A Chiliad of Runs in a Single Knock to Obliterate a 116 Year-Old Cricket Record

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In the first week of 2016 a 15-year-old Indian schoolboy batsman from Maharashtra state, Pranav Dhanawade, scored an unbelievable 1009 not out in a single innings playing for KC Gandhi English School in an inner-school competition — a world record for officially recognised games of cricket at any level🅥. Dhanawade’s staggering achievement—scored off just a mere 327 balls with 129 fours and 59 sixes (870 runs in boundaries alone)—eclipsed and completely destroyed the 116-y-o schoolboy record of 13-y-o AEJ Collins: 628 runs, also undefeated, accumulated in an innings spread over four afternoons on the junior cricket field at Clifton College in Bristol, UK, in 1899🅧.

The two scorecards: Collins (L) & Dhanawade (R)

Instantly young Pranav achieved name and face recognition across all-India and made headline news wherever cricket is seriously followed in the world. Indian cricketing icons Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni sent their congratulations, the state government picked up the tab for the boy’s future educational and coaching expenses and he was universally lauded.

The new record-holder

While Dhanawade’s accomplishment with the bat was phenomenal by any yardstick, some context and some caveats should be acknowledged. The opposition team from Arya Gurukul School was weakened by the absence of its U-16 XI players who had to sit senior exams at the same time. Consequently the Arya Gurukul coach was forced to field boys as young as 12 who were not experienced at playing with hard red balls. Another qualifying factor was the “ground” itself.  At some parts the boundaries were only 30 yards from the wicket! (Collins’ marathon stint also took place on a shortened playing area).

13-y-o run machine

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AEJ Collins never made it into the first-class cricket arena. Similarly, with the spotlight on him since his Herculean feat at the junior level, Pranav Dhanawade has also found it hard going to progress his career, to date struggling to even make the Mumbai Under-19 side. 

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🅥 KC Gandhi‘s innings total 1465 for 3 was also a all-cricket record

🅧 before Dhanawade’s epic knock the only batter to get close to Collins’ mammoth record tally was Tasmanian Charles Eady who hit 566 in a Hobart district men’s competition in 1902 (under the rules current at the time hits clearing the fence were awarded only “five” runs, cf. under the modern scoring system Eady’s score would have been 579).

Tossing the Kookaburra: Cricket’s Oldest Record

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Cricket is one of those sports that those of a statistically-minded bent have wet dreams about. For some of its more fanatical devotees the game can be all about maxing out on averages and records as much as it is about the spectacle of witnessing great performances with bat and ball on the field. One record relating to cricket, when judged on sheer longevity alone, stands above them all. The record for throwing a cricket ball has not been bettered for well-nigh on 150 years.

Cricket on Durham Sands Racecourse 

The setting for this feat of human-propelled aerodynamics was the riverine Durham Sands Racecourse in England’s northeast. The year was 1881 (or possibly 1882 or 1884) and the record throw was one event in a two-day Easter carnival, interspersed with the usual picnic pastimes (three-legged race, sack race, tug-of-war, etc.). A club cricketing pro of the day by the name of Robert Percival propelled a leather-stitched cork ball in his left hand weighing five-and-a-half ounces a distance measured at 140 yards, 2 feet (128.6m) to win the prize✪. This beat the existing record at the time, apparently that of 140 yards, 9 inches, set by Ross MacKenzie at Toronto, Canada, in 1872. 

The caveat or asterisk attached to this ”record” is that no verification or acknowledgement of the feat appeared in contemporary newspapers at the time of Percival’s record throw. It would be another 20 years or so before the achievement was first recorded in print...Wisden, the cricketing bible annual, added it to its records in its 1908 edition. Much later, the Guinness Book of Records accepted it as world record holder, where it sits to this day. I first came across this record oddity in a 1960s edition of J.J.Miller’s Guide.

There have been other claimants and a steady stream of challengers for the record of course. One (unverified) claim to bettering Percival’s mark is that made on behalf of a 19th century Australian aborigine, “King” Billy. The indigenous Queenslander’s 1872 throw was measured by an MCC committee man at a neat 141 yards, however the record attempt was not accepted by the Wisden people. Javelin thrower and performance artist Roald Bradstock also claimed a more recent record attempt (2010) of a tad over 145 yards, but neither Wisden or Guinness have accepted the “record” throw.

Since the 1970s there have been organised events to try to break Percival’s long-standing throw mark—with cricketers, baseball pitchers and even Olympic javelin champions taking part in contests—but no one has really got close to the magic 140.2 yd pinnacle. So the reign of Robert Percival continues, his unverified and unverifiable throw remains, legend-like, in Number One place in this most atypical of cricketing achievements. 

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*THROWING THE CRICKET BALL *   140 yards and two feet, Robert Percival, on the Durham Sands racecourse, Co. Durham c1882 ~ Wisden, Miscellaneous Records

 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡 𝄡

✪ the 1904 Cricket newssheet indicated that Percival’s throw was wind-assisted