England No. 3 Ollie Pope set a new world record after the Bazballers had a field day on the first morning of the cricket summer at home against Zimbabwe on Thursday.
Batting first on Day 1 of the four-day Test at Trent Bridge, Nottingham, England piled on a massive 498 for three in 88 overs with the top-3 of the Ben Stokes-led side all gathering centuries. While opener Ben Duckett slammed a century in as many balls on his home ground, a struggling Zak Crawley got some runs under his belt with relatively slower 124 off 171 balls.
But it was England’s No. 3 Pope who set the headlines after his senior batting partner Joe Root nudged past 13,000 Test runs.
Pope’s record century sta(r)t
Pope waltzed to his eighth Test century in 109 balls and set multiple records as he crossed the three-figure mark. Despite his middling Test average, Pope recorded his seventh hundred at No.3, putting him level with Jonathan Trott among English batters in the spot. Only legends Wally Hammond, Ken Barrington and David Gower have racked up more Test centuries for England at No. 3.
More curiously, Pope’s eight centuries have all come up against different oppositions. The 27-year-old extended his own world record to become the first batter to record his first eight Test hundreds against different countries.
Pope became the 30th Test batter to record centuries at least against eight different countries and could even equal the record should he hit a century in the Ashes later this year.
| Most Test hundreds against different teams | |||
| Player | Team | Total centuries | No. of opposition teams |
| Sachin Tendulkar | India | 51 | 9 |
| Jacques Kallis | South Africa | 45 | 9 |
| Ricky Ponting | Australia | 41 | 9 |
| Kumar Sangakkara | Sri Lanka | 38 | 9 |
| Rahul Dravid | India | 36 | 9 |
| Brian Lara | West Indies | 34 | 9 |
| Younis Khan | Pakistan | 34 | 9 |
| Mahela Jayawardene | Sri Lanka | 34 | 9 |
| Kane Williamson | New Zealand | 33 | 9 |
| Steve Waugh | Australia | 32 | 9 |
| Matthew Hayden* | Australia | 30 | 9 |
| Gary Kirsten | South Africa | 21 | 9 |
| Adam Gilchrist | Australia | 17 | 9 |
| Marvan Atapattu | Sri Lanka | 16 | 9 |
| Angelo Mathews | Sri Lanka | 16 | 9 |
| Dinesh Chandimal | Sri Lanka | 16 | 9 |
| Alastair Cook | England | 33 | 8 |
| Shivnarine Chanderpaul | West Indies | 30 | 8 |
| Hashim Amla | South Africa | 28 | 8 |
| Inzamam-ul-Haq | Pakistan | 25 | 8 |
| Mohammad Yousuf | Pakistan | 24 | 8 |
| Ian Bell | England | 22 | 8 |
| Ross Taylor | New Zealand | 19 | 8 |
| Michael Vaughan | England | 18 | 8 |
| Dimuth Karunaratne | Sri Lanka | 16 | 8 |
| Herschelle Gibbs | South Africa | 14 | 8 |
| Thilan Samaraweera | Sri Lanka | 14 | 8 |
| Kraigg Brathwaite | West Indies | 12 | 8 |
| Ashwell Prince | South Africa | 11 | 8 |
| Ollie Pope | England | 8 | 8 |