This is one of three long-form series taking place at the same time, but the only one with two full strength teams participating

Alagappan Muthu24-Jan-20244:30

‘Everyone’s responsibility to ensure Test cricket stays alive’

Joe Root screamed to no one in particular, and it was a fun word too. Rhymes with fire truck.He is, as he often is, in the middle of a marathon net session and clearly he expects all of these things to go perfectly.It’s good that they don’t though, because that one mistake feeds Root in a way a million shots off the middle of the bat couldn’t.Later on, he makes the same play that in his mind resulted in a wicket off England’s spin-bowling coach and he absolutely nails it, the bat face coming down on the ball, ensuring this slog sweep doesn’t go up in the air. Yet the only one who looked in any way pleased was the guy getting hit – Jeetan Patel. Root couldn’t care less. He has to be among the 74% who voted that Test cricket is still the pinnacle in 2022. And there will be an exhibition of it for the next six weeks.Related

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In some ways, there better be.India vs England is one of three different Test series kicking off together. And outside of the usual pressure – like maintaining a proud home record or stress testing a bold new way of life anywhere in the vicinity of a red ball – there is something else at stake here. Because it is the only series with both fighters at full-strength. West Indies and South Africa have sent compromised squads on tour, which has been framed as another sign that the format is dying.Now imagine if any, or worse, a majority, of these five Tests turn out to be duds. It isn’t likely because the conditions are expected to be bowler-friendly and when that is the case the cricket tends to be very watchable. What can potentially happen is a one-sided series where the jeopardy vanishes.People realised pretty quickly that the game had a sustainability problem when big-name players began to streamline their time on the field. Ben Stokes used that very word when he retired (albeit briefly) from ODIs. A month later, Trent Boult opted out of a New Zealand contract in order to spend more time with his family and to maximise on his earning potential in T20 leagues while he was still at the peak of his powers.R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja tune up for what everyone hopes will be a competitive series•PTI If two big-name teams with all the talent and resources available to them, end up being unable to do the one thing that makes sport so good – being unpredictable – then couldn’t the others who are significantly less fortunate use it as a reason to justify their pulling back from Test cricket? “If India and England can’t make it fun, why bother? Why shouldn’t we put our focus elsewhere?”South Africa’s investment into their T20 tournament already looks like a very smart play. It has already turned a profit, when it was meant to only after five years or so, and from the make up of the crowd that attends the matches – families, kids – it does look like they are accomplishing their aim of taking the game to the next generation. Also, that one gif of a woman yoinking a mug of beer from the man sitting next to her and downing it well before the camera had to pan back to show the next ball being bowled suggests that a day at the SA20 is fun whether you’re there to watch the cricket or not.T20 superstars may never command the hushed tones with which people speak about Brian Lara’s 153* or Shane Warne’s ball of the century but that doesn’t mean there is no scope for fulfilment.On Wednesday, a couple of hours after the India captain Rohit Sharma addressed a press conference in Hyderabad, the Big Bash League final kicked off at the SCG and a young man named Spencer Johnson thanked his franchise for changing his whole life. The IPL auction had the same impact on Shubham Dubey, Sameer Rizvi and Kumar Kushagra. So you see why Test cricket is under threat. Its pride of place has always been because it is entirely unique and that is still true in some ways – the challenges it presents players, the hope it draws out of the audience – but in others – the opportunities to win trophies, to build careers – there’s some pretty stiff competition. After 150 years, it was bound to happen.Joe Root in the middle of a marathon nets session•AFP”When I started playing under-19, that is when I used to watch a lot of Test matches even before then as well. That was 20, 25 years ago. So, yeah, obviously things change,” Rohit said. “But as far as our team is concerned, we would like to go out there and play our best Test cricket talk about test cricket being the most important cricket, all of that we can do, obviously for the you know, generation that’s coming up for them to know that this is the cricket that you want to play and want to excel as well.”Stokes and Brendon McCullum are doing something similar in encouraging England to play Test matches with sweet, sweet abandon. It doesn’t mean they’re any less committed to winning, just that they want a little more out of putting their minds and bodies on the line over five whole days of existence. And they got it. In Pakistan. In New Zealand. And, most recently, in the Ashes.When people of that calibre are putting in that much effort, there will be results.Yashasvi Jaiswal is practicing his slip catching. He flings himself to the right and grabs the ball inches off the turf. On either side of him, Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer, erupt into noise. It carries over the stands and into the hallway that leads into the press conference room at the Rajiv Gandhi international stadium. All of them care what happens over the next six weeks. When the artists care about the art, the art more often than not survives. But does it have to be this hard?

Team’s valiant efforts on first three days undone in 23.1 overs on fourth afternoon

Alan Gardner21-Jul-2024They had kept at it throughout the morning and afternoon, despite the inhospitable conditions and the odds stacked against them. As England’s fourth-wicket pair pressed towards a double-century stand and the chances for their side apparently receded, spirits remained high. “Baby don’t worry, ’bout a thing, cause every little thing, gonna be all right…”Perhaps it was due to Trent Bridge only being half full for this fourth day that the support for West Indies was more visible – certainly more audible. A clutch had banded together in the lower west terrace of the Radcliffe Road Stand, maroon shirts and funky headpieces, the colours of Dominica, Barbados, St Kitts and Nevis on display. Regular calls of encouragement floated across the ground, with Jason Holder turning on more than one occasion to acknowledge their enthusiasm.Sometimes a Test match resembles a tug of war. One team flexes their muscles and pulls the game their way, only for the opposition to dig in with their heels and start inching the rope back towards them. West Indies may have collapsed in an ungainly heap at the end, but they had made England sweat and strain throughout, at times threatening to pull the contest from their grasp.Few gave them a chance of competing on level terms after defeat inside seven sessions at Lord’s. Few will say, certainly with hindsight, that West Indies had much of a shot of chasing 385 to win in the fourth innings here. But neither did it look like a done deal for England, as Joe Root looked to chisel out as many extra runs as possible with the tail, Jayden Seales hustling through the crease to the end to claim a deserving four-wicket haul.The chase began in confident mood, England again denied early success with the new ball. Kraigg Brathwaite had exhorted his players to “find a way” with the bat before the game and he set the tone in the opening over by calmly drilling Chris Woakes through cover point for four. As Brathwaite cracked along at a run a ball, the West Indies openers put on 50 together for the second time in the match – the first time they had achieved such a feat in England since 1991.Then came the drinks break, a third of the way through an extended evening session that was theoretically set to see 48 overs bowled. West Indies were 61 without loss and seemingly building a sturdy platform from which to carry the fight into day five. Who knows, on a flat pitch, against an attack playing together for the first time, maybe history could be made?Few thought they were capable of levelling the series against Australia at the Gabba in January. Few thought they would pull off a 300-plus run-chase against England at Headingley in 2017, a game in which Brathwaite notched 134 and 95 after the tourists had been pancaked at in the first Test.Jamie Smith and Joe Root go up in unison to celebrate Kirk McKenzie’s dismissal•Getty ImagesBut the naysayers, it turns out, had this one right. The reversal was as swift and brutal as it is possible to be in cricket, where three-and-a-half days of graft can be rendered futile in 23.1 overs of spiralling madness. A punch to the gut just as West Indies fans might have been daring to dream.Brathwaite said afterwards that disappointment was the overriding emotion. “But the main thing is to learn from it,2 he said. “It’s gone, it’s history, we can’t bring it back. Test cricket will always bring challenges. There were positives in the game we can speak about and it’s important that we just learn, learn from different scenarios, different situations in a Test match. Because with 240-odd runs remaining, potentially if we had six/seven wickets in hand on day five, you can think about these things and say we’re not far away. But it’s important to learn.”A Test that had seen West Indies seemingly take a great leap forward with their batting was summed up by one cruel juxtaposition. While the first-innings 457 at Trent Bridge, underpinned by Kavem Hodge’s maiden century, was their highest Test total since 2014, the second-innings implosion marked the first time they had been bowled out in a session since 2013.For Brathwaite, the urge was to make building blocks from the rubble. The next few months amount to a rare period of concentrated cricket for his side, with a third Test against England to come ahead of visits to the Caribbean by South Africa and Bangladesh.Related

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• England make 400-plus twice for the first time, Bashir breaks Anderson's record

• Dominica dominant as two little pals Athanaze and Hodge make England sweat

“The big positive was our first innings, scoring 400 runs was great,” Brathwaite said. “A guy scoring his maiden hundred as well, that was good. I think with the ball we weren’t as good as we were supposed to be in the first innings. We dropped a few chances, which will happen, but I think we need to be a lot more disciplined. We went both sides of the pitch a little too much, too easy at times. That’s one thing we’ve got to get better at. They made 100-120 too many first innings, especially if we caught better.”The more you play, the more you’re in these type of pressure situations in international cricket, once you’re learning and thinking about how to get better, it can only be beneficial for us. The two defeats are gone but we still have five Tests matches remaining for this year. So we keep learning and by the end of the year we’ll be better off, once we have that correct mindset.”The problem for West Indies is that the learning curve is so steep. With the Richards-Botham Trophy back in English hands, there is only pride (and World Test Championship points) to play for at Edgbaston next week. But as those fans in the Radcliffe lower would tell you, pride is no small thing. Time to get up, stand up, and give them something to sing about once again.

All the stats highlights from a stunning match 68 of IPL 2024 where RCB beat CSK by 27 runs

Sampath Bandarupalli18-May-20246 – Consecutive wins – each of them a must-win – for RCB to qualify for the playoffs. This is, interestingly, the second-longest winning streak for RCB in the IPL, behind the seven they won in succession in the 2011 edition. RCB had five successive wins in 2009 and 2016, too, when they made it to the final.1 – Number of wins for RCB in their first eight matches in IPL 2024. These are the fewest wins for any team in the first eight matches in a season where they have qualified for playoffs. The previous fewest was two wins for Mumbai Indians (MI) in 2014, where they won five of their last six league games.2 – Number of teams to have won each of their last six matches in the league stage of an IPL edition, including RCB in 2024. Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) won their final seven league matches of 2014 and finished with nine consecutive wins to win the title.3 – IPL 2024 is only the third season where CSK have failed to make it to the playoffs. They previously missed out in 2020 and 2022, when they finished second last.Most sixes in IPL 2024•ESPNcricinfo Ltd5-0 – RCB’s record in the IPL matches played on May 18. CSK was the opposition on May 18 in 2013, 2014 and 2024, and they also had wins against Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings) in 2016 and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in 2023, all on May 18.157 – Sixes hit by RCB batters in IPL 2024. They are the first team to hit 150-plus sixes in a T20 tournament. The 146 sixes by SRH in this IPL are the next most by a team in a T20 tournament.6 – Number of 200-plus totals by RCB in IPL 2024. These are the joint-highest number of 200-plus totals for a team in a single edition of the IPL. MI had six 200-plus totals in the 16 matches they played last year, while KKR also have six 200-plus totals in IPL 2024 across 12 completed games.3040 – Runs by Virat Kohli in the IPL at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru. He is the first player to complete 3000 runs at a venue in the IPL.Kohli also went past 9000 runs in T20 cricket on Indian soil on the night, making him the first player with 9000-plus T20 runs in any country.

It was their lowest total at home, the lowest ever against New Zealand, and they bagged a record five ducks on their way there

Sampath Bandarupalli17-Oct-202446 – India’s total against New Zealand in Bengaluru was by far their lowest in Test matches at home. Their previous lowest at home was 75 all out against West Indies in 1987 in Delhi.It is also India’s third-lowest total in Tests overall, behind their 36 against Australia at Adelaide Oval in 2020 and 42 against England at Lord’s in 1974.1 – India’s 46 all out is the lowest by any team in Test cricket in Asia. The previous lowest in Asia was 53 all out by West Indies against Pakistan in Faisalabad in 1986 and Pakistan against Australia in Sharjah in 2002.ESPNcricinfo LtdIt is also the lowest total by any team against New Zealand in Tests. The previous lowest was 51 all out by Zimbabwe in Napier in 2012.3 – Number of first-innings totals lower than India’s 46 after electing to bat first in men’s Tests.5 – India batters to be dismissed for a duck in Bengaluru, all in the top eight. It is only the second instance of five out of the top-eight batters being dismissed for ducks in a Test innings. The previous instance was back in 1888, by Australia against England in Manchester.Getty Images15 – Runs scored by India for the loss of their last seven wickets – 31 for 3 to 46 all out. Only once have India added fewer runs in a Test innings for their last seven wickets – 11 against Australia in Pune in 2017.26 – Matches needed for Matt Henry to complete 100 wickets in Test cricket, the joint-second fastest to the milestone among New Zealand players. Richard Hadlee took 25 matches for his 100th Test wicket, while Neil Wagner also needed 26.2012 – The last instance of visiting pacers bagging all ten wickets in a Test innings against India – also by New Zealand in Bengaluru. Five of the seven occasions where the visiting pacers took all ten in an innings against India since 1988 have been by New Zealand.

His century in Multan was a reminder that Pakistan can still be on the right side of Test-match rejoicing

Danyal Rasool08-Oct-2024Pakistan domestic cricket is an unglamorous, hard watch, and you can tell Salman Agha was shaped by its caring, if calloused, hands – he is as close as you can get to a personification of it. The red-ball domestic system is constantly shapeshifting, and Salman’s own adaptability – from pressure absorber to pressure transmitter, from second fiddle to leading man – reveals the turbulent fires his game and personality have been welded in. Since making his international debut, Salman has rarely been in the spotlight; not stylish enough as Saud Shakeel, not charismatic enough as Mohammad Rizwan, and shunted to the outposts of the lower-middle order.His understated nature extends off the field. You speak to him and sense there’s a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth, a man who, despite reaching the other side of 30, never forgets he’s ultimately playing cricket for a living, and thus life isn’t that bad. Even his unbeaten 104 feels like the footnote to an impressive Pakistan innings, devoid of the delightful panache of Abdullah Shafique or the engrossing personal narrative of Shan Masood’s effort.When Salman came out, Pakistan had lost two quick wickets and were wobbling at 393 for 6. Just two Tests ago, a first-innings score of 448 for 6 declared against Bangladesh had resulted in a ten-wicket defeat.Related

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• Crawley leads England reply after Salman hundred sets up Pakistan

The first ball of the second session on Tuesday was a harbinger for England; Jack Leach pitched one up, and Salman half-volleyed it through the covers. It was the defining match-up of the session; Leach would bowl 61 balls to him with Salman plundering 65 runs off them. It included three sixes, one in fortunate circumstances as Chris Woakes caught him on the long-off boundary, only to leave a trailing foot planted outside the rope as he took the catch upon his return into the field of play. The call may have gone either way, and upon his reprieve, Salman chuckled before launching Leach over long-on the very next ball. Salman later said he looks to attack “all spinners in any situation”, but Leach – at the receiving end of more of Salman’s milestones – was singled out. He was clipped for the couple that brought up Salman’s half-century, smashed for the boundary that fetched him his 1000th run, and milked for the run that got him his century.The word in vogue is aura, and Salman has precisely none of it. It is perhaps that which discombobulated Salman as he batted on with Shaheen Afridi. England’s field settings bordered on the curious by this time, the visitors leaving several fielders in the deep towards the end of overs allowing him to farm the strike. Even when Abrar appeared to be trying to get out, England made him work to give his wicket away, Jamie Smith missing a straight stumping before Gus Atkinson put down a sitter. Abrar had a look of amusement at the other end; England might have been bored by this point, but having done this for over a decade in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, Salman is close to unboreable.But his nonchalance belies a steel that has been present since the day he made his Test debut. Runs scored with the lower order intrinsically feel lower-value, but Salman’s have been anything but. In this WTC cycle, Pakistan have scored exactly 2000 runs from batting positions five to eight, averaging 44.44 runs per wicket – no other side betters that. If you’re in any doubt about Salman’s outsized role in that statistic, here’s another one; no batter in world cricket has managed more runs in positions 7-8 than Salman’s 946 since he made his debut. If you consider Pakistan’s top-order-batting woes for the best part of Salman’s time in the side, those have not been bonus runs, but Pakistan’s bread and butter.Salman’s adaptability was on show in Multan•Getty ImagesFor the last year, Pakistan have been present at the scene of much Test-match rejoicing. Australia enjoyed themselves so much that David Warner, coming out to bat in his farewell Test to seal a series whitewash over Pakistan, allowed himself a beer at lunch before knocking off the winning runs. Bangladesh’s exultation was on an altogether higher plane, their Test series victory in Pakistan seen as an optimistic portent in the wake of a revolution.The last two days, Pakistan have got something of a taste of how all that felt in a remarkable inversion of the script. It was England who lined up with a bowling attack that looked wholly unsuited to these conditions, the next 149 overs dishing up further proof. England missed a key chance by inches to get Salman out early, the frustration exacerbated as he went on to reach three figures. It was England that lost their discipline and intensity as Pakistan’s last four put on 163.Pakistan were the side backing a struggling batting line-up, eschewing the ever-present temptation of frenetic changes. And – heaven above! – Pakistan were even taking stunners, Aamer Jamal refusing to let his magical Australian summer fade as England’s last-minute opener Ollie Pope was sent packing inside two deliveries. Even as England’s subsequent partnership delivered its reality check, Pakistan finally had the chance to remind themselves that is what made it all so much fun.And with Salman’s wide grin reminding them every single day, who could really forget?

In our first batch of team report cards for 2024: Sri Lanka, England, New Zealand, Pakistan, Ireland, the Associates

28-Dec-2024

England

by Andrew Miller
Ben Stokes once claimed his captaincy role model was Brad Pitt’s tank commander in the World War 2 film . At times in a tetchy 2024, he bore more resemblance to Jerry Maguire, Tom Cruise’s slick sports agent, in the midst of a locker-room meltdown.”You don’t know what it’s like to be me out here for you!” Stokes more or less implored, as a distinct lack of gratitude greeted England’s one-team mission to make Test cricket fun again – including widespread criticism of their eight often-thumping defeats out of 17 Tests played, and the ICC’s intransigence towards their tardy over-rates, which left Stokes cocking a snook at the World Test Championship in response.And yet, with apologies to a low-key home summer against West Indies and Sri Lanka, and tours of Pakistan and New Zealand that were a little bit samey, given the thrills of Bazball 1.0 only 18 months earlier, this was primarily a year of repositioning for England’s teams – red and white alike.The Test squad’s major objective, victory in India, had gone south by the end of February, taking with it the careers of James Anderson, Jonny Bairstow and Ben Foakes, to name but three key casualties. Likewise, head coach Matthew Mott carried the can for a T20 World Cup defence that was considerably less inspired than England’s semi-final finish would suggest.The future looked bright from the get-go, however. Gus Atkinson, Brydon Carse, Jamie Smith and Jacob Bethell were just some of the Test debutants who immediately seized their stage, while Harry Brook and Joe Root’s 454-run stand in Multan was the prelude to them taking turns at topping the ICC’s batting rankings.With a home rematch against India looming in the summer, and the 2025-26 Ashes thereafter, England’s sins of 2024 will be amply forgiven if 2025 turns out to be a year to remember.Much the same will apply to England’s women, with the Ashes awaiting in the new year. Their unbeaten home summer against Pakistan and New Zealand was swiftly forgotten thanks to their catastrophic failure at the T20 World Cup, where West Indies booted them out in the group stages. Heather Knight’s team did, however, end the year with a first Test win in ten years, to cap a successful multi-format tour of South Africa, and warm up for their main event in 2025.High point
Two of England’s nine Test victories were truly astonishing, including their run-romp in Multan. But nothing could compare with the heist in Hyderabad in January, where Ollie Pope swept and reverse-swept his way to arguably the greatest innings by an England batter in Asia. He overturned a 190-run deficit to put England 1-0 up, and the Bazball effect seemingly knew no bounds.Low point
It wasn’t the most damaging defeat of the year, but it was the most roundly condemned. England’s attitude stank during their dead-rubber loss to Sri Lanka at The Oval, particularly in a slap-happy second innings that opened the way for Pathum Nissanka’s fourth-innings victory march. The team could have been gunning for a first home summer Test sweep for 20 years. Instead they got bent over Mother Cricket’s knee for an eight-wicket spanking.Results
Men
Tests: P17 W9 L8
ODIs: P8 W3 L5
T20Is: P17 W10 L5 NR2Women
Tests: P1 W1
ODIs: P15 W11 L3 NR1
T20Is: P22 W19 L3Pakistan marked a surprising resurgence in ODIs towards the end of the year with a 2-1 ODI series win in Australia•Getty Images

Pakistan

by Danyal Rasool
If it wasn’t for the last couple of months, Pakistan’s 2024 would be about as bleak as a Kafka novel. There was disaster at the T20 World Cup, and an embarrassing 2-0 home Test defeat against Bangladesh. There was bedlam at the administrative level, where PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi has held on to power but little else is stable. Mickey Arthur, Grant Bradburn and Mohammad Hafeez left their coaching positions in January, before Gary Kirsten and Jason Gillespie were appointed in April. Before the year was out, both had quit in frustration.The year was salvaged slightly by a surprising turnaround to defeat England 2-1 in a home Test series, and by Pakistan’s ODI form, which saw them win three away series in a row, over Australia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.There was little to cheer for Pakistan supporters in the women’s game. The side won just five of 25 matches across formats, failing to win a single ODI of the six they played. There were series losses to West Indies and England in ODIs and T20Is, and they struggled to break through in multi-team competitions too, running Sri Lanka close but failing to make the Asia Cup final. At the Women’s T20 World Cup, an impressive win over Sri Lanka was a false dawn, and they lost their next three matches heavily. Moreover, the women’s PSL that the PCB has frivolously name-dropped, appears further away than ever.High point
All of Pakistan men’s sustainable gains appear to have come in ODIs – decent timing, with a home Champions Trophy around the corner. They played no ODI cricket between last year’s World Cup and November this year, but they show signs of having stumbled into assembling a 50-over team that can take on the best, and a four-pronged pace attack put Australia to the sword in a thrilling 2-1 series win. Saim Ayub’s explosive form up top marks him as arguably the best ODI opener in the world currently, and Pakistan’s resurgence in the format is as unexpected as it is welcome.Low point
Perhaps the Test defeat at Bangladesh’s hands at home was a graver sign of decline, but what happened at the T20 World Cup trumps it for sheer shock value. Pakistan began with one of their worst ICC tournament performances in history, scraping to a tie with the USA before losing the Super Over. They followed up with a stutter of monumental proportions against India, when they somehow found a way of messing up a chase where they required 48 in eight overs with eight wickets in hand. Days later, they had marked their earliest exit in T20 World Cup history.ResultsMen
Tests: P6 W2 L4
ODIs: P9 W7 L2
T20Is: P27 W9 L17 NR1Women
ODIs: P6 L5 NR 1
T20Is: P19 W5 L14Chamari Athapaththu led from the front again to give Sri Lanka women their first Asia Cup title•Sri Lanka Cricket

Sri Lanka

by Andrew Fidel Fernando
For the first time since 2014, perhaps, Sri Lanka fans can reflect on a year of cricket and mark it down as “mostly good”. Both the men and the women crashed out of their T20 World Cups at the first opportunity, so let’s temper the good vibes with some hard truths. But still, there is reason to look to the future with optimism, for now at least.The men’s greatest triumphs came in the second half of the year. They beat India in an ODI bilateral series for the first time in 27 years, before triumphing in limited-overs series against New Zealand and West Indies (all at home). In Tests, their best performance was in the third Test against England, at The Oval, in which their four-pronged pace attack scythed through the home team in seaming conditions. There were, additionally, 2-0 wins against both Bangladesh (away), and New Zealand (home).The women lit up the early parts of the year. They won a T20I series in South Africa, before drawing the ODI series there. They then surged through the WT20 Qualifier before, in July, winning six T20Is in a row to lift the Asia Cup. Though the team are still heavily reliant on Chamari Athapaththu, who keeps dropping hints that she is retiring soon, 2024 was the year in which Harshitha Samarawickrama broke out, while teenager Vishmi Gunaratne also made strides.High point
There’s very little in cricket to match the fun of winning a multi-team tournament, and Sri Lanka Women’s Asia Cup triumph was especially sweet for having come in front of an adoring crowd in Dambulla. Packed stands and grass banks roared for Sri Lanka in their tough final against India. The images and emotions from that win will last those players – and many fans – a lifetime.Low point
While the women failing to win a single match at the World Cup was a shock, the men’s tumbling out of their World Cup within the first few days was especially facepalm-worthy. There was also the 42 all out in Durban – the lowest Test total Sri Lanka have ever made in Tests.Men
Tests: P10 W6 L4
ODIs: P18 W12 L3 T1 NR2
T20Is: P20 W10 L10 Women
ODIs: P9 W5 L3 NR1
T20Is: P23 W15 L8The 2024 T20 World Cup was New Zealand Women’s first global title in the format•Getty Images

New Zealand

by Deivarayan Muthu
The year 2024 was one of unprecedented highs and lowly lows for New Zealand cricket. The Black Caps pulled off the unthinkable by not only securing their first-ever Test series victory in India but handing India their first-ever whitewash at home in a series of three or more matches. Hours after the men’s side had won the first Test, the White Ferns hit similar heady highs when they clinched their first T20 World Cup, toppling South Africa in Dubai.However, soon after conquering India, New Zealand men suffered back-to-back crushing losses at home against England’s Bazballers and eventually fell out of the race to make it to the World Test Championship final. Their 323-run drubbing in Wellington was their worst defeat at home in terms of margin of runs. Earlier in the year, in the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean, New Zealand’s men failed to make it out of the group stage, with their prep – or lack thereof – coming into sharp focus.The women’s side did deliver a T20 World Cup title but there was no indication that success was coming. Before that tournament, they lost ten T20Is in a row, their longest losing streak in the format.It was also a year where the cricketing landscape changed in New Zealand, with Neil Wagner and Tim Southee retiring from international cricket and Trent Boult signing off from World Cups. Kane Williamson, Finn Allen, Devon Conway, Lockie Ferguson and Adam Milne all gave up their central contracts to become freelancers. With the mushrooming of T20 – and T10 – leagues, the likes of Tim Seifert and Doug Bracewell even knocked back their domestic contracts to go the same route. Before the triumphant tour of India, Tom Latham took over from Southee as full-time Test captain and towards the end of the year, Mitchell Santner assumed charge as full-time white-ball captain.Speaking of changes, an unknown, uncapped domestic player, Bevon Jacobs, was plucked out from the Super Smash to turn up for Mumbai Indians in IPL 2025.High point
The New Zealand men’s side came to India with just two wins in 12 Test trips from 1955. In just six days in 2024, they turned that into five wins and swept India 3-0. “I think there’d be not many pundits around the world [who] would say that you would go to India and win 3-0 and probably deep down, I’m not sure if we even believed that it was possible ourselves to do this, considering it’s never been done in history before,” New Zealand coach Gary Stead said.The White Ferns staged a stunning turnaround of their own to hand New Zealand their first world T20 title.Low point
Though the women lurched from one defeat to another in the early half of 2024, and the men were walloped in Wellington towards the end of the year, the Black Caps’ T20 World Cup performance in the Caribbean in June was the performance that left them red-faced.Men
Tests: P12 W6 L6
ODIs: P3 L2 NR1
T20Is: P19 W9 L9 NR1
Women
ODIs: P11 W2 L9
T20Is: P19 W6 L13Ireland’s six-year wait for a Test win ended this year, in Abu Dhabi•ACB Media