England Captain Alastair Cook's Tale of Nervous Nineties

Alastair Cook's Ashes century woes continued when the England captain fell four runs short of what would have been his 28th Test hundred on Saturday during the third day of the second match at Lord's.

Cook is without a hundred in 23 Ashes innings. He last century against Australia came in Sydney -- 189 -- in January 2011. His Ashes average is also far from impressive at 28.30 against his career average of 46.55. The 30-year-old opener though has scored seven fifties since then. (Cook Sweats Blood but Misses out on Deserved Ton)

Cook, who scored 96 off 233 balls (13 fours), became the first England batsman to be dismissed in the nervous nineties for seven times. India great Sachin Tendulkar (10) heads the list of batsmen to be dismissed most times. Others to follow are: Rahul Dravid (9), Michael Slater (9), AB de Villiers (8) and Steve Waugh (8). (Buttler Follows Gilchrist's Example of Knowing When it's Time to go)

As captains, Stephen Fleming (New Zealand) and Mahendra Singh Dhoni (India) share the record for being dismissed four times in the nineties in Tests.

Other statistical highlights of Lord's Test Day 3:

# Cook registered his 14th fifty as captain - his 43rd in Tests. (When Steve Smith Broke a 77-Year-Old Record)

# Cook is the first England batsman to record 70 innings of fifty-plus in Tests - 27 centuries and 43 fifties. The next three in the list are Graham Gooch (66), Ian Bell (65) and Geoff Boycott (64).

# Ben Stokes and Cook were involved in a stand of 145 for the fifth wicket - the fourth instance a century stand has been recorded for England after being four down for 40 or less.

# Mitchell Marsh's three Test wickets till date are all left-handers - Shikhar Dhawan, Alastair Cook and Ben Stokes.

(With inputs from Rajesh Kumar)