Mahela Jayawardene-100 tests

[Lostman]

Congrats to Jayawardene on playing 100 tests. Sangakarra has a nice article on him on cricinfo, as well as an interview
Destined to rewrite all records
Interview

I first saw Mahela bat during a SL "A" game vs. West Indian A side at the SSC, and even during that time it seemed that everyone knew he was going to be captaining SL at some point in the future. And he had already been marked as Aravinda's replacement in the SL middle order. In the first few years of his career, I wasn't his biggest fan, always thought he threw his wicket away and never delivered under pressure, but he has improved a great deal over the last few years.
His overall numbers do look great, 99 matches 7926 runs @ 53, but they do hide his relatively weak play once he leaves the island. Home average @66 opposed to 39 away. However, he has been a great captain for Sri Lanka and I felt that once he was made captain his overall performance had been much much better.

25 matches with an average of 66.
home-13 games with an average of 100
away-12 games average of 41

I hope he does manage to improve his away average, He is only 31 and has about another 4 years to do so. But as captain he has played some great innings for Sri lanka. The hundred in Australia last year, the massive 300 against SA that lead to a win and also a hundred against SA when SL were chasing 350ish, which also lead to a win. The hundred against NZ in the WC semi was another great innings. But perhaps his greatest innings was the miracle against England at lords. The SL team was struggling at that point, and that hundred really turned around the teams fortune, managed to draw the test as well as the series because of it.

Also he is a great catcher, when he first started out he was helping murali out in front as a fwd. short leg, but even now as slip catcher he is second to none. Easily the best slip fielder SL has ever had.

 

[Richard]

Jayawardene has often been a player who slips under the radar, so it's no surprise I hadn't noticed this impending milestone. A good few games will have been against Bangladesh, mind, and they and the joke of Zimbabwe 2003/04 do make a difference - on official records it's 99 games, average 52.84, SR 52.70; against Test-class teams it's 87 games, average 50.44, SR 50.96.

Nonetheless, Jayawardene in recent times has undisputably been a terrific batsman. Until 2002 (ie, in the first 5 years of his career) he'd remarkably played just 7 games outside the subcontinent, and hadn't done much in them. After his Lord's 2002 he became much more consistent, then suddenly went completely inconsistent (since 2004/05 he's made 4 centuries in 20 innings, 2 40s, 2 30s and 11 scores of 14 or less). He's still played just 20 games against Test-standard teams outside the subcontinent the last 7 years though, which is not very many. His against-Test-standard-teams outside-subcont average is currently 36.23, and he should be pretty well at the peak of his powers right now so I hope he can get that up into the 40s eventually. Hope he plays a good few games outside the subcont in the next few years too.

In Sri Lanka and India though, he's been quite brilliant right from the very start of his career, and in 52 Tests (this is all against Test-standard teams - no Bangladesh) he averages a quite staggering 64.02. Only Pakistan remains in the subcontinent for him to conquer - he averages just 30.15 in 7 Tests there.

 

[_Ed_]

Fantastic player, congrats to him for this great achievement.

 

[zaremba]

Jayawardene has often been a player who slips under the radar, so it's no surprise I hadn't noticed this impending milestone. A good few games will have been against Bangladesh, mind, and they and the joke of Zimbabwe 2003/04 do make a difference - on official records it's 99 games, average 52.84, SR 52.70; against Test-class teams it's 87 games, average 50.44, SR 50.96.

A pretty formidable record then!

I loved Sangakkara's article about him. That boy can write.

 

[GIMH]

Also didn't realise he had reached this milestone. fair play, great player

 

[Jono]

Great achievement.

I really enjoy watching him bat, and he's a fantastic captain!

In fact, the only thing I don't like about Mahela is his voice.

 

[Mister Wright]

How good is Sangakkara as a writer? Love reading his articles.

 

[Athlai]

His eloquence with words being second only to when he's in full gear with the bat.

 

[Migara]

Has been a great batsman for SL, but by any means not the best. By the looks of it, Sangakkara the writer is going to get the crown from Aravinda de Silva, who took it from Mahadevan Sathasivam, who was a Ceylon player in 1950s.

But the real sad part is he is not a shadow of great duo of Aravinda and Arjuna in ODIs. His ODI SR is average. If Mahela cannot fill de Silva's spot, then I wouldn't belive there will be any one in next 25 years to fill it.

 

[SirBloody Idiot]

His eloquence with words being second only to when he's in full gear with the bat.

Is that you, Mark Nicholas?

 

[Athlai]

Is that you, Mark Nicholas?

You got me.

 

[G.I.Joe]

Seems like only yesterday that me and my friend had a chuckle over his first name on his debut. Quite possibly the first player I've witnessed both the debut and 100th test milestone of.

 

[R_D]

Always liked him.... ever since i saw him hit a 100 in ODI's against England in Aus... won them the match chasing 300 runs... his first ODI hundred.
Good player to watch... good captain as well

 

[susudear]

Good player

Strong home bully.

Mediocre away batsman.

But so good to watch when he gets going.

 

[Richard]

Always liked him.... ever since i saw him hit a 100 in ODI's against England in Aus... won them the match chasing 300 runs... his first ODI hundred.

Haha, a never-to-be-forgotten game, for mostly the wrong reasons. Hick and Jayawardene being the only big plus-points.

 

[krkode]

A pretty formidable record then!

I loved Sangakkara's article about him. That boy can write.

I noticed this. He's a pretty solid writer. The common trend in the subcontinent seems to be very little schooling for cricketers. I remember there was a point when Saqlain who won the MoM in a test against India in 1999 couldn't speak English to the presenter and so replied in Hindi.

That said, I've always felt like Jayawardene is probably the most underrated of contemporary batsmen averaging over 50.

I read an interesting tidbit a while back. Apparently, the dismissal "c Jayawardene b Muralitharan" is the most common dismissal in test cricket. Not sure if that included wicketkeepers or not. Possibly "c Gilchrist b McGrath" might be more common if you include wicketkeepers. Thought that was pretty neat, still.

 

[Richard]

It can't possibly be including wicketkeepers, surely? Must be the most common bowler-fielder combo, and I'm not in the least surprised at that. M Waugh \ Warne might well be 2nd as well? Or Taylor Warne?

Things like Marsh Lillee, Healy Warne and Boucher Ntini must be up near the very top, surely?

 

[krkode]

It can't possibly be including wicketkeepers, surely? Must be the most common bowler-fielder combo, and I'm not in the least surprised at that. M Waugh \ Warne might well be 2nd as well? Or Taylor Warne?

Things like Marsh Lillee, Healy Warne and Boucher Ntini must be up near the very top, surely?

Yeah, I just did some checking. It's definitely fielder-bowler combo.

Murali-Jayawardene is 70 dismissals.

McGrath-Gilchrist have 90. Ntini-Boucher 82. Lillee-Marsh 95.

 

[Lostman]

I remember there was a point when Saqlain who won the MoM in a test against India in 1999 couldn't speak English to the presenter and so replied in Hindi.

What exactly is wrong with that? Its not their native language.

 

[Fiji-Bati]

Jayawardene is a great batsman, who I think is under rated.