Alastair Cook will celebrate his 29th birthday next week. He is the youngest specialist batsman in Test history to play 100 Tests. He has also reached his 100th Test in the shortest span of time ever. Since his debut he has played one Test match every 4 weeks. Tendulkar, who played his first Test 5 months before his 17th birthday, was 5 months past his 29th birthday when he played his 100th Test at The Oval in 2002. Tendulkar played Test Cricket for 11 years after that day.
Will Cook catch Tendulkar? Lets see what batting records have to say about this. Needless to say, there are other arguments to be made for this, but a look at what other players have achieved is useful. Here is a list of most batsmen who have played 100 Tests. It shows their records at the completion of their 100th Test match. I have not included all such batsmen. Desmond Haynes, the Waughs and a few others did not add anything to the data set. I have included most English players, and all players who average 50 or better after their 100th Test Match.
Opening batsmen have tended to play about 12-15 innings more than middle order batsmen by their 100th Test Match. For number 3 batsmen this varies depending on the strength of the batting and bowling sides they played in. Viv Richards batted in the 2nd innings in less than half of his first 100 Tests. I've given four batting measures in the list, in addition to giving the number of innings.
1. Player's aggregate at the end of his 100th Test
2. Frequency of 50+ scores in these 100 Tests
3. Batting Average (Runs per Dismissal)
4. Runs Per Innings
I have also given the player's age in his 100th Test and the length of a player's career at the time of his 100th Tests using the Days Per Test Match calculation. Alastair Cook is about 7 runs per innings behind Tendulkar over his first hundred Tests. If he continues at this run scoring pace over his next 100 Tests or so, it will mean that he will be an England Test player until 2020, play 13 Tests per year, and match Tendulkar's run aggregate. In terms of Test Matches, Cook is 450 runs behind Tendulkar currently. In terms of Innings, Tendulkar's 179th inning in Tests happened to be his 241 not out at Sydney in 2004. In 179 innings Tendulkar had made 9205 Test runs. Cook is 1250 runs behind Tendulkar in terms of innings.
In 2013, Alastair Cook has played 25 Test innings so far and made 838 runs. He began the year well with a century in Dunedin, but his returns in the Ashes have been poor. In his first 100 Tests, Tendulkar's least prolific 25 innings brought 870 runs. It ended in the Port Elizabeth Test of 1992. In the next Test Tendulkar made 73 in India;s only innings at Cape Town.
Unlike Tendulkar in his first 100 Tests, Cook has known lean periods. He had rough period in 2008 and early 2009 when Test centuries eluded him. Cook made 118 against Sri Lanka at Galle in December 2007. He did not make a Test hundred for the next 15 Tests. He came out of this stretch with 94 and 139 not out against West Indies at Bridgetown in 2009. 2013 has so far been a bad year. Cook could rescue his year with a century at Melbourne.
Alastair Cook's 100 Tests have been played over 30 series. In 13 of those series which make up 41 of his 100 Tests, Cook did not make a century. Tendulkar's first 100 Tests were played over 38 series. Tendulkar failed to make a century in 14 of those series (which include 7 one off Tests) which comprise of 29 Tests.
In his 24 year career, Tendulkar played 51 series in which he played at least 4 innings. He failed to make a century in 21 of these, or in 2 out of 5 series. Alastair Cook has played 21 series so far in which he has played at least 4 innings. He has failed to make a century in 12 of these 21 series.
All these points suggest that Cook's run making rate is not quite in Tendulkar's league, especially over their first 100 Tests. It is true that Test batsmen do much better after the age of 29 than they do between ages 21 and 29. This is partly because most specialist Test players who play Tests in their early or mid 20s fail at Test level and aren't playing by their mid 30s. The players who are still playing at age 35-36 have had long careers by then. For example, Tendulkar, Kallis, Gower, Ponting, Miandad, Dravid, Atherton, Lara, Sobers, Gavaskar, Harvey, Richards and Greg Chappell, all averaged at least as much if not more at age 29, than they did at the end of their careers. Late bloomers like Steve Waugh and Michael Clarke are the exceptions rather than the rule.
Then there is the fact that three long standing England captains in the recent past - Michael Vaughan, Nasser Hussein and Andrew Strauss have retired in their mid-30s for reasons of form and injury.
Test Cricket is a diabolically difficult sport at the best of times. To perform at the high level that Tendulkar maintained over 24 years (even counting his two major periods of bad form - 2005-06 and 2012-13) is extremely difficult given the pressures that an average international cricket has to face playing in a team sport, in varied conditions, against a variety of bowlers. Opening batsmen get more opportunities to score runs than middle order batsmen. But they also have to face the new ball which is a challenge.
Alastair Cook has been England's best opening batsman since Graham Gooch. Michael Vaughan shone brighter for a short period of time but quickly gave up opening the batting. But if Cook is to catch up with Tendulkar, a lot of things will have to go right for him. For a start, he will have to improve his run scoring substantially from his 2012 and 2013 levels. He will need to have many years in which he makes close to a 100 runs per Test. Even if he manages to keep up his current rate of Test match play, he will have to play for at least another 8 years. It is unlikely that he will captain England for these 8 years. It is unclear how captaincy has affected Cook's batting. He started off with a bang, but has struggled in 2013.
Then there is the questioned of so-called "hunger". But lets assume that Cook will have the same hunger that Tendulkar had for the purpose of this argument. It has been argued in India that Tendulkar should have been dropped after the 2011-12 Australian tour. This might have been reasonable as part of a wholesale purge. But people forget that Tendulkar was India's 2nd highest run getter on that tour, 13 runs behind Virat Kohli, and nearly 100 runs ahead of the 3rd placed batsman. Of all the obstacles in Cook's path, it is perhaps the compulsion of England's Test selection committee which will be the toughest. For given his record until now, it is inevitable that Cook will have a run of bad form at some point in the next 7 years. Andrew Strauss did too. But in Strauss's case, England were winning, so the selectors could afford to give him more time. One hopes that Cook will be similarly lucky.
Even if everything goes right, Alastair Cook will have to play out of his skin from this point in his career, and far better than he has in the past couple of years, to match Tendulkar's Test records. If I was a betting man, I'd bet against him doing so. But I'm not, and I'd like him to do well, so I will end by encouraging him to chase Tendulkar's record. It will be good for Cook. But more importantly, it will be great for England if he gets anywhere near Tendulkar.
Realistically, if I had to put money on someone approaching Tendulkar's mark, I would put my money on a middle order batsman who shows the ability to consistently average 50 in Test cricket throughout his 20s. It is nearly impossible to replicate Tendulkar's Test career from the opening slot, even with the more frequent Tests nowadays.
Now, if Cook were to move to Number 3....