The year in pictures
Thirty-seven from 2010
South Africa v England, Cape Town, January 6: South Africa accused England bowlers James Anderson and Stuart Broad of being "a bit naughty" during their four-match Test series. Broad had stepped on the ball, while Anderson was seen seemingly picking at the leather. "...They've been very silly... What would we say if it was Pakistan?" was former England captain Michael Vaughan's scathing criticism. Broad's excuse was that he was just too lazy to pick the ball up.•Gianluigi Guerica/AFP/Getty Images
United Arab Emirates v Afghanistan, ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier, Dubai, February 13: For once the cynics, skeptics and critics had to take a back seat. For there was no other way to describe Afghanistan's qualification for the World Twenty20 than as a fairytale. •Associated Press
India v South Africa, Gwalior, February 24: The unprecedented feat of an ODI double-century was achieved by one of the most likely candidates. Sachin Tendulkar's knock against South Africa marked the beginning of a year in which he gave the lie to the assumption that he would slow with age.•Getty Images
ICC World Twenty20 final, Barbados, May 16: They invented the game, but until 2010 England had never won a major international tournament. All that changed when Paul Collingwood led his men to the Twenty20 World Cup. Unfortunately England's next World Cup campaign - on a rectangular field this time - was slightly less memorable.•AFP
West Indies v South Africa, Barbados, June 29: Perhaps they were miffed they were missing the football World Cup, but there was something distinctly ill-tempered about the series between South Africa and West Indies. By the end of the three Tests and five ODIs, Kemar Roach had been fined for an altercation with Jacques Kallis, Dale Steyn reprimanded for spitting, and Sulieman Benn ordered off the field for disobeying his captain.•Associated Press
Pakistan v Australia, Headingley, July 24: With the advent of the UDRS, the role of the on-field umpire changed in 2010. Rudi Koertzen, a champion of the review system himself, retired in July, after standing in 108 Test matches and 209 ODIs.•Getty Images
England v Pakistan, The Oval, August 19 : With a five-for in Pakistan's victory over England, and 33 wickets in seven Tests in the year, Mohammad Amir was taking giant strides towards becoming Pakistan's next left-arm fast-bowling superstar. Unfortunately, one of those strides was a little too long, resulting in him being named in the spot-fixing controversy, and he ended up fighting in court.•Getty Images
England v Pakistan, Lord's, September 20: Three of their players had been accused of spot-fixing, the chief of their board was adding fuel to the fire with outrageous pronouncements, and they had lost the first two ODIs. It was hard to see an upside for Pakistan. Promptly Umar Gul stepped up, took 10 wickets in two matches, and put his team back into the series, and gave his nation some pride back.•Getty Images
Bangladesh v New Zealand, Mirpur, October 17: After Bangladesh beat New Zealand 4-0 at home, no one could treat them as pushovers anymore. The same couldn't quite be said for New Zealand, who lost 11 ODIs in a row towards the end of the year.•Associated Press
India v New Zealand, Hyderabad, November 14: Harbhajan Singh spent a large part of 2010 cursing "highway-like" pitches that didn't give bowlers a chance. He wised up by the end of the year and started belting the ball around himself, becoming the only player to get back-to-back Test centuries from No. 8. The second of those came in a 105-run last-wicket partnership with his old buddy Sreesanth. •AFP
Sri Lanka v West Indies, Pallekele, December 3: "The worst series of my life" was how Kumar Sangakkara described the drop-by-drop action of West Indies' tour of Sri Lanka. Torrential rain meant there was barely any play over the three drawn Tests. Following which, bizarrely, the Sri Lanka board decided to postpone the entire ODI series to a drier season.•Associated Press
South Africa v India, Centurion, December 18: Jacques Kallis spent 15 years in international cricket searching for an elusive double-century, and finally realised all he needed to do to break the hoodoo was grow a new head of hair.•Associated Press
South Africa v India, Durban, December 29: A batsman leaping into the air, only to glove a wicked bouncer to gully, in Durban - surely he couldn't be wearing a green helmet? India turned the tables on South Africa in the Boxing Day Test, their bowlers making good use of the bounce in the Kingsmead pitch to level the Test series 1-1. This image of Jacques Kallis being dismissed by Sreesanth remains the defining one from the match.•ESPNcricinfo Ltd
South Africa v England, Johannesburg, January 15 : MS Dhoni described the UDRS as a life jacket without a guarantee, but umpire Daryl Harper forgot to even blow the air into his. His failure to turn on his headphones while officiating as third umpire meant he didn't hear the clear sound of the ball hitting the edge of Graeme Smith's bat. Smith got a century, England lost the Test, and the debate over the use of technology raged on. •Getty Images
New Zealand v Bangladesh, Hamilton, February 16: Poor New Zealand fans must have been looking forward to a good year when Brendon McCullum smashed 185 in their first Test of 2010. Sadly, that would remain their only win of the year; they only won six ODIs and were whitewashed in two series in a row, including by Bangladesh. McCullum was a silver lining, scoring two more centuries, but it was a very dark cloud indeed for New Zealand.•Getty Images
Bangladesh v England, Chittagong, March 15: In 2010, Graeme Swann tweaked his way to over 60 wickets at 25-odd, 33 ODI wickets at 18.67, and widespread recognition as the world's best spinner. And he did it all with a cheeky grin on his face and a witty quip never far from his lips. Perhaps, by the end of it all, he had earned the right to, as Shane Warne said, "strut around like David Hasselhoff".•PA Photos
England v Bangladesh, Old Trafford, June 5: Virender Sehwag had called Bangladesh an ordinary side, and one could be forgiven for thinking that, in an attempt to improve them, he had switched to batting left-handed and sneaked on their plane to England. Such was Tamim Iqbal's flamboyance during his back-to-back centuries at Lord's and Old Trafford, that he drew comparisons to the best, was anointed Wisden's Test Cricketer of the Year, and can now realistically stake a claim to being Bangladesh's first truly world-class batsman.•PA Photos
Australia v Pakistan, Lord's, July 16: There are many ways a player can deal with a heavy loss in his first Test as captain, but few would go the Shahid Afridi route: decide to retire from Test cricket. By the end of 2010, Pakistan were on their fourth Test captain for the year, with Misbah-ul-Haq taking the reins after Salman Butt's fall from grace.•AFP
Sri Lanka v India, Colombo, July 27: With all the records that were broken by other batsmen in 2010, it is sometimes hard to remember that Kumar Sangakkara still tops the ICC Test batsmen rankings. The Sri Lanka captain averaged 99.28 in Tests in the year, but his seventh double-century unfortunately came on a pitch so flat Harbhajan Singh listed it as a possible cause for the death of Test cricket. By the time the one-day series between the two teams was over, India and Sri Lanka fans were praying for respite from further meetings between their sides.•AFP
August 31: In 2010 there were times you could afford to take your eyes off the cricket, but you couldn't go five minutes without checking your Twitter page. Tweets, ranging from franchise-ownership exposés to apologies for not walking, were analysed nearly as much as on-field performances. This rant from Kevin Pietersen, after being dropped for the series against Pakistan, was probably the pick of the bunch.•Twitter
Warriors v Chennai, Champions League Twenty20, Johannesburg, September 26: It was the year of the Chennai Super Kings, who won the IPL and the Champions League, leaving Kris Srikkanth barely able to contain himself and the marketing men happy that an Indian team had won the marquee tournament. •AFP
Australia v Sri Lanka, Melbourne, November 3: With no shortage of people saying Twenty20 had made ODIs redundant, Angelo Mathews and Lasith Malinga's record-breaking partnership was a timely reminder of just how exciting the 50-over format can be. When they came together at 107 for 8 with another 133 still needed to win, it looked like they were just having a bit of fun in the face of a hopeless cause. The miraculous recovery set up what was to be Sri Lanka's first series win in Australia. •Getty Images
Pakistan v South Africa, Abu Dhabi, November 21: In 2010, AB de Villiers seemed to be participating in some kind of one-man decathlon. First he won the distance race, achieving the highest Test score by a South Africa batsman with his 278 in new Test venue Abu Dhabi. Then he finished first in the sprint, making the fastest Test hundred by a South African, off 75 balls against India.•AFP
Australia v England, Adelaide, December 6: As Andrew Miller put it, "At face value, it all looked so laughably predictable. After all the agonising and pontificating, the doubts and column inches, [Kevin] Pietersen did what everyone, deep down, believed was his destiny, and turned in a performance that might have been lifted from one of Ian Botham's scripts from the 1980s." KP's double-century and crucial wicket, of Michael Clarke, in the second Test had his critics looking sheepish.•Getty Images
Australia v England, Perth, December 19: Dumped from the team, panned by the critics and questioning his own mental state; it looked like Mitchell Johnson's Ashes campaign was over after the first Test. Then, suddenly, he turned it all the around in Perth. Nine wickets, his first half-century in 19 Tests, and the Man-of-the-Match award. •Getty Images
Australia v England, Melbourne, December 29: England came in to the Ashes with huge expectations that they would retain the urn on Australian soil for the first time in 24 years. They should have had the weight of the world on their shoulders, but perhaps their secret was that they just seemed to be having fun. Graeme Swann led the "sprinkler" dance after his side created history.•Getty Images
India v South Africa, Kolkata, February 18: In 2010, Hashim Amla turned the cricket field into his own private monastery of endurance and concentration. He scored an incredible 490 runs in a two-Test series against India and 1200 at 85.71 in all, with five centuries, in the year. He even conquered the one-day format, scoring 1058 runs at 75.57 with five centuries.•Getty Images
IPL 2010, March 29: It all started with a spat between then IPL chairman Lalit Modi and Shashi Tharoor, a member of India's parliament, over the league's new Kochi franchise. Within a month both men had lost their jobs and the IPL was mired in an ever-deepening spiral of court cases and tax investigations.•Indian Premier League
England v Australia, Old Trafford, June 27: Eoin Morgan and his audacious repertoire of shots brought an edge to England's ODI team that saw them win 12 of their 17 matches in 2010. Morgan hit three ODI centuries, a Test hundred, and made 183 runs in England's successful World Twenty20 campaign. He also ticked what now seems like a key box when it comes to being a successful modern-day England cricketer: not being English.•Getty Images
Sri Lanka v India, Galle, July 22: If you didn't have goosebumps when Muttiah Muralitharan walked off the field for the last time in Test cricket, after taking an unfathomable 800th wicket, you just aren't human. Dileep Premachandran wrote: "For nearly two decades Murali was Sri Lanka's Constantine, the prime factor in his nation wresting respect from a grudging world... nobody could have done it better."•Associated Press
England v Pakistan, Trent Bridge, July 29: It was a dismal year for Kamran Akmal behind the wickets. He dropped four catches against Australia in Sydney in January and then had another shocker against England at Trent Bridge, dropping two and missing a stumping. By the end of the year he was out of the side, replaced by his little brother, and facing a PCB inquiry over spot-fixing.•Getty Images
England v Pakistan, Cardiff, September 5: Murmurs about dodgy doings in cricket have been around ever since Hansie Cronje was banned for match-fixing. But there had never been anything as spectacular as the News of the World's footage which alleged that Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif were involved in a spot-fixing scandal. For fans, video evidence that the sport they loved had been thrown into murky waters again was too much to take.•PA Photos
India v Australia, Mohali, October 5: Ninety-two runs to win with two wickets in hand, an injured back forcing him to use a runner, and Ishant Sharma and Pragyan Ojha for company. It didn't matter to VVS Laxman; it was the second innings - his domain - and he pulled off an unbelievable victory. And when he scored a match-saving 91 against New Zealand in India's next Test, it was his eighth consecutive second-innings score of more than 50.•AFP
Pakistan v South Africa, Dubai, November 5: Zulqarnain Haider helped Pakistan pull off a Houdini-esque escape to level the series 2-2, but it was just the precursor to his next grand illusion: vanishing into thin air himself.•AFP
Australia v England, Brisbane, November 25: The lead-up to the Ashes had everything from Kevin Pietersen calling John Buchanan a nobody to an image of Ricky Ponting projected onto Big Ben. On the first day of the first Test, though, it was the little-talked-about Peter Siddle who lit up the series, with a hat-trick and six wickets on his birthday.•Getty Images
Australia v England, Adelaide, December 7: Before the Ashes, Ricky Ponting and Andrew Strauss were pictured smiling with one hand each on the urn. It all looked a bit too nice and cordial. In the second Test, the two were involved in a heated argument at the end of the first day. The sledging had begun, the gloves were off, the Ashes were on.•AFP
South Africa v India, Centurion, December 19: A lot of Test cricketers are thrilled when they score a half-century. Sachin Tendulkar scores a half-century of centuries. Seven Test hundreds and 1543 runs in 2010 - after 20 years of international cricket, the great man still finds a way to leave the statisticians goggle-eyed.•Getty Images
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