Shan Masood and others who reached their maiden Test hundreds with a six

Batting against Sri Lanka, Shan Masood completed his maiden test century with a six.

Shan Masood in his match winning 125 against Sri Lanka at Pallekele completed his maiden test century with a six. Bharath Seervi lists the batsmen who got to their maiden test hundred with a six.

Test cricket is known to be a game of patience where batsmen usually prefer getting to their milestones in a slow and steady manner. But, not all batsmen adhere to this trend. While most prefer to take it slow after getting into the 90s in order to minimise risk of getting out, some try to race through the period in order to stifle the influence of the ‘nervous nineties’.

Scoring a century in Tests is of utmost importance to all batsmen and with that thought they try to get there as safely as possible while the brash ones go for the big ones against all the odds. Sometimes the aggressive route does pay off.

In the final test of the series between Sri Lanka and Pakistan at Pallekele, Pakistan were given a target of 377 to win. One of the openers Ahmed Shehzad was out for a duck for three balls in the second over and then Azhar Ali went to pavilion in the seventh over. But Shan Masood, the opener, and Younis Khan at number four were determined at the crease. Shan Masood had scored 75 in his debut test innings and in the next eight innings he never scored more than 40. This time the stage was set and the chance was there to prove his worth for the team.

Masood breached the 75-run mark and worked his way to 96 and in a bid to get done through his first ever experience of nervous nineties quickly, he attacked spinner Tharindu Kaushal and it paid off as the ball went for six, taking Masood past the 100-run mark. He joined a club of players who reached their maiden test century with a six in Tests. The table below lists all the players who got to their maiden test century with a six. Overall Shan Masood is the 28^th to feature in the list which has most of the players from this century.

Maiden Test century with a six

– It was the only century in test career for Ted Bowley, Paul Winslow, Chris Lewis, John Benaud, Ian Davis, IjazFaqih, Collis King and Robert Samuels. Mitchell Johnson, Irfan Pathan, Dean Brownlie and Shan Masood have also scored only one century but haven’t retired yet.

– Till 2014, only one player from Pakistan had this distinction – Ijaz Faqih in 1986/87. But in about a year there have been two players who done this – Sarfraz Ahmed and Shan Masood.

– Phillip Hughes and Mitchell Johnson did in the same series in South Africa in 2008/09 – Only such instance.

– Ridley Jacobs scored three test centuries out of which two had come with a six, his first two.

Footnote Trivia – Most test centuries reached with a six

This is another record held by Sachin Tendulkar. He scored six test centuries with a six to which no one came near. The next highest is four by Ken Barrington. Batsmen who have completed three centuries with a six in Tests are Brian Lara, Chris Gayle, Brendon McCullum and Kumar Sangakkara.

(Bharath Seervi is a cricket statistician who is obsessed with digging numbers, facts and records related to the game. An active member of Society of Cricket Statisticians of India, he blogs at www.cricketseervistats.blogspot.com. He can be followed on Twitter at @SeerviBharath and on Facebook here)

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