International cricket is back after a while as six big cricketing nations played some high-quality cricket on the 27th of November. New Zealand played West Indies and England played South Africa in a T20I whereas India was up against Australia in an ODI. India lost the game to Australia but India’s Hardik Pandya who played as a pure batsman reached a milestone in the first ODI. He reached 1000 ODI runs as he scored 90 in a losing cause. He is one of the quickest to get there in terms of balls. So, let’s have a look at how many balls did he take to get to 1000 runs and where are the others in the comparison.
3. 900+ balls – Shimron Hetmyer, Thisara Perera, Kedar Jadhav and Colin Munro
Shimron Hetmyer from West Indies is the fastest among these players as he has taken only 916 balls to reach his 1000 ODI runs. Thisara Perera is second in this group with 926 balls.
Kedar Jadhav who is a surprising entry in this list has taken 937 balls for his 1000 runs and Colin Munro is fourth in this group with 943 runs. Most of these batsmen are aggressive by nature and hence you expect them to have a strike-rate of over 100.
All batsmen apart from Munro are middle-order batsmen so it is a great thing if you can maintain a strike-rate of over 100 while opening the innings. Jadhav had a purple patch from 2017 for a year or so where he scored a 60 ball hundred against England and used to score some quick runs at the end of the innings. All those innings have helped him to get to 1000 ODI runs in just 937 balls.
2. 800+ balls – Luke Ronchi, Shahid Afridi, Corey Anderson, Hardik Pandya, Jos Buttler and Glenn Maxwell
This list contains the proper middle-order hitters who are there on the side to attack the opposition. Luke Ronchi has opened the innings and batted in the middle-order which has helped him reach 1000 ODI runs in just 807 balls. Shahid Afridi is the only player on this list who started his career way earlier than everyone else and still he reached the milestone in just 834 balls which gives an idea of how he was way ahead of his time.
Corey Anderson from New Zealand who held the record for the fastest ODI hundred at one time has reached the milestone in 854 balls. Hardik Pandya who is the latest entrant in this list reached his 1000 ODI runs in 857 balls. The freakish batsman from England – Jos Buttler who is capable of doing some unbelievable things has got to 1000 ODI runs in 860 balls.
Glenn Maxwell who played an explosive innings in the first ODI has reached the milestone in 867 balls. All these batsmen have reached their 1000 ODI runs in less than 900 balls which is a great achievement.
1. 700+ balls – Andre Russell
There is only one batsman who can score 1000 ODI runs in less than 800 balls and it is Andre Russell. The muscle man from West Indies holds the record to reach 1000 ODI runs in the fewest number of balls as he did it in 767 balls which are 40 less than the next batsman – Luke Ronchi. We all have seen the explosiveness of Russell in the IPL and he is capable of doing it at the international level as well. We rarely see him in the West Indian colors but Russell fans will be hoping that he is back to play for his country in white-ball cricket.
