Chris Cowdrey (8 & 5)

Len & Richard Hutton (7 & 3)

Jeff & Simon Jones (1 & 1)

Micky & Alec Stewart (2 & 9)

Australia:

Geoff & Shaun Marsh (10 & 2)

West  Indies:

Everton Weekes & David Murray (10 & 6)

New Zealand:

Lance & Chris Cairns (6 & 8)

Zin & Chris Harris (1 & 1). 

Pakistan:

Nazar Mohammad & Mudassar Nazar (5 & 18).

Hanif & Shoaib Mohammad (15 & 9).

In the Melbourne and Sydney Tests, Sachin Tendulkar took the field against Shaun Marsh. He had also played against his father Geoff in the 1991-92 series Down Under. How many players have played against two generations of a family? - Vivek Awasthi & Santosh Patil

No Indian player had played against two generations of a family before Tendulkar did at Melbourne. The Indian batting ace's first series in Australia in 1991-92 was also Geoff Marsh's last series.

Twenty players have now played Test cricket against a father-son pair. They are: England's George Ulyett (v Ed & Syd Gregory of Australia), Maurice Tate, Herbert Sutcliffe & George Duckworth (v Dave & Dudley Nourse of South Africa), Graham Gooch, Ian Botham & Allan Lamb (v Lance & Chris Cairns of New Zealand)

Australia's Bert Oldfield (v Dave & Dudley Nourse of South Africa), Allan Border, Geoff Lawson, Terry Alderman, David Boon & Craig McDermott (v Lance & Chris Cairns of New Zealand)

West Indies' Rohan Kanhai & Gary Sobers (v Vinoo & Ashok Mankad of India)

Pakistan's Salim Malik and Wasim Akram (v Lance & Chris Cairns of New Zealand)

Sri Lanka's Arjuna Ranatunga & Rumesh Ratnayake (v Lance & Chris Cairns of New Zealand)

...and India's Sachin Tendulkar (v Geoff & Shaun Marsh of Australia)

How many times have two or more batsmen scored maiden centuries in the same match (Test, ODI or T20I) – Anwar Maldar

In Test cricket there have been 97 instances when two or more batsmen scored their maiden centuries in the same match. The last such instance was in the India-New Zealand Test at Ahmedabad in 2010-11 when Kane Williamson and Harbhajan Singh scored centuries. On the following occasions four batsmen scored their maiden centuries in the same Test:

Australia v England, Melbourne, 1946-47

(CL McCool 104,AR Morris 155,RR Lindwall 100 & C Wahbrook 112)

West Indies v England, Port-of-Spain,1947-48

(SC Griffith 140,AG Ganteaume 112, GM Carew 107, JDB Robertson 133)

India v West Indies, Delhi, 1948-49

(CL Walcott 152,GE Gomez 101,RJ Christiani 107,HR Adhikari 114)

West Indies v Australia, Georgetown, 1977-78

(AB Williams 100, HA Gomes 101,GM Wood 126,CS Serjeant 124)

There have been 15 such instances in One-Day Internationals. The latest being at Chennai in December 2011 between India and West Indies when Manoj Tiwary and Kieron Pollard scored their maiden centuries.

No such instance has been seen in Twenty20 Internationals, where only five centuries have been scored.

Rajasthan's Robin Bisht has aggregated 841 runs in eight Ranji games till the end of the quarter-final stage in 2011-12 Ranji Trophy. What is the record of highest run-aggregate in a single Ranji season? - Mahesh Patwardhan 

Robin's performance -- though best this season -- is only at 41st place in the all-time list. There have been 11 instances when a batsman crossed 1,000 runs in a Ranji season. The list is headed by Hyderabad's VVS Laxman, who amassed 1,415 runs in 1999-00 season with the help of eight centuries that included a triple-ton. Mumbai's (then Bombay) Rusi Modi was the first batsman to aggregate 1,000 runs in a Ranji season, way back in 1944-45. He did so in only 7 innings of 5 matches, scoring 5 centuries.  

No one has aggregated 1,000 runs in a season twice. Delhi's Ajay Sharma (1,033 in 1996-97 & 933 in 1991-92) remains the only one to aggregate 900 runs in a season twice. 

Ajay Sharma and Mumbai's Vinod Kambli have aggregated 800 runs in a season on three occasions. 

Can you tell me about the longest undefeated series streak in Test cricket? Currently, Pakistan has 6 undefeated Test series. What's the world record and Pakistan record? - Mazhar Arshad

West Indies hold this record. They did not suffer a defeat in 29 consecutive series between 1980 and 1994-95, winning 20 and drawing 9 series.

Pakistan's record is of 10 series between 1985-86 and 1989-90. They won 5 and drew 5. The current sequence of 6 is their joint second best. Between 1972-73 and 1976-77 Pakistan had won 2 and drawn 4 series.

In how many countries international matches (for example Tests, ODIs, T20Is) have been played? Can you list them out separately with each country name and how many Test/ ODI/ T20I it has hosted. - Alex Vincent

If we count 'West Indies' as one country and have Wales clubbed with England, we get 20 countries, which have hosted an international cricket match. The complete list along with the matches across different formats is as under:  

Apart from Ashok Menaria last season, Sachin Tendulkar in 1994-95 and VVS Laxman in 1999-00, has anyone else scored a hundred in the quarter-finals, semi-finals and final in a Ranji season? - Sreeram 

No one else has performed this rare feat, Sreeram. As pointed out by you, Rusi Modi could also be included here, as he scored hundreds in all Bombay's matches in 1944-45, which were all knock-out matches, but there was no quarter-final at the time.

During the series against the West Indies, Sachin Tendulkar played his 100th consecutive international innings without a duck. Does he hold the record for most consecutive international innings without a duck? - Thejas C Balaraman 

Good spot, Thejas! But Sachin is only sixth in this exclusive list (up to the end of the Sydney Test). The list is headed by his team-mate Rahul Dravid. Between January 2000 and February 2004, Dravid played 173 consecutive innings without a duck. Alec Stewart held the previous record with 135 innings between March 1994 and November 1998. Stewart took the record from New Zealand's Jeremy Coney, whose sequence of 117 innings lasted from January 1983 to March 1987 (till the end of his career). Coney was also the first player to play 100 consecutive innings without a duck.  

The complete list is: Rahul Dravid (India) -- 173, Alec Stewart (England) -- 135, Carl Hooper (West Indies) -- 122, Jeremy Coney (New Zealand) -- 117, Javed Miandad (112), Sachin Tendulkar (India) -- 104 and Mohammad Yousuf (Pakistan) -- 103.

West Indies batsman Shivnarine Chandrapaul has a habit of coming in front of the wicket even before the bowler releases the ball. How many times he has been LBW in Test cricket? Who has the highest percentage of LBW dismissals? - Kiran Y Bodas 

Chanderpaul has been dismissed LBW 43 times in his Test career. Only Sachin Tendulkar, Graham Gooch and Ricky Ponting have been dismissed more often in this fashion. However, Chanderpaul is nowhere at the top in the list of batsmen who have the highest percentage of such dismissals in Test cricket. Among batsmen who have batted at least in 50 Test innings, Chanderpaul is at # 70. 

Most LBW dismissals in a Test career

Highest percentage of LBW dismissals in a Test career (Min.50 innings) 

What is the record of maximum number of batsman getting retired hurt in an innings in a Test innings? - Satish Sasikumar 

In the first innings of the Sydney Test in 1975-76, three West Indian batsmen -- Bernard Julien, Clive Lloyd and Michael Holding -- were retired hurt, which seems to be the Test record. All three though came back to resume their innings later. 

The record of most number of players getting retired hurt and not being able to resume their innings is two. This happened in West Indies-India Test at Kingston in 1975-76 when Anshuman Gaekwad and Brijesh Patel -- in India's first innings -- had to retire hurt with injuries that put them out of the match.

There would have been one more such instance had Gundappa Viswanath not been caught off the glove, with the impact leaving a finger fractured. This led to a situation where India's second innings was recorded as "all-out" with only five wickets having actually fallen.

Apart from Gaekwad, Patel and Viswanath, Bishan Singh Bedi and Bhagwat Chandrasekhar also could not bat in the second innings. Both Bedi and Chandraskehar had damaged their fingers while attempting return catches during the West Indies' first innings. These five were shown as "absent hurt" in the second innings' scorecard.