KEY POINTS:
If you have a mind for it, and are prepared to fossick about, cricket throws up all sorts of statistics.
Here's one which popped up yesterday from the weird and wonderful department: Daniel Vettori is the third player in tests to have taken eight or more wickets and hit two half-centuries in the same match - to which it's tempting to add he's the first one with facial hair, a birthday in January, wearing glasses and has a surname starting with V.
Here's another, and more relevant: until the Australian series of 2005, Vettori was averaging 20.58 with the bat, and 35.06 with the ball. In 25 tests since, those numbers have bumped up to 43.56 and down to 30.66 respectively.
By the end of this summer, Vettori, 29, could sit among the world's all-time great all-rounders, men who have been among the most dominant cricketers of their generation. And if not by then, it'll happen shortly after.
New Zealand have seven tests left this season. Vettori requires 124 runs and 34 wickets to reach the 3000-run/300-wicket test double.
On present form, the runs will be a doddle and if he repeats his exploits during the Chittagong Crawl this week in the second test starting at Dhaka on Saturday, he will probably haul in the wickets, too.
He is a remarkable cricketer. At Chittagong he took charge of the game, imposed himself on it and wrenched a historic first win over a major test nation away from Bangladesh on the final day.
Vettori has said he went in at No 4 late on the penultimate day as a nightwatchman, partly because he thought it would be easier for a lefthander to combat Bangladesh's biggest threat, the left arm spinners Shakib al Hasan and Abdur Razzak.
Maybe so, but two lefthanded batsmen above Vettori in the order were available for the job if that was the primary concern.
Perhaps, in the back of his mind, Vettori was grumpy at the collective inability to produce test-minded batting in the shoddy first innings effort and wanted to show his team what was required, and expected, of them.
He deserved to be there at the end, instead falling for 76 to a tired shot 19 runs short of the victory he had done so much to secure. Altogether, Vettori batted 6h 16min in the test, faced 295 balls, scored 131 runs for once out, and took nine for 133 off 78 overs.
When - not if - he joins the all-round elite, it'll be no less than he deserves. His batting technique has its idiosyncrasies. But it is his own style and works just fine.
International cricket has its share of fancy dans, headline-grabbing flash-and-dash artists.
But every team needs a Vettori or two, talented, sensible cricketers who apply themselves with the prime objective of getting the job done.
Amid some ordinary performances, two other batsmen caught the eye. Opener Aaron Redmond's conscientious second innings 79 was important.
Australia's attack next month will be a vastly different proposition but, although Bangladesh's attack lacks the cutting edge of most international attacks, Redmond at least showed resolve in his best test innings.
And Daniel Flynn, out for 49 with the scores tied, again demonstrated he's got ticker. It's easy to poke borax at the selectors when a pick goes wrong, but credit where it's due: the Northern Districts lefthander, who lost a couple of teeth at Manchester last May either side of a couple of plucky innings in a well-beaten side, looks to be made of strong stuff.
This week provided a fascinating contrast on side-by-side television channels. One had the high-octane, ripsnorting Indian demolition of Australia; the other a test which averaged 2.25 runs an over, produced at times seriously mediocre cricket.
Yet how often have New Zealand chased down 317 to win a test in the subcontinent? Their previous best was 82 in winning at Lahore in 1969. So credit where it's due for a solid fourth innings job over the last two days.
Dhaka will show whether the team have heeded the lessons imparted by their skipper.
