Ashes Stats: Pat Cummins reaches a home century as James Anderson matches Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting | Cricket News

Benedict Bermange

Cricket Statistician

Australia dominated day one of the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne after asking England to bat first; Sky Cricket stats man Benedict Bermange has all the key numbers after day one of the third Test at the MCG, featuring Pat Cummins, James Anderson and Joe Root

Pat Cummins took his 100th Test wicket on home soil to get the ball rolling for Australia at the MCG

Sky Cricket number-cruncher Benedict Bermange has all the key stats after Australia buck their own trend on yet another difficult day for England in this Ashes series…

Australia won the toss and chose to field. They had chosen to bat in each of the last 19 home Tests in which they had won the toss.

James Anderson is playing his 168th Test, putting him in a tie for second place in the list of the most-capped Test cricketers:

Pat Cummins’ dismissal of Haseeb Hameed was his 100th Test wicket in Australia, the 20th bowler to take that many.

Scott Boland, 32, became Australia’s oldest specialist fast bowling Test debutant since Geoff Noblet, who played his first Test against South Africa at Port Elizabeth in March 1950 when he was 33 years 170 days old.

Joe Root started the Test with a Test batting average of 50.01587. He was dismissed for exactly 50, meaning his average decreased to 50.01578.

Joe Root saw his batting average drop by 0.00009 after be dismissed for 50 on day one in Melbourne

It was his ninth score of at least 50 in Australia without a century, which equalled Bruce Laird’s record. He is still two short of the most 50s by any player in a visiting country without converting any to a century:

When he reached 27 in his innings though, he set a new record for the most runs by a Test captain in a calendar year, surpassing Graeme Smith’s 1656 runs for South Africa in 2008. However, Root needs 109 runs in his second innings to surpass Mohammad Yousuf’s all-time record of 1788 runs in Test cricket in a calendar year, set in 2006.