Bairstow at 100: A career with plenty of expectations but minimal execution

March 7th and 8th, 2024

Mark these two dates. Down the lane, in 2030 or whatever, hardly there will be players who will represent 100 Tests. In a world where the T20 format is taking over, and players prefer to play franchise leagues over their national teams, four players will feature in the 100th Test in a couple of days. 

Ravichandran Ashwin will step on the field for the 100th time in the fifth Test. On March 8th, Tim Southee and Kane Williamson will feature for the 100th time in the second Test between New Zealand and Australia.

And guess who the fourth is? It is the Yorkshire man, Jonny Bairstow.

Bairstow is probably the least expected to achieve this feat compared to the other three. By no means is he a mug. It's just that Williamson, Southee, and Ashwin are better known as Test specialists and the fact that they all have just got to 100. 

When you conceptualize Bairstow, the first thing that comes to mind is that he is an aggressive batter. His technique might not be as sound as Joe Root's, but he can demolish any bowling attack once set. 

Both New Zealand and India could well and truly attest to it. While the Black Caps were demolished in 2022, India were on the wrong side of things in the one-off Test, where he scored twin centuries. 

The journey hasn't been as pleasing as Bairstow would have wanted. For him to make his Test debut before Root, the selectors must have seen something extraordinary in him. And that is absolutely true by the numbers. 

Before making his Test debut, Bairstow scored 3296 runs at an average of 46.4. In comparison, Root had scored just over 2000 runs at a lower average of 38.02. This means prioritizing Bairstow over Root wasn't a bad call. 

Despite the promise, Bairstow had a false start to his Test career. It took him four years and 36 innings to register his first Test century. In his debut year, Bairstow scored 196 runs in seven innings at an average of 32.7. In his first 21 matches, he had an average of 28.4. 

When everything was going south for the Yorkshire batter, a break season finally arrived in 2016. To be precise, to make a statement. 

In 2016, England played 17 Tests, and Bairstow played in each. He started the year with a whopping maiden century against South Africa in Cape Town. This was the match in which Ben Stokes clubbed 258 runs. The pair were involved in a 399-run partnership for the sixth wicket. To date, it is the second-highest partnership for England in Tests. 

In the 17 Tests that year, Bairstow scored 1470 runs at an average of 58.2, with three centuries. All his runs came as a wicket-keeper, which is the most by a gloveman in a calendar year. In fact, he still remains only the second keeper to hit 1000+ runs in a year after Andy Flower (1045) in 2000. 

Just when everyone thought Bairstow had finally arrived, his follow-up years went the opposite. Every successive year, it just kept declining till 2022. Between 2017 and 2021, he played 41 matches, scoring 1986 runs at an average of 27.2. 

Among 37 top-order batters (1-7) who scored 1500+ runs in these five years, only Roston Chase (26.3) and Shai Hope (26.8) had a lower average. It was a spiralling period. 

Desperately needing runs, Bairstow once again found his mojo in 2022. Like he did in 2016, he started the year with a century against Australia in the 2021/22 Ashes Down Under. He turned out to be the only centurion for England in that series. 

But that was not the best part about his entire 2022. 

Under the leadership of Stokes, Bairstow was given complete freedom, and the batter brought his ODI style of batting into play. It started with a blazing century in the fourth innings against New Zealand in the second Test at Trent Bridge. He scored 135 runs at a strike rate of 147.8 and helped England chase 299. 

Following that innings, Bairstow smashed a 162 in the first innings and an unbeaten 71 in the second in the third Test against the Kiwis. Both these innings came at a strike rate of over 100. He registered twin centuries in the rescheduled Test and helped England chase 378, helping the Three Lions achieve their biggest chase to date.

In five innings, Bairstow had five 50+ scores. That’s normal. Tell me something new. He converted four of them into centuries and blazed his way through all of them. 

The freedom with which Bairstow batted under Stokes' captaincy sort of revived his Test career. 

His best tenure has been under the captaincy of Stokes. Even in the ongoing series against India, Bairstow might be averaging only 21, but he has thrown away a few starts that he got. 

The right-handed batter averages 36.4 in his 99-match career. Leading into the 100th match, only Sir Ian Botham (34.3) and Ben Stokes (36.3) had a lower average among the top-order batters for England. 

Bairstow's Test career has been two years of excellence and ten years of expectation. Regardless of that, as he said in the presser “Like in every game, you put your best foot forward. No matter what it is, I'll be going out there, chewing my gum, puffing my chest out, and trying to have a good time with the other ten blokes out there.” 

After all, that is how Bairstow has always played cricket.