David Leggat: Two-ton Jesse stands among special group

David Leggat

New Zealand are playing their 350th test and in that time the country's best batsmen have produced 15 double centuries, of which Jesse Ryder's 201 yesterday is the most recent.

They have come along rarely, and there's no denying they are special occasions.

And yet, it's fair to say there are double hundreds, and then there are double hundreds.

There's a saying that to be a great batsman, he needs to retire with a test average in excess of 50. So how do you assess batsmen with double centuries to their name?

Certainly to do it you require considerable concentration, even against ordinary bowling attacks.

Circumstances, opponents and venue dictate how a double century will be remembered.

Sachin Tendulkar, for example, has a highest test score of 248 against Bangladesh, yet you'd doubt he'd rate it one of his finest performances. For one thing, there have been too many great achievements to count; for another, with all due respect, Bangladesh aren't Australia or South Africa.

Stephen Fleming has scored three double hundreds, more than any other New Zealander. I'd be prepared to wager he puts his 274 not out against Sri Lanka - Muttiah Muralitharan in the Colombo sweatbox - on a higher pedestal than his 202 against the Bangladeshis in Chittagong.

The list of double centurions contains some surprising names.

Zimbabwean Guy Whittall got one against New Zealand; Brendon Kuruppu batted over two days for one on debut for Sri Lanka, also against New Zealand.

You might not have heard of Faoud Bacchus of the West Indies team in the late 1970s-early 1980s, with good reason. Hashan Tillekaratne was a gritty fighter for Sri Lanka, but like Bacchus, not, you'd have thought, a member of the 200 club. Wrong.

None of those players figure on the table of cricket's stellar batsmen. None belong in the same street as a Richards, Lara, Tendulkar, Miandad or Pollock. But they have the runs to prove their place in this company.

Of the New Zealanders, Mathew Sinclair scored two of them, one on debut, but for all his prolific runmaking at first-class level, his international career never quite took off. The double centuries were among a dozen false dawns. Glenn Turner got two in the West Indies among his 100 first-class centuries.

And seeing as you want to know, the other New Zealanders to have seen 200 roll up are Martin Crowe, Bryan Young, Graham Dowling, Bert Sutcliffe, Lou Vincent, Nathan Astle and Martin Donnelly.

Crowe's is the highest, 299 against Sri Lanka at the Basin Reserve in 1991 during which he shared New Zealand's record partnership for any wicket, 467, with Andrew Jones.

Crowe was mightily unimpressed when he feathered a catch to the wicketkeeper off roly-poly medium pacer Arjuna Ranatunga just before the end of the match.

So too was Ryder upon his dismissal yesterday. His reaction was a poor end to a terrific display, if understandable on one level for the disappointment at getting out a ball after gleefully celebrating his double ton.

But someone will have a quiet word, pointing out it's out of order not to acknowledge a supportive, cheering crowd, nor to hurl his bat away. Still, no matter what the rest of his career holds, Ryder's place is secure among a special group of New Zealand cricketers.