Two hundred in 153 balls

New Zealand were set 550 at Christchurch in March 2002 and made 451. Nathan Astle made 222 of them from 168 balls, with 28 fours and eleven sixes, and was last out. England won by 98 runs. Graham Thorpe, who had made 200 not out in the innings that set the target, was player of the match.

How 550 was set

England were 0 for two after five balls of the match, Marcus Trescothick and Mark Butcher both caught behind off Chris Cairns without scoring. They made 228, Nasser Hussain 106 and nobody else past 31. Matthew Hoggard took seven for 63 and New Zealand were all out for 147.

Then Thorpe and Andrew Flintoff put on 281 for the sixth wicket in 215 minutes, Thorpe 200 not out from 231 balls, Flintoff 137, and Hussain declared at 468 for six. The target was 550, with a day and a bit to bat.

Full scorecard: New Zealand v England, 1st Test, Christchurch, 13–16 March 2002 →

The fourth day, by session

New Zealand were 28 without loss overnight and 140 for three at lunch, Astle 13. At tea they were 270 for six, Astle 83, Daniel Vettori 4. Between tea and the close they scored 181, lost the last four wickets, and Astle went from 83 to 222.

The card gives his landmarks by the ball. Fifty from 54. A hundred from 114, with 16 fours and two sixes. A hundred and fifty from 136. Two hundred from 153, with 27 fours and nine sixes.

The second hundred took 39 balls and the fifty from 150 to 200 took 17. The previous fastest Test double hundred by balls faced was Adam Gilchrist’s, from 214.

One hundred and eighteen for the last wicket

New Zealand were 333 for nine when Ian Butler was caught behind. Chris Cairns came in, and the tenth wicket put on 118 in 55 minutes from 69 balls, of which Cairns made 23. The card gives the stand’s fifty at 24 balls and its hundred at 55. The runs-per-hour line for the last hour reads 100.

At 451 Astle was caught behind off Hoggard, from the 168th ball he had faced, in the 231st minute. Ninety-eight short. Andy Caddick took six for 122 and Hoggard, who had taken seven in the first innings, took the last wicket in the second for 142 in 24.3 overs.

What made it unrepeatable

The innings was made with the match already lost by any ordinary reckoning. At 333 for nine, 217 were needed. What Astle did was bring the number down to 98 in an hour, from a position where it did not matter, and the record he took on the way was set in a defeat. A 153-ball double hundred in a winning chase is a thing to be attempted. In a losing one it is a thing that happened once.

The card is exact about it. England took the new ball after 81 overs with New Zealand 315 for eight, Astle 116; the next 12.3 overs cost 136. Hoggard’s last three spells read 6-2-28-0, 2-0-41-0 and 1.3-0-21-1. The one wicket in that line is the one that ended it.

The other double hundred

Thorpe’s 200 not out took 231 balls and 330 minutes, and the card gives his fifties at 51, 121, 183 and 231 balls. It was the innings that made the target, and it was made a day earlier, with the match in the balance rather than gone. The award followed the arithmetic of the result. The record followed Astle.

What the card holds

Two double hundreds in one Test, one not out for the winners and one for the losers, and the award to the first. A seven-for and a six-for for the same side. A last-wicket stand of 118 in which the number eleven scored 23. Eleven sixes. And a margin of 98, which is the distance an innings of 222 from 168 balls still left.

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No. 9 in Unrepeatable, a series of 22.

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