Dear Editor,
I saw Shivnarine Chanderpaul play his first Test match at Bourda in 1994, when rumour had it that Captain Richie Richardson was not in favour of Shiv playing Test cricket yet. Richie said to the media that Shiv’s day will come, and the rumour mill had it that Hooper called in sick so Shiv could play, and that was the break he needed. Owing to his unorthodox batting style, I’ve heard people compare Shiv to Baichan. For those of us who have seen both men bat, there may be some glimpse of Baichan‘s style when the necessity arises, but we have also seen many instances where one would think that Shiv plays in the footsteps of a Lara, Richards or even a Bradman. When you can be in the same boat with the likes of Sir Donald Bradman and Sir Everton Weekes, as the records show, I don’t think you live in Baichan country.
In West Indies cricket Shiv has a strike rate of 70.74 in ODI, which is about the 5th highest. Just imagine that the great Gordon Greenidge and Desmond Haynes have ODI strike rates of 64.92 and 63.09, respectively. There are presently 9 batsmen in the world with over 10000 Test runs, and I believe that Shiv will be there as the 10th batsmen to score 10000 runs on April 26.
TEST CRICKET
100+ AVERAGE IN CONSECUTIVE CALENDAR YEARS: Shiv shares the World Record: with Sir Donald Bradman as the only batsmen in Test history to average 100+ in consecutive calendar years. Shiv averaged 111.60 in 2007 and 101.00 in 2008.
HUNDRED & DUCK IN SAME TEST MATCH: World Record: Shiv is the first batsman in Test history to score a hundred and a duck in same Test 3 times, ( 118 and 0 vs England; 0 and 109 vs SA; 126* and 0 vs NZ).
HUNDRED & NINETY IN A TEST MATCH: World Record: Shiv is the only batsman in test history to score a hundred and a ninety in the same Test twice.
CONSECUTIVE FIFTIES—Multiple times: Shiv Chanderpaul shares World record with Jacques Kallis as the only batsmen in test history to have scored 5 or more consecutive fifties 3 times.
CONSECUTIVE FIFTIES: Shiv shares the World Record with Everton Weekes and Andy Flowers for scoring most consecutive Test fifties—7 No.
2 UNBEATEN FIFTIES IN A MATCH: Word record: Shiv is the only batsman in test history to accomplish this feat 3 times—128* and 97* vs England; 65* and 70* vs South Africa; 107* and 77* vs Australia.
1000+ MINUTES: Shiv holds the World record for batting 1000+ minutes between dismissals, he did it 4 times in his career, no batsman in history has done so more than once.
1513 MINUTES BETWEEN DISMISSALS: Shiv holds the World Record for the longest batting between dismissals with a grand total of 1513 minutes, that is 25 hours and 21+ minutes.
HIGHEST AVERAGE AT #6: World record: Shiv has the highest batting average at the #6 batting position in Test cricket—he averages 63.26 in 40 innings at #6.
HIGHEST AVERAGE in Innings with 100s: For batsmen with more than 20 centuries, Shiv leads the average with 286.72 (25 centuries) for those century innings .
100+ Tests Without Getting Stumped: Shiv Chanderpaul holds World Record s the only batsman in test history to have played 100+ Tests without ever getting stumped. The following batsmen have played 100+ tests and have each been stumped once—Tendulkar, Kallis, M.Waugh, Jayasuriya, Boon, Atherton, and Langer.
MAIDEN HUNDREDS: Shiv holds the World Record for partnering more batsmen to their maiden hundreds, he was at the wicket when 5 WI batsmen(Junior Murray(1995), Sherwin Campbell(1996), Stuart Williams(1997), Jerome Taylor(2008 ), Brendan Nash (2009), and Kirk Edwards (2011) scored their maiden test hundreds. No batsman in Test history has partnered more batsmen to their maiden test hundreds than Shiv.
WEST INDIAN RECORDS
1. MOST CAPPED WEST INDIAN IN TEST: Shiv Chanderpaul holds the WI record for most capped Test player (139 tests), Walsh (132 tests), and Brian Lara (131 Tests).
2. MOST BALLS FACED BY A WEST INDIAN IN TEST: Shiv Chanderpaul holds the West Indies record for most balls faced in Test cricket, a total of 23275 balls in Tests.
3. MOST TEST GROUNDS: Shiv Chanderpaul holds the WI record for most Test grounds played on. After 133 Tests, Shiv has played on 53 Test grounds. Brian Lara, who played in 131 Tests, played on 45 Test grounds. The world record is held by Sachin Tendulkar. After 159 Tests he has played on 56 Test grounds.
4. MOST BALLS FACED IN A NINETH- WICKET STAND: The 222 balls faced in the ninth-wicket stand between Edwards and Chanderpaul is the highest ever for the West Indies for the ninth wicket in Tests.
5. HIGHEST AGGREGATE AT KENSINGTON OVAL: Shiv Chanderpaul holds the record as the highest Test run scorer at Kensington Oval, Barbados with 1374 runs.
6. NOT OUTS: Shiv holds WI record for most ‘not out’ in Tests, 38. Only three batsmen in the history of Test cricket have more NOT OUTS than Shiv, Steve Waugh (46), Alan Border (44), and Jacques Kallis (39).
7. RUNS SCORED AT #5 BATTING POSITION: Shiv holds WI record for most runs at No. 5 position. Only one batsman in Test history, Steve Waugh (6754 @ 56.28 avg) has scored more runs than Shiv Chanderpaul (4640 @ 52.13 avg) at the #5 position.
8. 4000 RUNS AT HOME & AWAY: Only Brian Lara and Shiv Chanderpaul have scored more than 4000 Test runs at home and away.
ODI STATS
OLDEST & YOUNGEST Players Top Scoring in an ODI Series: Shivnarine Chanderpaul is the only player to have top-scored while being the oldest and the youngest player in the series.
MOST RUNS IN AN OVER; (ODI) Shiv joins Brian Lara in scoring the most runs by a West Indies batsman in an over in one dayers. He scored 26 runs(5 4s and 1 6) against Steve Harmison and England in 2009
ODI RUNS: In WI history, only Brian Lara (10348) has scored more runs in one dayers than Shiv Chanderpaul (8648)
SIX FROM LAST BALL TO WIN MATCH: Shiv is only cricketer in world to have scored a six from last ball to win match, when anything less than 6 would not have won the match, OK guys I know many times 6 was scored from last ball to win, but a 4 or 5 could have given same result.
Yours faithfully,
Harry Harnaam
