Records galore at World Cup before quarterfinals

NEW DELHI (Agencies) - The knockout stage is all set to begin in the cricket World Cup and in the 42 league games so far, the flagship event of the ICC has witnessed many records. Indian batting legend Sachin Tendulkar became the first player to score five or more hundreds at the World Cup and Ireland's Kevin O'Brien's 50-ball century against England set a record for the fastest hundred. Australian skipper Ricky Ponting broke the record for the most match appearances in the World Cup and also became the first player to be on the winning side in 250 ODI games. Sri Lankan pacer Lasith Malinga became the first player to take two hat-tricks in World Cup. Here are more statistical highlights, released by the ICC, in the tournament so far: *Sachin Tendulkar became the first batsman to score 2000 ICC Cricket World Cup runs. *Ireland (329 for seven) recorded the highest successful run chase in the ICC Cricket World Cup. *The India-England tie in Bengaluru set a new match aggregate record for the ICC Cricket World Cup as 676 runs were scored. *Jonathan Trott became the joint record holder, alongside Viv Richards and Kevin Pietersen, of the fastest player to reach 1,000 ODI runs. *Shahid Afridi became the first bowler to capture three successive four wicket hauls in the ICC Cricket World Cup. *The partnership of 282 between Tillakaratne Dilshan and Upul Tharanga for the first wicket against Zimbabwe was a new record for that wicket *Paul Stirling became the youngest centurion in the history of the ICC Cricket World Cup, with his hundred against the Netherlands. *After the 42 group games, the average run rate for the competition looks set to average more than five runs per over for the first time in the history of the competition. So far runs have been scored at 5.07 runs per over, at an average of 28.43 runs per wicket, beating the previous best of 4.95 in 2007. The lowest run rate in a competition was 3.54 runs per over in the 1979 event. *Of the 42 games in the competition so far, 30 captains have won the toss and chosen to bat, whereas only 12 have chosen to bowl. However, this has had not had much impact on the results of matches, as 22 have been won by the team batting first and 18 by the team batting second, with one tie and one no-result. The influence of day/night matches is also seen to be negligible, with 15 of the 30 matches won by the team batting first, while 13 have been won by the team batting second. *In the group stages, overall statistics show pace bowling was more effective than spin with a better strike rate (34.4 in comparison to 40.4) and a better average (29.86 in comparison to 31.53). However, spinners did have a better economy rate (4.68 in comparison to 5.19). However, the success of the likes of Sulieman Benn opening the bowling means this event has seen more spinners open the bowling in 2011, on 26 occasions in total, than in all other editions of the tournament combined. When spinners have opened the bowling it has been delivered with a better average in comparison to pace (22.38 to 29.14), a better economy rate (4.14 to 5.17) and a better strike-rate (32.4 to 33.8).