It’s fair to say that England’s batsmen have not had a good tour of the UAE so far. Seeing the performance in light of England spending the last year breaking batting records left, right and centre has been especially shocking, but the numbers actually stand out without any help. I’ve sound some fairly interesting numbers ahead of the third Test
England’s top seven batsmen average just 18.77 between them, right now that’s the lowest they have averaged in any series this century by some distance. The next lowest is 25.04, set on the 03/04 tour of Sri Lanka, so they will need a fairly good performance (most likely in the area of 500 runs) to avoid the worst mark this century.
Pakistan’s top order have been kept in check, however, meaning that the two teams have an average of 25.97 for the top seven batsmen. Currently it ranks 182 of the 190 series this century. Interestingly, recent Pakistan sides have been involved in three of the lower averages; both their series in England in 2010 had combined top order averages under the one from this Test, and their two Test series against the Windies last year is the second lowest.
So far no batsman has scored a century in the series. There have been 14 series of two or more matches in which no batsman has scored a century, but only six three match series in which that has occurred (or failed to occur) and two of those were in the nineteenth century.
The last time no English batsman has scored a century in a series was at home against New Zealand in 1999.
Pakistan’s win is their fourth in a row, which they have not done since August – October 2003 when they whitewashed Bangladesh and then won the first Test against South Africa. The last time they won more than four consecutive Tests was when they won six on the trot from May 2001 to February 2002.
Defensive Indifference 