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The week in numbers: w/e 29/1/12

January 30, 2012 Leave a comment

Azarenka won both her first major and gained the number 1 ranking (image courtesy of Mark Howard/Flickr)

1 – Having lost the opening two games of the Australian Open final, Victoria Azarenka won 12 of the next 13 games to defeat Maria Sharapova 6-3 6-0, winning her first Grand Slam tournament and taking over the number one ranking.

15 – This was the third time in the last six tournaments that only 15 games were required to complete the ladies’ singles final. On each occasion the losing finalist was Russian (Sharapova in 2007 and 2012, Dinara Safina in 2009).

7 –  A joint-England-record seven players failed to score more than one run as the tourists were skittled out for 72 in pursuit of a target of 145 to give Pakistan an unassailable 2-0 lead in the second of their three-match series.

22 – 22 wickets fell in one day as New Zealand inflicted Zimbabwe’s record defeat to win their one-off Test in Napier by an innings. New Zealand declared on 495/7 before dismissing Zimbabwe for 51 and then 143 following on.

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The week in numbers: w/e 4/12/11

December 5, 2011 3 Comments

Sócrates, 1954-2011. RIP (image courtesy of Wikipedia)

57 – Age of former Brazilian football captain Sócrates Brasileiro Sampaio de Souza Vieira de Oliveira – better known simply as Sócrates – who died in hospital in São Paulo after a three-month battle with illness. Instantly recognisable to a generation of football fans by his trademark beard and headband, he played 60 times for Brazil, scoring 22 goals from an attacking midfield position, and captained his country at the 1982 World Cup.

0 – Number of women in the final shortlist of ten candidates for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, which will be awarded on December 22nd.

58 - Winger Shane Williams capped his 87th and final Test with his 58th try in the final move of the game as Wales lost 24-18 to Australia at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium.

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The week in numbers: w/e 18/9/11

September 19, 2011 3 Comments

Djokovic improved his record against Nadal in 2011 to 6-0 in winning the US Open

6 – Novak Djokovic‘s 6-2 6-4 6-6 6-1 victory over Rafael Nadal in Monday’s US Open men’s singles final improved his 2011 record against the Spaniard to 6-0 and made him only the sixth man to win three Grand Slam singles titles in the same year, joining Rod Laver, Jimmy Connors, Mats Wilander, Roger Federer (three times) and Nadal.

97.0% – Djokovic‘s win percentage in 2011, currently the best single-year record ever. He has lost just twice in 66 matches this year.

26 – Federer (12), Nadal (10) and Djokovic (four) have now won 26 of the last 27 Slams between them, dating back to the 2005 French Open. The only man to break the sequence is Juan Martín del Potro, who won the US Open in 2009.

77 – Lancashire won their first County Championship in 77 years after beating Somerset by eight wickets.

3 – AC Milan became only the third team in Champions League history to score in the first and last minutes, as they drew 2-2 at Barcelona. Alexandro Pato‘s opening goal after 24 seconds was the fifth-fastest in the history of the competition.

17 – Borussia Dortmund’s late equaliser in a 1-1 draw extended Arsenal‘s run of Champions League away games without a clean sheet to 17 games.

Giggs has now scored in 16 separate Champions League campaigns

16 – Ryan Giggs‘ goal for Manchester United in the 1-1 draw at Benfica means he has now scored in a record 16 of the 17 Champions League campaigns he has played in, failing only in 2007-08.

2 – Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake recorded the fastest times of 2011 in the 100 and 200 metres respectively at the Diamond League meeting in Brussels. Bolt clocked 9.76s in the 100 metres, while Blake’s 19.26s in the 200 metres was also the second-fastest run ever, 0.07s behind Bolt’s world record.

1 – Jonathan Trott became the first ever English cricketer to win the ICC Cricketer of the Year award outright. (Andrew Flintoff shared the award with Jacques Kallis in 2005.) Alastair Cook also won Test Player of the Year.

8 – Barcelona‘s 8-0 win over Osasuna in La Liga on Saturday night marked the first time they had scored eight times in a game at the Camp Nou since October 2003. Lionel Messi scored a hat-trick.

3 – The HTC-Highroad pair of Mark Cavendish and Mark Renshaw recorded three one-two wins during the Tour of Britain‘s eight stages. Cavendish won the final sprint in London to claim his second stage. Dutchman Lars Boom won the overall race by 36 seconds.

58:56 – Kenya’s Martin Mathathi broke the men’s record for the Great North Run, winning in a time of 58:56 – nine seconds faster than the previous record and the sixth-best half-marathon time ever.

The Premier League in numbers

3 – All three promoted sides won on Saturday: Swansea beat West Bromwich Albion 3-0, while QPR and Norwich won 3-0 at Wolves and 2-1 at Bolton respectively.

Arteta has scored for both Everton and Arsenal at Ewood Park this season (image courtesy of arsenal.com)

2 – Mikel Arteta‘s goal in Arsenal’s 4-3 defeat at Blackburn marked the second time he has scored in the Premier League at Ewood Park this season. He had already scored the only goal when Everton won 1-0 in August.

3 – Shots on target by Blackburn, who scored four goals.

373 - Scott Sinclair’s 14th-minute opener for Swansea was their first Premier League goal, ending a run of 373 minutes without scoring.

5 – Bolton‘s 2-1 defeat at home to Norwich means they have lost five consecutive top-flight home matches for the first time ever.

5 – Norwich equalled Wimbledon’s feat (in the 1999-2000 season) of conceding a penalty in each of the first five games of a season.

14 – Liverpool‘s 4-0 defeat at Tottenham, in which they finished with just nine men, was the 14th consecutive away game in which they have gone on to lose after trailing at half-time.

4 – Stoke‘s 4-0 defeat at Sunderland means they have failed to score in their four Premier League visits to the Stadium of Light.

5 – Wayne Rooney became only the second player to score in each of first five matches of a season, scoring the last of Manchester United’s goals in the 3-1 win over Chelsea. Former Arsenal player José Antonio Reyes was the first to achieve the feat, in 2004/05.

6 – Martin Jol remains unbeaten as a manager against Manchester City as Fulham recovered from two goals down to draw 2-2. However, the draw did end his perfect record of six wins out of six against City prior to yesterday’s game.

1 – Four of the five teams who started the weekend winless – Blackburn, Swansea, Sunderland, Norwich – won their matches. Only Fulham remain waiting for their first victory.

The Rugby World Cup in numbers

11 - Penalties committed by England in an ill-disciplined first half of their 41-10 win over Georgia. They conceded just three after the interval.

Shaw became England's oldest ever World Cup player

38 – At 38 years and 17 days, Simon Shaw became the oldest player to play for England at a Rugby World Cup.

0 – Number of tries scored in Scotland‘s 15-6 win over Romania.

1 – Russia lost 13-6 to the USA in their debut World Cup match, as Mike Petri scored the only try in the first half. It was also only the third ever win in the competition for the USA.

83 – New Zealand‘s 83 points in their 83-7 win over Japan was the 14th highest score in Rugby World Cup history. In total, they have posted six of the top 14 individual scores.

3 – Australia‘s 15-6 defeat to Ireland was only the third time they had failed to score a try in their 36 World Cup matches.

6 – South Africa and Argentina both scored six tries from six different players as they beat Fiji 49-3 and Romania 43-8 respectively.

The NFL in numbers

11 – New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady became only the 11th man to pass for over 500 yards in a single game as he registered 517 yards and four touchdown passes in a 38-24 Monday night win over the Miami Dolphins. One of Brady’s four touchdown passes was a 99-yarder to Wes Welker, a former Dolphin.

358 – However Brady did throw one interception, ending his NFL record streak without an interception at 358 pass attempts.

Janikowski tied the NFL record with a towering 63-yard FG (image courtesy of raiders.com)

63 – The Oakland Raiders’ Sebastian Janikowski tied the NFL record by kicking a 63-yard field goal in their 23-20 win over the Denver Broncos. New Orleans’ Tom Dempsey (in 1970) and Denver’s Jason Elam (1998) also landed 63-yarders.

5 – The Buffalo Bills scored on all five second half possessions as they overcame a 21-3 half-time deficit to beat the Oakland Raiders 38-35. The lead changed hands five times in the last 14:10, the last on a 6-yard touchdown pass from Ryan Fitzpatrick to David Nelson with 14 seconds remaining.

45 – The Detroit Lions‘ margin of victory in their 48-3 win over the Kansas City Chiefs was the largest in the team’s history.

16 – Santonio Holmes‘ first quarter score in the New York Jets‘ 32-3 win over Jacksonville broke his team’s streak of 16 consecutive games without an offensive touchdown in the opening period.

11 – Rookie running back Ben Tate became only the 11th player in NFL history to rush for at least 100 yards in his first two games as the Houston Texans defeated the Miami Dolphins 23-13. Tate gained 107 yards on the ground.

7 – Both Carolina Panthers rookie Cam Newton and New England’s Tom Brady had their second consecutive 400-yard passing days, becoming only the sixth and seventh quarterbacks ever to achieve the feat. Carolina have lost both games (they lost 30-23 to the Green Bay Packers last night); New England have won both (they beat San Diego 35-21).

(Some statistics courtesy of Opta Sports, The Times, StatManJon, Infostrada, nfl.com and rugbyworldcup.com.)

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The week in numbers: w/e 3/7/11

July 4, 2011 Leave a comment

Haye landed an average of just six punches per round (image courtesy of Wikipedia)

72 – David Haye landed just 72 punches during his comprehensive points defeat by Wladimir Klitschko in their world heavyweight title fight in Hamburg. Klitschko registered 134, nearly twice as many.

144 – Mahela Jayawardena scored 144 as Sri Lanka defeated England by 69 runs in the second one-day international at Headingley.

119 – England captain Alastair Cook scored 199 at Lord’s in the third ODI, but Sri Lanka still cruised to an easy six-wicket victory as Dinesh Chandimal made an unbeaten 105.

7 – Thomas Levet became the seventh Frenchman – and only the second in the last 42 years – to win golf’s French Open as he beat Britain’s Mark Foster by one stroke.

5 – Number of trophies won by the Great Britain rowing team at Henley Royal Regatta, the last major event in the UK before the London 2012 Olympics.

84 – Durham‘s Callum Thorp took 6/20 as Lancashire were bowled out for just 84 in the first innings of their County Championship match. Durham won a low-scoring match by five wickets.

4.70 – 19-year old Holly Bleasdale cleared a height of 4.70m to break the British women’s pole vault record, previously held by Kate Dennison, by 10cm.

5 – Double Paralympic swimming champion Eleanor Simmonds was one of five British gold medallists on the opening day of the IPC European Championships in Berlin yesterday.

Wimbledon in numbers

Pironkova beat Venus for the second consecutive year (image courtesy of wimbledon.com)

2 – Bulgaria’s Tsvetana Pironkova became only the second woman to beat Venus Williams at back-to-back Wimbledons, after winning their last-16 match 6-2 6-3. The other player to do so was Venus’s sister Serena in 2002 and 2003.

8 - For the first time in the Open era, the eight quarter-finalists in the ladies’ singles were represented by eight different nationalities.

1 – Jo-Wilfried Tsonga became the first player ever to defeat Roger Federer in a Grand Slam singles match from two sets down, winning 3-6 6-7 6-4 6-4 6-4.

4 – Sabine Lisicki became only the fourth female player ever to reach the semi-final of a Grand Slam singles tournament as a wild-card, after Zheng Jie (Wimbledon 2008), Kim Clijsters (US 2009) and Justine Henin (Australia 2010).

5 – Andy Murray lost in four sets to Rafael Nadal in their semi-final, but nonetheless boasts an enviable record of five semi-final appearances in his last seven Grand Slam tournaments.

3 - Murray is only the second male player to have lost his first three Wimbledon semi-finals. Tim Henman is the other.

1 – By reaching the men’s final, Novak Djokovic became the first Serbian tennis player to gain the world number one ranking.

Eight proved to be Kvitová's lucky number? (image courtesy of wimbledon.com)

21 - Petra Kvitová defeated Maria Sharapova 6-3 6-4 in the ladies’ singles final to become the first left-handed winner since Martina Navratilova in 1990, 21 years ago. At the time, Kvitová was less than four months old.

1 – Kvitová also became the first number eight seed to win a ladies’ singles Grand Slam final, at the tenth attempt.

38 – Sharapova‘s erratic serve contributed towards her downfall. She served 38 double faults, 14 more than any other female player and more than twice as many as Kvitová’s 17.

5 - Novak Djokovic‘s 6-4 6-1 1-6 6-3 win over Rafael Nadal in the men’s final was the fifth time he has defeated the Spaniard in 2011, but also marked his first victory over him at a Grand Slam tournament.

35 – No player converted more break points in the tournament than Djokovic‘s 35. Nadal was second, with 30.

17 – Djokovic bounced the ball 17 times before serving on championship point.

The Tour de France in numbers

16 – George Hincapie has now equalled the all-time record of Dutchman Joop Zoetemelk in making his 16th start at the Tour de France.

Gilbert claimed his 13th win of 2011

13 – Philippe Gilbert won stage one to take his 13th win of 2011, his first career Tour victory and the yellow jersey. He is one of a select group of riders to have won stages of cycling’s three Grand Tours: the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España.

80 – Number of seconds lost by defending champion Alberto Contador when he was caught on the wrong side of a crash in the peloton on the run-in to the finish of the first stage.

12 – Number of seconds separating first from seventh in Sunday’s team time trial, won by Garmin-Cervélo.

1:42 – Contador finished the second day of the Tour 1:42 behind yellow jersey Thor Hushovd.

(Some statistics courtesy of Opta Sports, The Times, Infostrada and wimbledon.com.)

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My sporting month: July 2011

July 1, 2011 Leave a comment

There is no major football tournament this summer – with all due respect, the European under-21s, under-17s World Cup and Women’s World Cup aren’t close to being on the same scale – but July is nonetheless an action-packed sporting month, with much of the major action taking place here in the UK.

For me, most of the month will be taken up watching 200 men in skin-tight suits with really bad tan-lines pedalling through scenic countryside. Which means, of course, that I kick off my monthly preview of sporting highlights with …

1. Tour de France (2nd-24th)

The world’s biggest cycling race starts its 98th edition tomorrow (Saturday), with a course that celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Tour’s first visit to the Alps. The race will climb the mighty Col du Galibier twice, setting a new record for the highest ever finish in the Tour’s history in the process.

Can Alberto Contador – who is racing pending the outcome of a doping appeal – add a fourth Tour victory to his Giro d’Italia win in May? Or will Andy Schleck, second to the Spaniard in each of the last two years, finally climb the top step of the podium? British interest will be fuelled by sprinter Mark Cavendish – winner of 15 stages in the past three years – and Bradley Wiggins, who claimed victory at the prestigious pre-Tour Critérium du Dauphiné. Cavendish will be eyeing his first sprinters’ green jersey, while Wiggins will be in hot pursuit of Contador and Schleck as they chase the yellow jersey for overall victory.

For Tour de France previews, stage recaps and analysis, click here.

2. Wimbledon finals (2nd & 3rd)

The past fortnight has given us some wonderful tennis and massive upsets, not least the departure of world number one Caroline Wozniacki, defending champion Serena Williams and her sister (and five-time champion) Venus all on the same afternoon. But as soon as it has arrived it is almost over, and the championships draw to a close with what will hopefully be a memorable set of finals on what is forecast to be a hot, sunny weekend.

In the women’s final tomorrow (Saturday), Czech eighth seed Petra Kvitová, a semi-finalist last year, will participate in her first Grand Slam final after beating Victoria Azarenka. She will take on Maria Sharapova, the 2004 champion, who will be seeking her fourth Grand Slam title, but her first since the Australian Open in 2008.

It’s anyone’s game in the men’s draw, which sees the semi-finals take place today. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, conqueror of Roger Federer, takes on Novak Djokovic, to be followed by Andy Murray against defending champion Rafael Nadal. Each has played some scintillating tennis during the tournament – Djokovic’s match against Marcos Baghdatis last Saturday being one which particularly sticks in the memory – and, whoever wins, it promises a final of the highest quality. And for the rest of the month, expect tennis courts up and down the country to be full to overflowing.

3. British Grand Prix (10th)

If anyone is to mount a serious challenge to Sebastian Vettel‘s apparently serene defence of the Formula 1 drivers’ title, it will have to start at the British Grand Prix. Jenson Button and Vettel’s Red Bull teammate Mark Webber are both 77 points – more than three race wins – behind, with Lewis Hamilton the only other driver with more than half the German’s current tally of 186 points.

The Red Bull drivers have won the last two races at Silverstone, with Webber coming out on top last year, while Hamilton won in 2008. Button, however, has never finished higher than fourth here. The high-speed nature of the track and the new rule changes – the DRS moveable rear wing and faster-wearing tyres – should ensure some close and spectacular racing no matter what.

4. The Open (14th-17th)

Royal St George’s hosts the world’s oldest golf championship for the first time since 2003 when Ben Curtis lifted the old Claret Jug, with hopes high for a first European victory in three years. European golf is currently in the ascendancy after Rory McIlroy’s astonishing eight-shot triumph at the US Open last month, and with Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, McIlroy and Martin Kaymer occupying the top four spots in the world rankings.

Last year, the unheralded South African Louis Oosthuizen dominated the field at St Andrews, winning by seven shots despite having missed the cut at all but one of his previous attempts at the majors. Since then, he has continued his form, winning the Africa Open in January and tying for ninth at the US Open. Can he repeat last year’s miracle, or will the Americans finally break a winless streak at the majors dating back to Phil Mickelson’s victory at the 2010 Masters?

5. England vs India, First Test (21st-25th)

The recent 1-0 series win over Sri Lanka consolidated England‘s third place in the ICC test rankings, and they will have the opportunity to progress further with a good result against India in the first of a four-test series at Lord‘s. Not only would a series win against easily the top-ranked side in the world be a real statement of intent, it will also give England the chance to overhaul South Africa and claim second spot ahead of their tough winter tours against Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Alastair Cook and Ian Bell have each scored two centuries already this summer, while Chris Tremlett and Graeme Swann have been in fine form with the ball. England will need to be at their best to defeat India, but this improving side is as good an England team as we have seen for many years.

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