“Has Mohammad Rizwan Achieved the Highest Run Score in the World Cup as a Wicketkeeper?”
“Has Mohammad Rizwan Achieved the Highest Run Score in the World Cup as a Wicketkeeper?”
During a recent World Cup match between Bangladesh and New Zealand in Chennai, Bangladesh opener Litton Das faced a rather unfortunate fate. He became the 86th batsman in men’s one-day international history to depart on the very first ball of the match. While the list includes some instances where the dismissal came from the first legal delivery after wides or no-balls, Litton was only the seventh man to fall to the first legitimate delivery of a World Cup match.
The first such incident occurred in the 1992 World Cup when New Zealand’s John Wright was dismissed on the first ball against Australia in Auckland, although this game began with two wides from Craig McDermott. Since then, it has happened to a select few, including Hannan Sarkar for Bangladesh in 2003, Ed Joyce for England in 2007 (the first ball was a no-ball), Brendan Taylor for Zimbabwe in 2011 (lbw to Khurram Chohan), Martin Guptill for New Zealand in 2019 (lbw to Sheldon Cottrell), and Dimuth Karunaratne for Sri Lanka in the same year (bowled by Kagiso Rabada).
To add to Litton Das’s woes, this unfortunate event took place on his birthday. He became the 25th player to be dismissed for a duck in an ODI on his birthday, but only the third in a World Cup. The other two were Ian Bell (England against Bangladesh in 2007) and Shahid Afridi (Pakistan vs. Zimbabwe in 2015). Notably, five of the 25 instances were golden ducks, and the list even includes Makhaya Ntini, who was run out without facing a ball on his 23rd birthday in 2000.
Furthermore, during a World Cup match, Liam Livingstone of England also faced a golden duck but managed to take a wicket with the very first ball he bowled. A similar instance took place in the 2015 World Cup when Pakistan’s Wahab Riaz was dismissed by the first ball he faced and later had Hashim Amla caught behind with his opening delivery. Though detailed ball-by-ball data from earlier World Cups is limited, these occurrences have indeed added some unique twists to cricket history.
During the recent World Cup, New Zealand’s opening batsman Devon Conway joined an exclusive club by becoming the 16th individual to score a century right at the start of the tournament. This impressive feat sparked a chain reaction, with his teammates Rachin Ravindra and Pakistan’s Abdullah Shafique emulating his success.
Conway’s spectacular innings in the opening match in Ahmedabad, where he scored an unbeaten 152 runs against England, etched his name into World Cup history. This achievement made it the fourth-highest score at the beginning of a World Cup. At the very top of this list is South Africa’s Gary Kirsten, who struck an unbeaten 188 runs in his opening match against the United Arab Emirates in Rawalpindi back in 1996. Another standout performance came from Zimbabwe’s Craig Wishart, who also remained unbeaten with a score of 172 runs in his first match against Namibia in Harare in 2003.