They say that you must learn to crawl before you can walk. But for England’s Zak Crawley, however, there was no such crawling.
Playing only his eighth Test match in the third Test between England and Pakistan at Southampton, England from August 21-25, 2020, Crawley notched up his maiden Test hundred.
Not content with merely a century, he made it is a big one he went past 150, 200 and 250, before eventually being dismissed for 267. He was provided good support by wicket-keeper Jos Buttler, who himself scored 152.
By scoring 267, Zak Crawley joined an elite group by taking the seventh place in the list of highest maiden Test hundreds.
After going past the 300-run partnership mark, the partnership between Zak Crawley and Jos Buttler finally came up to an end with the former’s dismissal. Coming together at 127 for four, the two put on 359 for the fifth wicket before Crawley got out, the score reading 486 for five.
Theirs is now the joint fourth-highest fifth-wicket partnership in Test cricket. For England, this is the sixth highest partnership for any wicket in Test history.
Crawley contributed 200 off 285 balls in the partnership, while Buttler pitched in with 138 from 278 deliveries.
At the start of the third Test between England and Pakistan, Crawley was 22 years and 200 days old. This means that there have been only four players who have made a score of over 250 in Tests at a younger age than Crawley. That is indeed an illustrious list as the four batsmen are Garry Sobers, Don Bradman, Len Hutton and Graeme Smith. Bradman and Smith, in fact, made two such scores of over 250 before turning 23!
Crawley’s innings also makes him the third-youngest England batsman to score a Test double century. Hutton and David Gower are the only ones to have achieved it at younger age.
Picture Credit : Google