Stat Attack: The Blackcaps’ Closest Ever Test Victories
The early wickets were a boost. Coming into the fourth day of the first Test between Pakistan and New Zealand, Pakistan were 37/0 with a further 139 runs to win and all of their wickets in hand, so none of what was to follow would’ve been possible had Kane Williamson not opted for double spin to start the day and been rewarded with wickets to both Ajaz Patel and Ish Sodhi within the first six overs of the day, taking Pakistan from 37/0 to 48/3.
Azhar Ali and Asad Shafiq then tidied things up for the hosts (weird to call them that when they don’t even get to play in their own country but UAE is their cricketing home these days so hosts it is), taking Pakistan to the brink of an expected victory. Hey, 176 to win is always going to be in the batting team’s favour unless they’re playing on a nuclear wasteland of a pitch or a literal minefield. Especially when you’ve got seven wickets in hand, five sessions and an over remaining, and only 46 more runs to win. It’s crazy to think how mundane that sounds considering what happened next.
Then Neil Wagner struck, dismissing Asad Shafiq caught behind for 45 on the brink of lunch, and there was a still sliver of hope remaining. After the lunch break… well, that’s when things got borderline supernatural. Babar Azam was run out with 29 runs to win, five wickets remaining. Sarfraz Ahmed was caught behind with 23 runs to win, four wickets remaining. Bilal Asid and Yasir Shah went immediately after and it was 22 to win with two wickets remaining.
Even then, you’d rate the batting team to get there but it was getting extremely fascinating. After all, if you need two wickets then you get your most effective bowlers to go hundies. If you need twenty runs with two wickets left then you’re forced to do it with your two worst batsmen and whoever was left over, in this case Azhar Ali – who played an absolute blinder considering what he was dealing with at the other end. Can’t ignore what a gutsy, determined, battling innings that was just because the result didn’t go his way. Especially when a lot of the focus is going to be on some dumbass batting from a few of his mates.
Ajaz Patel and Neil Wagner went all out for the rest of the game. There was a feeling that maybe Trent Boult might be more useful, getting the ball full and on the stumps and all that (compared to the amount of duck-able deliveries Wagnuts tends to bowl)… but then you try and get the ball out of Neil Wagner’s hands at that point of the match. Lost amidst all the rest of it is that Neil Wagner bowled 13 consecutive overs through the hottest part of the United Arab Emirates day, including 11.3 (69 deliveries) without a break after lunch. That’s monstrous for a pace bowler, even by his own standards.
Hasan Ali had got very silly and was caught out on the boundary with 12 runs left to get, trying to halve the deficit in one swing despite it being the last ball of the over and all he had to do was block it out to keep Azhar on strike. Then Azhar set about doing it with immense patience by going one run per over to keep Mohammad Abbas off strike as much as possible… he wasn’t able pierce the deep field for any welcome boundaries despite a few creative attempts.
Once the runs to win got within four it was going to get extremely difficult for Williamson to arrange his fields. Like, bring protection up at the end of the over to try and trap Azhar at the wrong end would risk ending the game right there if the ball snuck through to the fence… effectively Azhar could have just blocked five and taken a single off the last one for the rest of the way. Maybe… you never know how any game of Test cricket is going to progress and this game was sure proof of that – but these would have been the thoughts bouncing through Williamson (and a few hundred thousand kiwi cricket fans and probably a few million more Pakistani ones) head(s).
Then, erm, this happened…
Words cannot sufficiently describe that moment, nor the hour or so of utterly gripping Test Cricket that proceeded it.
This is where Test Cricket becomes untouchable. Shorter form cricket there’s the possibility of runs or wickets on every single delivery, which is nice in its own way. But only in Test Cricket do you get spells like this where there seems no possibility of runs or wickets for long stretches of time. That sounds like a bad thing but it isn’t. It’s the best, most entertaining thing imaginable. Every. Single. Run. Matters. Think of the lone boundary Trent Boult hit in the first innings. Four runs… that was the difference. Tiny margins deciding a massive result.
And tiny margins is fair, mate, this was the smallest victory New Zealand has ever managed in terms of runs defended…
4 RUNS vs Pakistan (Abu Dhabi) – November 2018
7 RUNS vs Australia (Hobart) – December 2011
27 RUNS vs West Indies (Auckland) – March 2006
32 RUNS vs Pakistan (Dunedin) – November 2009
32 RUNS vs Zimbabwe (Bulawayo) – November 2011
40 RUNS vs South Africa Port Elizabeth) - February 1962
40 RUNS vs India (Auckland) - February 2014
44 RUNS vs Pakistan (Lahore) – November 1996
53 RUNS vs West Indies (Bridgetown) – June 2014
62 RUNS vs India (Wellington) – February 1981
Keep in mind that Test match wins are hard to come by for New Zealand, particularly away from home. Hell, Test matches in general are hard to come by, particularly away from home. This was the first time the Blackcaps had played a Test in seven months since another famous finish when Ish Sodhi and Neil Wagner batted for ages in Christchurch to preserve a draw against England… and it was the first Test the Blackcaps had played outside of Aotearoa (massively relevant because of some of the hype around this team over the last year or two and how difficult it is to win away from home in international cricket) since the tour to India in October 2016 – 25 months between away Tests.
Not the smallest victory by runs ever though. That honour belongs to the West Indies after Courtney Walsh got Craig McDermott out caught behind in Adelaide (1993) to end a 40-run final wicket partnership two shy of the win for a one-run triumph. Smallest possible margin, obviously. Then there have also been three Ashes Tests, in 1902, 1982 and 2005, which were decided by two or three runs. If you were watching cricket in the mid-00s then you definitely remember Steve Harmison getting Mark Kasprowicz caught behind down the legside at Headingly that time. One of the great Test matches ever played.
Alternatively if Pakistan had snuck through with one wicket remaining then it would have been the first one-wicket victory since India did it to Aussie at Mohali in 2010. There have only been 12 such one-wicket wins in Test history, the first in 1902. There have only been a further 17 matches won by two-wickets as well. New Zealand have one of each, both coming in the 1980s – a one-wicket win over the West Indies in Dunedin, 1980 and a two-wicket win over Pakistan, also in Dunedin but five years later in 1985.
Comparatively the 12 smallest margins of victory by runs takes us down to an 11-run win by Aussie over England in 1925, while the 29th smallest margin of victory by runs (matching the 29 one or two wicket wins in history, if you ain’t clicked on) a pair of 22-run victories by Pakistan over England in 2005 and England over Bangladesh in 2016. Coming back to that earlier point that it’s easier to get the last couple wickets than it is to get the last couple dozen runs.
Then of course we have the drawn Tests. No chance of that one happening here, it would’ve taken roughly 130 more consecutive maiden overs or a whole lot of unforecasted rain to stop this one shy of a winning result but the Blackcaps have definitely been there before. The Ish Sodhi innings in Christchurch was an example of clinging on for a draw, the Monty Panesar/Matt Prior game the previous time England toured here was an example of being frustrated into a draw. Not quite the same but another example of Test cricket dramatics… not gonna go all in on those though because they’re tricky to compare because of the massively varying states of games that lead to draws.
How about lowest totals successfully defended then? Yeah believe it or not we’ve done better… but only once. That was all the way back in 1978 when Sir Richard Hadlee had one of his finest performances, taking 6/26 in the fourth innings (and 10/100 for the match) to bowl a touring England side which included the likes of Geoffrey Boycott, Ian Botham and Derek Randall out for 64 while chasing 137 for the win. They didn’t even get close. But previous to that it was the famous Hobart Test where we bowled Australia out for 233, seven runs short, which was next on the list. Only one other time in history have the Blackcaps defended a total of under 250 (England at The Oval in 1999, another famous win).
Flip that to unsuccessful defences and there have been 65 example of New Zealand setting totals of 250 or less to win and then losing. Beginning with setting Pakistan a target of 1 in Hyderabad in 1976, no surprises to see we lost that one by ten wickets.
So New Zealand bowling to a target in the fourth innings, excluding drawn Tests, goes:
TARGET <250: 4 wins & 65 losses
TARGET >250: 29 wins & 8 losses
Sometimes the game can be very predictable. Sometimes the game is like nothing you’ve ever seen before.
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