The Rain Rule
Twenty-two off one ball, and other absurdities.
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1971
The Test that turned into something else
Rain killed a Test at Melbourne without a ball bowled. Four men met in a room and invented the one-day international to fill the gap.
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1992
The number everybody remembers
South Africa needed 22 off one ball at Sydney. Except they did not, and the rule that replaced the rule would have been worse.
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2002
A hundred overs to ten
Sri Lanka batted twice in the 2002 Champions Trophy final. India never really batted at all, and both teams took the trophy home.
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2003
One run, and a printed sheet
Mark Boucher blocked the last ball at Kingsmead because he believed South Africa were ahead. They were level, and level put them out of their own World Cup.
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2007
Three overs after the end
Australia had won the 2007 World Cup and were celebrating when the umpires sent both sides back out to bowl three more overs in the dark.
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1996
Drawn, with the scores level
England needed three off the last ball at Bulawayo in 1996 and ran two. The scores finished level and the match finished drawn, which no Test had done before, and the card had to be corrected afterwards to say which man was out.
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2000
Finished in the dark
England needed 176 in 44 overs at Karachi in December 2000 and got them in 41.3, with the light going and the fielding side bowling as slowly as it could. The card records the target, the overs and a five-ball over the umpire miscounted. It does not record the light.
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1935
Twenty-one behind, and declared
England declared at 81 for seven at Bridgetown in January 1935, 21 runs behind on first innings, because the pitch was worse to bat on than the deficit was to concede. West Indies declared back at 51 for six. The card has four innings, two of them closed on purpose, and none of them past 102.
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1937
Seventy-six for nine, declared
Two captains declared with a wicket standing at Melbourne in January 1937, Australia at 200 for nine and England at 76 for nine, to put the other side in on a wet pitch. Then Bradman sent his two spinners in to open, batted at seven himself, and made 270. The card shows all of it and explains none of it.