Numbers don’t lie. Well, mostly. And in the world of sport, every passing day throws fascinating numbers at us to analyse and dissect. Many sports fans are statistics-nerds by default, because who doesn’t like to show off how good the team or player one supports is. With that in mind, The Field brings you to a weekly series on the numbers that made the news from around the sporting world, across varied publications.
Here’s a look at the key statistics that we came across in the past week.
244 not out
Alastair Cook scored his highest individual score against Australia to put England in the lead of the fourth Ashes Test. Along with his double century, the left-handed opener became the seventh highest run scorer in Test history. His score is the highest individual score by any batsman carrying his bat through a Test innings. Cook struggled to find form earlier in the series and has been troubled by Mitchell Starc’s searing pace. But with Starc out with injury, Cook came out of his shadow and played with the resilience reminiscent of his innings at the Gabba in 2010. [The Field]
£75 million
Liverpool dropped a serious amount of money on Dutch defender Virgil van Dijk, making him the seventh most expensive transfer in football history. The former Southhampton defender is also the expensive defender in history. [The Field]
Five world number ones
In a perplexing year for women’s tennis, no one player managed to hold onto the No 1 ranking consistently. Aided by the absence of Serena Williams, players duked it out over the course of the year, with no player emerging as a dominant force. [The Field]
58 points
The Manchester City juggernaut continues to obliterate the opposition. Pep Guardiola’s team is on track for the best season among all European teams. If they win the remaining 18 games, they will end up with 112 points. The Premier League’s best finish of 95 points by Chelsea in 2004-’05 looks to like an easy target for City. [Yahoo Sports]
14 years
The time between Viswanathan Anand’s first and second World Rapid Chess Championship titles. The 48-year-old Grandmaster beat Vladimir Fedoseev 2-0 in the tie-break play-off. On his route to victory, he beat world champion Magnus Carlsen. [The Field]
33,643 points
Kobe Bryant’s total points tally after retiring last season. Bryant whose jerseys were retired last week is arguably one of the greatest basketball players of all-time. The Los Angeles Lakers guard is third on the all-time scoring list. Only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Karl Malone are ahead. But Bryant’s legacy is not just his points tally, but the way he’s scored them. He was ridiculously efficient as a scoring guard. In his prime, very few players came close. [FiveThirtyEight]
19 matches
The number of Test matches India have played without losing, the fifth on the all-time list. In recent history, an Australian team led by Ricky Ponting between 2005 to 2008 played 22 matches before registering a defeat. India however are facing possibly their hardest series in the last 18 months facing a formidable South African team. [Cricket Archive]