Australia took Jack Leach for 100 runs from just 73 deliveries as England spinner made Ashes history - but the overall Test record remains with Bryce McGain; eight England fielders take catches in Australia's first innings, matching an Ashes high
Friday 10 December 2021 11:18, UK
Sky Cricket number-cruncher Benedict Bermange looks at the top stats from day three of the 2021/22 Ashes series as Travis Head passes 150, Joe Root passes Michael Vaughan and England kept their victory hopes alive...
England have trailed on first innings by at least 200 runs in 24 previous Test matches in Australia. Of those, they lost 22, drew one (at Brisbane in 2010) and won the other (at Sydney in 1894).
Giving his thoughts, Dawid Malan said: "We need one more good 100-run partnership to put a score on the board and then who knows what can happen?"
Only three Australians have made a higher individual score in Test cricket than Travis Head at better than a-run-a-ball.
The highest score in Test history with a strike rate of at least 100 is Virender Sehwag's innings of 319 off 304 balls for India against South Africa at Chennai in March 2008.
Jack Leach brought up his 100 runs conceded in just 73 deliveries, setting a new record for the fastest bowling hundred in Ashes cricket. Brett Lee conceded his first 100 runs in England's first innings at Edgbaston in 2005 in 86 deliveries.
One crumb of comfort for Leach is that he didn't break the all-time Test record, which still belongs to Australia's Bryce McGain, who conceded 100 runs in his first 63 deliveries against South Africa at Cape Town in 2009.
Eight different England fielders took catches in Australia's first innings, with only Leach, Chris Woakes and Joe Root missing out.
That equals the England record set in Australia's second innings at Adelaide in 1929 and in West Indies' second innings at Lord's in 1939.
Uniquely in first-class cricket, 10 different Leicestershire fielders took catches in Northamptonshire's first innings of their match at Leicester in 1967.
In four home Tests last summer Australia failed to reach 400. In their first innings of this summer, they made 425.
When Root reached 27 he broke Michael Vaughan's England record of 1,481 Test runs in a calendar year, set in 2002. He will start day four in Brisbane in eighth-place overall, but only needs a further 22 runs to move into fifth place.
Root completed his seventh half-century in Tests in Australia and will be hoping to convert it to his first century in the country.
Only four players have scored more half-centuries in Australia without ever converting one to a century.
Bruce Laird of Australia scored nine fifties without a hundred, while England's Tom Hayward and Nasser Hussain and Australia's Shane Warne hit eight half-centuries without a ton.
