Sri Lanka v Zimbabwe 2017: Only Test – Statistical Preview

After losing the ODI series to Zimbabwe, the home team will face the visitors in the one-off Test match under their 15th Test captain, Dinesh Chandimal as Angelo Mathews stepped down. Sri Lanka, who recently lost a Test to Bangladesh for the very first time, will want to do better against Zimbabwe or they will bag an unwanted record of losing against all 9 teams who have played Test cricket so far.

Ahead of the game, we look at some of the key numbers and records related to the game.

1 – Number of Zimbabwe players who have played a Test match on Sri Lankan soil. Hamilton Masakadza is the only player who is still around from both the squads that played the SL-ZIM 2002 series in the island country.

1 – Number of drawn games in the last 27 Tests played by Sri Lanka. Their last draw was in the rain-affected Lord’s Test last year which was 10 games ago. Prior to that draw, they obtained a result in 16 consecutive Test matches.

7 – Number of Test matches between Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe at the former’s home. The last one was played in 2002 and the hosts have defeated Zimbabwe in all the 7 Tests.

13 – Hamilton Masakadza’s batting average against Sri Lanka in Test cricket; his lowest against any team. He averages 13 vs New Zealand as well. Masakadza has scored 104 runs in the 8 Test innings he has played against Sri Lanka.

15 – Number of consecutive Test matches on Sri Lankan soil without a drawn game. There were 9 drawn Tests in 18 games before the 15 result producing ones. The last drawn Test in Sri Lanka was in 2014 between Sri Lanka and South Africa.

17 – Number of times Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe faced each other in Test cricket. They won 12 of those whereas two Tests ended in a draw. Last year’s 2-match series was the first meeting in Tests between the two sides since 2004.

19 – Number of Zimbabwe wickets Rangana Herath has taken in the two matches he played against them. He averaged 15.1 in those two Tests and picked up two five-fers.

24 – Number of consecutive Test matches for Zimbabwe without it ending in a draw; the longest streak without a drawn game for any team. The last time Zimbabwe were part of a drawn Test was in 2005 against Bangladesh in Dhaka.

51 – Graeme Cremer’s batting average against Sri Lanka in Tests. Cremer scored 153 runs against them in last year’s 2-match series which includes an unbeaten century. For Zimbabwe, only Dave Houghton (155.33) averages more than Cremer vs SL in Tests.