What 4 January Tells Us About Cricket

Australia v England Tests appear on this date in 1975, 1991, 2018 and 2026, and it is no coincidence that so many milestones fall inside them. Ian Redpath's 4000 Test runs in 1975, David Lloyd's 500 in the same match, Alec Stewart's 500 and David Gower's 8000 in 1991, Alastair Cook's 12000 and Steven Smith's 6000 in 2018, and Usman Khawaja passing both 2000 and 4000 Test runs across 2018 and 2023 all sit inside this recurring fixture. The scorecards themselves also carry the date's biggest individual innings, from Khawaja's 195 in 2023 to Travis Head's 163 and Joe Root's 160 in 2026, suggesting the turn of the year at Sydney has long been fertile ground for long, milestone-laden Test batting.

Not everything on 4 January is English or Australian. Muttiah Muralitharan's 9/51 for Sri Lanka against Zimbabwe in 2002 stands apart as the date's outstanding bowling performance, set inside a match Sri Lanka won by an innings and 94 runs after posting 586. New Zealand also recur often in the ODI log, appearing in matches from 2000 through to 2025 against West Indies, Zimbabwe, India and Sri Lanka, hinting at this being a regular touring date in the New Zealand summer calendar.

In the T20 era, 4 January has become heavily associated with the Big Bash League, with Melbourne Stars, Melbourne Renegades and Hobart Hurricanes fixtures listed across 2011, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2020/21, 2022/23, 2023/24, 2024/25 and 2025/26. The highest T20 scores logged for the date, including MP Stoinis's 97 and DJM Short's 96, both belong to BBL matches, reinforcing that this point in the Australian summer is now as much a Big Bash fixture point as an Ashes one.