Who are the greatest openers in ODIs?

Let us consider three hypothetical situations of run-a-ball opening partnerships of 50. Depending on the format, the same score has different connotations.

In a Test match, this is not necessarily a great position. The batters have swung the bat around and scored quickly. But the ball is still new and the bowlers are fresh. The score could easily become 60 for 3.

If this happened in a T20 match, again, not a great position in most cases. The powerplay seems to have been wasted and only a score of 150-160 is on the horizon. On normal good batting pitches, this score is woefully insufficient.

However, in an ODI this is an excellent position to be in. Good use has been made of the powerplay, and since no wicket has been lost, a potentially match-winning score of 300 is on the horizon.

This hypothetical shows that openers in ODI matches are important cogs in the wheel. They have to follow a clear path of setting up the innings. They cannot afford to pitch their tents like in a Test match, nor can they go berserk like their T20 counterparts do. Fifty overs is a long enough time to lose plenty of wickets in.

In this article, I will look at openers in ODI matches both as individual batters and as opening pairs: who scored the greatest number of runs, who scored when it mattered, who averaged the most, who scored the quickest, and who gave their teams good starts most of the time.

Opening batters
Let us move on to the analysis tables. The data is current up to the third ODI between Sri Lanka and India . First, I will look at the batter-centric tables. It is possible that a batter could play a match but not bat, even if he is an opener, since the innings might not start. So what we have here is the number of innings the batter played.

No prize for guessing who is at the top. Sachin Tendulkar scored the small matter of 15,000-plus runs as an opener. Two other stalwarts, Sanath Jayasuriya and Chris Gayle, also had over 10,000 runs. Jayasuriya opened the innings in a record number of matches - nearly 400. Adam Gilchrist and Sourav Ganguly follow next. Then comes a modern great, Rohit Sharma. He is followed by a string of batters who were renowned openers. The table is on expected lines.

Now we move on to performance-oriented metrics. The criterion for selection for all these tables is that the batter should have scored at least 2500 runs as an opener. That needs around 50 to 60 matches. Sixty-six batters qualify.

It is one thing to score runs in mostly inconsequential bilateral ODI matches; it is another altogether to score runs in important matches, in tough situations, and against top-class bowlers. I created a composite index comprising the following key factors to determine whether the runs in any given innings qualify as top-quality runs or not.

- Both Innings: Match Importance Index (Highest for a World Cup final)
- First Innings: Bowling quality faced
- Second Innings: The target to win
- Second Innings: Bowling quality, which kicks in only when the target is reasonably challenging

The exact calculations are too complicated to be outlined here. Suffice to say that the bar to identify top-quality runs is set quite high - so high that only 600 innings qualify, which is roughly one innings in eight matches. Innings played in the final stages of a World Cup tournament, innings against tough bowling attacks, innings played in the face of huge targets, and those with challenging targets against tough bowling attacks: these are the kinds of performances that qualify.

Fakhar Zaman tops the table with an incredible 22% of his runs qualifying as top-quality runs. He is indeed an extraordinary opening batter. Send him in to open with a stiff target and he blazes. Four of his hundreds (including two huge ones) feature in the 770 runs on this table. Three of those made while chasing huge totals. Jonny Bairstow is in second place with over 13% of his runs coming in tough matches/situations; most of his innings in this category have come in tough chases. David Boon is next, with one-eighth of his runs belonging to the top-quality category. This would not be a surprise to those who watched the 1987 World Cup.

Saeed Anwar, the Pakistani opener, almost always rose to the occasion. For him too, three hundreds feature in the top-quality category. Matthew Hayden follows close behind. His key runs in the Australian World Cup wins in the 2000s are legendary. Three of his hundreds are included in this category. Graham Gooch's hundred against India in the 1987 World Cup semi-final was one of the innings that give him a top-ten place on this table. He also scored 35 in that year's final.

Now we move on to the batting average, but more aptly, the runs-per-innings value. Not-outs do not particularly matter, so they are ignored here.

A real surprise here. Shai Hope, the mostly unheralded West Indies batter, tops the table. He has scored, on average, more than 53 runs per innings. This is indeed a very high value. Imagine a batter scoring more than 50 every time he goes out to bat. Rohit Sharma, who is the only other batter to average more than 50 runs per innings, follows some distance behind. This is certainly not a surprise. After some more daylight comes Hashim Amla. Tendulkar follows next, with just over 45 runs per innings. Imam-ul-Haq, another surprise in the top five, just pips Quinton de Kock. The top ten is rounded off by a trio of modern stalwarts and Tillakaratne Dilshan.

At the other end, Shahid Afridi features at the bottom with a sub-25 value. But let us not forget that he scored these runs at breakneck pace. It is not a surprise that Romesh Kaluwitharana is in the bottom three. He was not known to stay for long periods at the crease.

Across all 4754 ODI matches so far, 18,806 opening batters have averaged 31.6 runs per innings.

Now on to the strike rates of the opening batters.

It is no surprise that the table of strike rates is led by a pair of English openers from the current era. Bairstow and Jason Roy scored at well over 100 in their careers. Imagine these two openers batting together. It is amazing that Virender Sehwag comes in next, close behind, despite having played nearly 15 years earlier. And across 200-plus innings. Brendon McCullum clocks in at just over 102. Afridi is the last of the top five batters who all scored at better than run a ball in their careers.

The next five could all be expected to be on a list of this sort. Adam Gilchrist, David Warner, de Kock, Rohit and Fakhar all have scored at well above 90.

At the other end of the table, we have batters from the 1970s and 1980s, who were all brought up with the axiom that they should open and score at three runs an over. The objective back then was to score 230 to 250 in a team innings.

The next table is a special one. It is based on a powerful index I created using the Runs per Innings and Strike Rate values. In my first cut of this parameter, the Batting Index ws a product of the batting average and strike rate, before I realised that the multiplication led to some unusual and unacceptable values, especially when the strike rates were high. Now I have worked out a revised Batting Index as the sum of the Runs per Innings and 50% of the Strike Rate values. The additive nature of the computation smooths out the index values. With this change, the Batting Index is a true indicator of a batter's value to their team.

Rohit's 50-plus RpI value and a near-100 strike rate place him at the top; his Index value is just short of 100. It shows how valuable he has been to the Indian team. In the first two of the recent matches against Sri Lanka, he was the only batter who looked comfortable throughout. Bairstow is second - compensating for a lower RpI value with an excellent strike rate. Hope's is a surprisingly high placement, his very high RpI value making up for a rather pedestrian strike rate. De Kock follows closely. In fifth position is Warner. The last two referenced batters are somewhat similar to Bairstow.

Sehwag snatches a top-ten position with an outstanding strike rate to make up for a somewhat low RpI. With Amla, it is the other way around - a very high RpI taking care of the middling strike rate.

Thirteen qualifying batters scored all their runs in the opening position. Here they are, in order of runs scored.

- Desmond Haynes (WI)
- Tamim Iqbal (Ban)
- Shikhar Dhawan (Ind)
- Geoff Marsh (Aus)
- Marcus Trescothick (Eng)
- Jason Roy (Eng)
- Krishnamachari Srikkanth (Ind)
- Mark Taylor (Aus)
- Fakhar Zaman (Pak)
- Alastair Cook (Eng)
- Imam-ul-Haq (Pak)
- Salman Butt (Pak)
- Andrew Hudson (SA)

Opening partnerships
The cut-off bar is slightly lower here, at 2000 partnership runs, since player partnerships do not last that long. Only 20 pairs qualify. Possibly because a batter, through a long career, might partner many other batters. In the lists below, the senior batter, the one who made his debut earlier, is named first when referring to the pair.

Who else but Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly to lead the table for runs scored for the first wicket. Opening in 136 matches, this wonderful pair compiled over 6600 runs. Either side of the turn of the millennium, they gave India great starts frequently. They are followed by the equally effective pair of Gilchrist and Hayden, who scored well over 5000 runs in the opening position. The redoubtable West Indian pair of Gordon Greenidge and Haynes clocked over 5000 runs. The recent Indian combination of Rohit and Dhawan also crossed this mark. To round off the top five, we have the left-right combination of de Kock and Amla. Tendulkar appears twice in the top ten, the second time in the company of Sehwag.

We now move on to the top-quality runs table. The explanation provided for this parameter for individual batters applies here as well.

It should not surprise anyone that Hayden and Gilchrist top the table. Their contributions to the three Australian World Cup wins either side of 2000 are well known. Close behind follow another renowned pair, Gary Kirsten and Herschelle Gibbs. South Africa might have missed out on the silverware but they reached the later stages of World Cups often. The recent English pair of Bairstow and Roy follows next. Gilchrist appears again in the top five, this time partnering Mark Waugh. Australia's successes are reflected by the presence of three of their pairs in the top five.

We move on to the Runs per Innings value.

Bairstow and Roy top the table with an amazing RpI value of nearly 59 runs. Just imagine this. Every time this pair walks in, they are expected to score nearly 60 for the opening partnership. A frightening prospect indeed for the opposition bowlers. Nearly eight runs behind come Greenidge and Haynes. These two pairs exceed RpI values of 50. Tendulkar and Ganguly averaged over 48 runs per partnership. At the other end, Jayasuriya and Kaluwitharana scored barely 30 runs per innings.

Across 4754 ODIs, 9403 opening partnerships averaged 35.3 runs per innings.

Onwards to the strike rates of the opening partnerships.

A caveat here. The information of the exact ball on which the first wicket of an innings fell is available with certainty only from around 2000 onwards. For the first two decades of the format, this information was never available, and in the 1990s it was available sporadically. Hence, where this information is not available, I have taken the pro-rata value based on the team balls. I have had to do this for about 40% of matches, which means the final strike-rate values are not 100% accurate (though the discrepancies are likely to be slight).

Bairstow and Roy top this table too, with a strike rate of 114. It helps that both of them were attacking batters. Tendulkar and Sehwag scored at just over 100. Then come two Australian pairs from the past three decades, clocking just either side of 100. Upul Tharanga is the common batter in the next two pairs. Rohit and Dhawan scored at just over 90.

The lower end of the table is propped up by two 1970s-'80s pairs. However, it must be said that both these pairs might have benefited from the faster scoring rates of the later-order batters in their sides.

Finally we move on to the most important facet of opening batting.

It is essential that the opening pair gets the team off to a good start. The definition of a good start should be able to take into account a pair from the 1980s scoring 25 runs in eight overs and a modern attacking pair scoring 30-35 runs in five overs. Both are reasonable starts. So I define a successful opening partnership as an innings in which the opening pair lasted eight overs or longer or scored 35 runs or more.

Why eight overs? In most ODI innings the opening bowling pair bowls around eight overs and then the first change takes place. If the opening batting pair lasts till the ninth over, they have taken the sting out of the opening attack. An attacking pair of batters could do this, in a different manner, by scoring quickly. The 35-run bar is also in sync with the average overall opening partnership figure of 35.3. In summary, 28 for 1 in 8.3 or 40 for 1 in 6.0 are acceptable first-wicket-down situations.

In recent times, Bairstow and Roy gave England great attacking starts often. They have the highest success rate, of over 55%. Hayden and Gilchrist had a very good success rate of well over 50%. With these sorts of starts, it is no wonder that Australia were very successful around the turn of the century. It is not a surprise to see Greenidge and Haynes coming in third. They might have achieved this success through different methods, but they were an invaluable opening pair for the West Indies team. These are the three pairs of batters who succeeded more often than not. Then follow the trusted pair of Tendulkar and Ganguly, and another right-left combination in Jayasuriya and Atapattu. Note the presence of another Gilchrist pair in the top seven, this time with Mark Waugh.

It is no surprise that Jayasuriya and Kaluwitharana are at the bottom of the table. Their semi-attacking methods resulted in quite a few failures. Above the Irish pair of William Porterfield and Paul Stirling, we have Anwar and Afridi. This is on expected lines, since Afridi was an attacker from ball one.

Conclusion
Let me do what I normally do not attempt: based on these numbers, select who I think is the best opener.

I have zeroed in on Tendulkar. To most readers, this will not be a surprise. Tendulkar has scored over 15,000 runs while opening, at an excellent RpI of 45.0 (a top-ten placement on that parameter), and a very good strike rate of 88.1. Also, he was the common factor in two very successful pairs. Gilchrist, Rohit and Gayle were the other possible contenders.

On a similar basis, for the best opening pair, I have selected Gilchrist and Hayden. They scored over 5000 runs together, at a very good RpI of just over 47, a near-100 strike rate, and had a high degree of success. And, not surprisingly, they contributed to over three wins out of every four matches they played. A truly match-winning and devastating pair. Tendulkar and Ganguly and Greenidge and Haynes were their main rivals.

Bairstow and Roy were up there on most of the tables. But they have played in only 50 ODI matches.

From this article, I am providing an additional resource for the readers. Normally I create the complete data files (of all the players who qualify) for my work/edit purposes and provide a subset of those in my articles here. Often, some readers want to know the values of the players not featured. Hence I have created a zip file containing the complete data files; for this article, they can be downloaded here: batters | partnerships .

The quirky stats section
In each article, I present a numerical/anecdotal outlier relating to Test and/or ODI cricket. This time's outlier theme is "Special hundreds starting with Charles Bannerman's 165".

We all know that Bannerman took strike against the first ball bowled in Test cricket and went on to score 165 out of a team total of 245. This value of a batter scoring 67.3% of the team's runs in a completed innings has withstood the test of time - for no fewer than 147 years. I wondered whether there were hundreds that exceeded this value if we modified the qualification criterion of "completed innings" to "all innings". The answers are given below, up to and including the Edgbaston Test between England and West Indies. It is interesting to note that four of the five are Australian batters. Also, I expected more such instances.

In Test No. 1 (Australia-England, 1877), Charles Bannerman scored 165 out of 245/10: 67.3%

In Test No. 164 ( England-Australia, 1926 ), Charlie Macartney scored 133 out of 194/5: 68.6%

In Test No. 248 ( South Africa-Australia, 1935 ), Stan McCabe scored 189 out of 274/2: 69.0%

In Test No. 941 ( Pakistan-India, 1982 ), Mohsin Khan scored 101 out of 135/1: 74.8%

In Test No. 2198 ( Australia-West Indies, 2016 ), David Warner scored 122 out of 176/2: 69.3%

Incidentally McCabe's all-time classic of 189 not out is immortalised in Ray Robinson's cricket classic Between Wickets . If anyone gets a chance to read the book, they should not miss the chance. There is an unforgettable chapter on McCabe titled "Never Say Die" that is sheer poetry indeed.

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