Is Ben Stokes the only player to have batted in every position from 1 through 11 in Tests? – Ask Steven

On the first day of their Test against Zimbabwe, Bangladesh lost all the wickets in scorecard order, with No. 11 left not out. How rare is this? asked “The Voice of Steven” (no relation!) on X
That’s a good spot, as Bangladesh very neatly lost all ten wickets in scorecard order in the first innings in Harare at the end of last month. Zimbabwe went on to complete their biggest Test victory, by an innings and 85 runs (and their second innings win in a row, after defeating Afghanistan in Harare last October).When Ben Stokes opened at Trent Bridge it meant he had batted in every position for England from No. 1 to 11. How many others have done this in Tests? asked Mark Jefferson from England
There were suggestions after Ben Stokes went in at No. 2 in the third Test against New Zealand at Trent Bridge that he had done so because it was the only position in which he’d never batted in a Test. I don’t really think that’s very likely – I’m fairly sure Ben doesn’t spend hours fiddling with Statsguru – but it’s true that he was only the fourth player known to have batted in all 11 positions in Tests, following Syd Gregory of Australia, Wilfred Rhodes of England, and Vinoo Mankad of India.

The Pakistan allrounder Nasim-ul-Ghani opened in one Test innings (he never went in at No. 1), and also batted in every position from 3 to 9 in the order. There are 11 other men who batted in 10 of the 11 positions: Jack Blackham and Ian Johnson of Australia batted everywhere except No. 4; Shujauddin (Pakistan) and Hugh Trumble (Australia) never entered at No. 5; Sri Lanka’s Marvan Atapattu never went in at No. 8; VVS Laxman (India) not at No. 9; Australia’s Warwick Armstrong never No. 10; while Farokh Engineer (India), Sammy Jones (Australia), Ravi Shastri (India) and Guy Whittall (Zimbabwe) batted everywhere except No. 11. Jones, who played a dozen Tests in the 1880s, is particularly worthy of mention since he only had 24 innings in all.

There’s another small group, mainly regular nightwatchmen, who batted everywhere from No. 3 to No. 11 but never opened: Jimmy Anderson (England), Lance Gibbs (West Indies), Matthew Hoggard (England), Syed Kirmani (India), Kemar Roach (West Indies), Ishant Sharma (India), Derek Underwood (England) and Daniel Vettori (New Zealand).

Kemar Roach reached 300 wickets in his 89th Test. Has anyone taken longer to get to 300? asked Mikey Branson from Barbados
Kemar Roach became the fifth West Indian to take 300 Test wickets when he dismissed Asitha Fernando during the innings victory over Sri Lanka in Antigua last week. Roach was the 41st bowler from all countries to get to 300, but only three needed more Tests than his 89: Chaminda Vaas reached 300 in his 90th match, Daniel Vettori in his 94th, and Ishant Sharma in his 98th. The fastest to 300 in Tests was R Ashwin, who needed only 54 Tests, two fewer than Dennis Lillee.What’s the highest total in a T20 international? I saw that Austria scored 322 the other day! asked Mahesh Sundaram from India
Austria piled up 322 for 7 against Hungary in Szodliget (just north of Budapest) last week. That’s the second-highest total in all men’s T20Is, behind Zimbabwe’s 344 for 4 against Gambia in Nairobi in 2024.

Shiva Jayaraman of ESPNcricinfo’s stats team helped with some of the above answers.