Anantha Narayanan
The best teams in terms of matches played, runs scored and wickets taken.
Ah! I fooled you, didn't I. You must have thought that I have sent an article meant for Fortune or Forbes magazine by mistake to Cricinfo. First let us put that matter to rest. The richest team must be the Indian team which collectively must be earning more than the rest of the teams together. Not that I care two cents about what the players earn. By "richest team" I mean, cricketing riches, in other words, the sum total of matches, runs and wickets which the team members take on to the field. It is also a lighter piece, coming in the wake of some serious and heavy analysis which have been done by me recently.
I had done a sub-set of this article for another blog. I used the career figures. As I finished the article I realized that the career-to-date figures are the more appropriate figures to be used. So I applied the career-to-date figures, expanded the scope to matches also and have come out with a more comprehensive article here.
Since it usually happens that these analyses develop further based on user comments, I have done a simple accumulation of career-to-date figures of all 11 players. It certainly will give us some insight into the richness of teams in terms of the aggregates. I could look at the following options in later articles. I would also like the readers to come in with their own takes on these numbers and how these could be interpreted.
- Adding only the runs of the first 7 batsmen
- Add only for career-to-date runs greater than a certain value
- Add the wickets for the best 5 bowlers
- Do a comparison of the two team aggregates and analyse the most matched or ill-matched pairings.
I am aware that these are quantitative measures and not performance oriented. However there is no substitute for experience as the Indian batsmen showed at Dambulla against a New Zealand attack, which can at best be termed good and effective. It must be understood that the aggregates normally keep on increasing for a team but take a dip when senior player(s) retire.
The other thing I have done is not to show the top-10 accumulations. That would be quite silly on my part since the same team is likely to occupy the top-10 positions in terms of aggregates. Instead I have taken the top 8 teams + ICC XI and found the best for each of these teams and then ordered the tables accordingly. The other key feature is that I have taken the first innings figures. In other words, the test-beginning values. The second innings values would be higher, but this is a very minor matter.
Let us look at the tables. I have also provided the relevant details for the players who played in the particular innings for the top 3 teams. The support files provide the complete data.
Top teams based on number of Tests played
2008 1887 India 861 vs Aus Gambhir G 18 Sehwag V 61 Dravid R 126 Tendulkar S.R 151 Laxman V.V.S 97 Ganguly S.C 110 Dhoni M.S 30 Harbhajan Singh 70 Zaheer Khan 57 Kumble A 131 Sharma I 10 2005 1768 ICC XI 818 vs Aus Smith G.C 40 Sehwag V 37 Dravid R 92 Lara B.C 118 Kallis J.H 94 Inzamam-ul-Haq 102 Flintoff A 53 Boucher M.V 85 Vettori D.L 65 Harmison S.J 36 Muralitharan M 96 2006 1819 Australia 811 vs Eng Langer J.L 102 Hayden M.L 86 Ponting R.T 107 Martyn D.R 67 Hussey M.E.K 13 Clarke M.J 24 Gilchrist A.C 87 Warne S.K 142 Lee B 56 Clark S.R 6 McGrath G.D 121
A detailed statistical look at the greatest Test bowlers
As I had mentioned in my recent article on Muralitharan, this is the right time to have an in-depth look at the great bowlers of our times and before. We have just seen the retirement of one of the all-time great bowlers and the next active bowler is, in Formula-1 parlance, three laps behind.
Australia: Shane Warne Glenn McGrath Dennis Lillee West Indies: Malcolm Marshall Curtley Ambrose Joel Garner Pakistan: Imran Khan Wasim Akram Waqar Younis India Anil Kumble Kapil Dev Sri Lanka: Muralitharan New Zealand: Richard Hadlee South Africa: Allan Donald England: Fred Trueman.
A few notes on the selections. I did not select any pre-WW2 bowlers since their figures would have distorted the numbers considerably, especially Sydney Barnes. The three Australian bowlers select themselves. For West Indies I selected their three best bowlers over the past 30 years. Holding for Garner could be an option. However Garner has a bowling average of 20.98 against Holding's 23.69. First I had selected only Imran Khan and Wasim Akram for Pakistan. Then I realized that Waqar Younis led in one key measure (strike rate) and there was no way could miss him. I did not want to drop Wasim Akram since he is the only left-hander in this group.
Kumble selects himself while Kapil Dev, although he has average overall figures deserves a place since he was the leading wicket-taker for quite some time and changed the face of Indian fast bowling. Shaun Pollock is the only one who could challenge Donald's place. I selected Fred Trueman to represent the period between 1947 and 1969. He is also the best modern English bowler. I also followed the basic principle that any bowler who was the best in a key category (wkts/strike rate/rpo) cannot be left out. One could find justifications for including Walsh, Holding, Shaun Pollock, Willis et al. However this is my selection and not a bad one at that. Let me also add that this is not necessarily the top bowlers list. I am sure Holding, Roberts, Pollock et al would be placed higher than a few in this list. However I wanted to have as wide a representation as possible and restricted one country to 3 bowlers.
Now for the measures on which the rating work is done. First let me clarify two fundamental differences to the way I have done such exercises before.
The first is that I have selected ten measures and given equal weight to all. That way I reduce the chances of subjective valuations.
The next is that for each measure, the best gets the maximum points, viz., 10.0 and the others get proportionate points. This reduces the possibility of differential weights and ensures a fair allocation of points.
The following measures are used.
1. Wickets captured. 2. Bowling strike rate (Bpw). 3. Bowling accuracy (Rpo). (These two are components of the Bowling average, but have been considered independently). 4. Quality of wickets captured (Average of dismissed batsmen's batting averages) 5. Away bowling average. 6. % of top order wickets captured. 7. Team load borne by bowler (balls bowled and wickets captured). 8. Ratio of bowling average to peer bowling average - all teams. 9. Ratio of bowling average to peer bowling average - other bowlers of own team. 10.Win index (Combination of two ratios)- (% of win wickets to career wickets and % of win wickets to team win wickets).
Just to summarize, Muralitharan leads in 2 measures (Wickets and Team load factor). The other 8 measures are led by Ambrose (RpO), Garner (Away bowling average), Imran Khan (Dismissed batsman quality), Waqar Younis (Bowling strike rate), Marshall (Peer comparison to all bowlers), Hadlee (Peer comparison to own team bowlers), McGrath (Top order wickets ratio) and Warne (Win index). A very fair distribution of the top positions with nine bowlers leading in one or more measures. There is no domination by one bowler.
There is one point worth mentioning here. There have been a number of comments about the wickets captured by Muralitharan against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. I have thought long and hard and decided not to do anything about it. What is the definition of a weak team. India against Trueman in 1952 were much worse than Bangladesh against Muralitharan. England in 1984 were the rabbits against Marshall. How do we value the English wickets against Australia in 2006. It pains me to say this, what about Pakistan during the past few months. And finally where do we place Sri Lanka itself during its first 10 years. Let us not forget that Warne did not bowl against the strong Australian batsmen, nor Kumble against the great Indian line-up and so on. However the fact that the bowlers in the strong batting lineups did not bowl against their own lineups does not make them any less bowlers. Let Muralitharan not get penalized for playing in a weaker team.
If Muralitharan captured wickets against a team including the Flower brothers, Campbell and Goodwin, how can anyone downgrade these wickets. Where do we draw the line. A test wicket is a test wicket. There are enough measures built in to take care of wickets of batsmen of lower quality. If we start down-valuing performances against Bangladesh, what about Tendulkar's recent 105 out of 243, one of his best ever. For that matter, Gilchrist's 144 or Inzamam's 138 were all truly great match-winning innings. So let us put to rest this red herring, once and for all.
A final point to ponder for those doubting Thomases. Zimbabwe have won 8 of their 83 tests played. India won 8 out of their first 83 tests and New Zealand won 4 of their first 83 tests. Nice to remember that the first away test India won was past the 100th test they played (during 1968). Both Zimbabwe and Bangladesh have won away tests well before this number.
I understand that this analysis favours the fast bowlers slightly. This is primarily because fast bowlers' strike rates are lower and they have a better chance of capturing top order wickets. However we have to consider the contribution to team causes and taking top order wickets and having lower strike rates are very essential to the team cause. As far as Strike rates and Rpo are concerned there is no need to do any adjustment since these are all great bowlers. Only two of these bowlers, Kumble and Kapil Dev have strike rates exceeding 60. Muralitharan and Warne have strike rates comparable to the pace bowlers. Surprisingly the bowler with the best Rpo figure is Ambrose. This clearly shows that there is no need to do any special adjustment.
Now for the tables.
1. Career wickets captured
Bowler Value Points
This table is self-explanatory.
2. Bowling strike rate (Bpw)
Bowler Value Points
An analysis of batting performances in the two halves of a Test innings
It is the responsibility of the first 6 batsmen in a Test innings to score the required runs and the low order batsmen, normally the bowlers, to provide support. There are times when it happens the other way around. The low order batsmen score more runs than the top order. There is an inherent charm and excitement in these innings. Often these also turn out to be match-winning innings. More often than not one of the top order batsman stays on to shepherd the late order. It could also be that these are true cases of innings revival controlled by genuine late order batsmen. In this article I have taken a comprehensive look at such innings.
I may be wrong. However there is only one innings in test cricket in which, for strategic reasons, a captain sent his entire low order first on an a "gluepot" of a wicket, and then he himself came on to play one of the greatest Test innings ever. This match is discussed later. So this is the only innings in which the late order was expected to outscore the top order.
First some summary facts. These are current up to match no 1965, the second Pakistan-Australia match.
Number of innings played: 6187 (Maximum-7860)
Number of innings played in which the late order (wkts 6-10) has out-performed the top order (wkts 1-5).
A statistical analysis of Muttiah Muralitharan's outstanding Test career
This article is dedicated to Muralitharan, arguably the greatest but certainly one of the greatest of all Test bowlers. I will not be doing any comparisons with other bowlers, that will be done in a later article. I will probably select all the other top bowlers to do a comparison. In this article, as a mark of appreciation and admiration for this wonderful bowler and person, I will do comparisons only within his own career. I would appreciate if readers remember this view and no negative comments are made on one of the greatest ever. Let us leave that task to Mr Bedi and umpires whose sole claim to fame will be to act as nothing more than mere historical footnotes in his legendary career. I hope the reader will pardon this moment of strong feeling on my part. But it comes in disgust at the horrendous treatment to a great bowler, who took it in the most gentlemanly way and came through a stronger man. My own personal feelings apart, I hope to highlight Murali's achievements through numbers.
Muralitharan's career is analysed from many points of view. Some of these tables might be available elsewhere but a few are quite new and are being done for the first time. The Wikipedia entry on Muralitharan incidentally is full of very useful and nice-to-know facts. The summary file containing all these tables is available at the end for viewing/downloading. I have stayed away from tables on country performances since that is often shown on television screens and I have to keep this article to reasonable size. Anyhow Murali is the only bowler to have captured 50+ wickets against all Test-playing countries and three of these are 100+ wickets. Also this article covers only Murali's Test performances.
1. Career summary
Tests played: 133 Wickets captured: 800 Wickets/Test: 6.02 Runs conceded: 18180 Overs bowled: 7340.0 Bowling average: 22.73 Strike rate: 55.0 Runs/over: 2.48 10 wkts in match: 22 (4 in consecutive tests, that too twice, and against all 9
countries). 5 wkts in Inns: 67 Maidens bowled: 1792 Maidens %: 24.4 Best bowling: 40.0-19-51-9 (the first 9 wickets !!!). There is another
9-wkt haul. Fielder combination: 77 (Murali/Jayawardene - highest for non wicket-keeper).
A detailed study of Twenty20 results indicates the matches haven't been as close as you'd expect
First let us eliminate some of the matches. Needless to say that only T20 internationals will be considered. IPL matches are not true international matches. Also if the IPL is to be included, then all other club leagues should be included. All matches which finished through the D/L route are discarded. It is clear to most people that, Queen's honours notwithstanding, the learned duo, M/s Duckworth and Lewis, have made a pig's breakfast of the D/L calculations when it comes to T20 matches. More about it in a later article. Finally matches which finished in a tie and decided through the single-over-eliminator will be discarded. After all when the 40 overs were bowled, the teams have finished dead level.
That leaves us with 168 matches (out of the 185 we started with). Now we will separate the wins defending totals (first batting team wins) from the wins chasing the target totals since the two wins are as different as chalk and cheese. One is a bowler-driven defensive win and the other is a batsman-driven attacking win.
First let us take the matches won by teams batting first and defending their totals. There are 83 such matches, just below the 50% mark. There is only one objective in front of the defending team: restrict the opposite team to a total below their own total. Whether this is done by dismissing the other team or restricting them to a total below the total is immaterial. The win is stated as "by x runs" and this is the only measure necessary to measure the type of win. The only factor to be taken into consideration is that a match score of 200/190 is a less emphatic win than a match score of 100/90. This is achieved by dividing the run differential by the first innings total and the Win Index arrived at.
It is a fact that T20 wickets are cheaper to get than ODI wickets (a Balls-per-wicket value of 18.2 against 42.6). This makes the wickets valuation somewhat difficult. I tried adding the wickets captured component to the Win Index. It did not work out, especially for very close matches. Take a match such as 150/148 a.o. By all criteria this is a very close match and should have a very low Win Index value. However once I give credit to the winning team for capturing wickets, the Win Index moves way up and goes into a comfortable win zone (because of the 10 wickets), which is wrong.
A few statistical highlights of this group of matches.
1. The average Win Index is 20.5. This can be compared to the average for the other group later.
2. The average first innings score is 169 for 6.5 wickets.
3. The average second innings score is 133 for 8.5 wickets.
4. The average winning margin is 36 runs, which makes the wins quite comfortable.
5. Out of the 83 matches, the losing team has lost 8 or more wickets in 59 matches (71%).
Before we look at the tables, let me emphasise that absolute values cannot be used in these exercises. An over represents 5% of a team's balls-resource unlike ODIs in which an over represents 2% of the resource. There is less of a difference in terms of runs since T20 scoring rates are higher. Even then, 10 runs in T20 represents around 6% of the average T20 total while the same 10 runs represents around 4% in ODIs. What is normal in T20s is difficult in ODIs. Hence all comparisons are only in relative % values.
Now for the tables.
Matches won by teams defending totals
No Win MtId Cty First Inns Vs Second Inns Vs Team Result Index <--Score--> <--Score-->
It can be seen that 5 of the 83 matches have been won with a very high Win Index of 50+. However more importantly, only 14 matches (around one in six matches) could be classified as close matches. The winning margin in the other matches has been 10 runs or more which is quite comfortably a full-over score. This puts paid, at least for these types of wins, to the general feeling that the T20 matches are close matches. Five out of 6 are not.
Now for wins by the second batting teams. There are 85 such matches, which is just over 50%. These are batsmen-driven chasing wins. The chasing team works with two clearly identified resources. The first, and the more important one, explained later, is the number of balls, normally 120. The other one is the number of wickets, 10. The win is normally stated in the lesser of the two resources, wickets. This is less of a resource restriction since the overall balls-per-wicket figure for all 185 matches is 18.2, meaning that the average number of wickets lost would be 6.4 in a 120-ball innings.
The balls left and the wickets left form the basis for determining the Win Index. The proportion of balls left to the maximum balls carries a 66.7% weight. The wickets remaining carries a 33.3% weight. This is not a linear scale since the top order wickets are more valuable. The wicket values are 0.12, 0.12, 0.12, 0.12, 0.12, 0.10, 0.10, 0.08, 0.06 and 0.06 for wickets 1-10. For instance if a team has lost only 1 wicket, their valuation for this component is 0.293 (0.333*0.88). On the other hand if they have lost 7 wickets the valuation for this components 0.067 (0.333*0.20) and so on.
A few statistical highlights of this group of matches.
1. The average Win Index is 27.5. This is a 25% increase over the first group of matches indicating that the chasing wins are a little more easy and the index values are higher.
2. The average first innings score is 129 for 8.0 wickets.
3. The average second innings score is 131.6 for 3.8 wickets. This confirms the view that the wins are relatively easier.
4. The average winning margin is 6.2 wickets and 18 balls. which makes the wins very comfortable.
5. Out of the 83 matches, the losing team has lost 5 or fewer wickets in 68 matches (80%).
Matches won by teams chasing totals
No Win MtId Cty First Inns Vs Second Inns Vs Team Result Index <--Score--> <--Score-->
In line with our findings, the top 7 wins have a Win Index value exceeding 55. Also only 6 of the matches could be termed close. The cut-off for determining close matches varies between the two types of wins.
Adding the five tied matches to the 168, only 25 of the 173 matches (14%) can be termed as quite close. The other 86% of the matches are relatively easier wins. This confirms my feeling that the excitement is mostly artificially created.
Those of you who would like to raise a point on the relative strengths of the teams, let me point out that in T20s there are fewer contests between the top teams and the minnows. This normally happens only in the World Cups.
Also furthermore, the lesser number of overs actually reduces the relative strength-differential between teams because there is lesser room for error. Hence, it is quite intriguing that there have been such wide margins of victory.
To view/down-load the table of defending wins, please click/right-click here.
To view/down-load the table of chasing wins, please click/right-click here.
A look at the most significant innings in ODIs and the batsmen.
Viv Richards' 189 against England is the top ODI innings
© Getty ImagesA sequel to the article on significant innings done earlier, taking reader feedback into account
Brian Lara has a high Significant Innings percentage of 45.69
© AFP1. As many readers have suggested, I have used the innings as the basis for determining the significant innings rather than the two team innings together. This takes care of the many Tests where the two innings by a team are as different as chalk and cheese. If we take the famous Calcutta Test of 2001, the two Indian innings were 171 and 657. The 59 in the first innings was an outstanding innings considering the 171 for 10 as the basis, probably not if we take 728 for 17 as the basis.
2. This is one lapse which was missed by all the readers. And for that matter myself. In the base analysis, I had taken the wickets as the base for determining the runs and balls cut-off. This is quite wrong. I should have taken the number of batsman who batted as the basis. Take the West Indian innings of 790 for 3. The base should be 5 (which includes Sobers) and not 3 (the number of wickets). If a team is all out, the base will be 11. Of course batsmen who did not bat will be excluded, but batsman who retired hurt will be included. This is absolutely the correct method.
3. Raise the multiplier values for two reasons. One is the consideration of innings as the base and the other is the taking of batsmen as base rather than wickets. I have also introduced a graded multiplier. The multiplier is highest at 2.00 for low rpb/bpb (runs per batsman and balls per batsman) values for 1-7 batsmen and stays at 1.00 for high rpb/bpb values ford 8-11 batsmen. The capping of run-cutoff at 100 and balls-cutoff at 200 is also retained.
4. I will ignore all not out innings below 10, if they have already not become SI, from the total innings. This is a very relevant suggestion. This is necessary since quite a few batsmen, especially in the late order and in later innings remain unbeaten on low scores. Since they have not been given the opportunities to further their innings, these innings are excluded from the total.
5. Now that we have the single innings as the base and have raised the cut-off values, there is no need to have the one-third criteria. Even in the 26 by New Zealand, the 11 by Sutcliffe does not really warrant being considered as a SI. On the other hand, Hutton's 30 out of 52, Tancred's 26 out of 47 and Flintoff's 24 out of 51 must be included. This is done by keeping the lower limit for runs cut-off as 20.
6. Finally one very important addition. I have done a weighting of the innings by determining a Situation innings index value. A 100 out of 200 and a 100 out of 500 are both significant innings. However the first innings is far more significant than the later. This measure indicates the extent of significance. It is possible that this factor can very well be used to determine the influence of batsmen. So there is an additional table based on the average SI Index value. The SI Index value is a simple calculation. The innings measure, runs or balls, is divided by the runs cut-off or balls cut-off, as required. Thus the minimum value for this is 1. Where a player has crossed both cut-offs, the higher index value is taken.
Let me conclude this section by saying that the user responses have been outstanding revealing a very incisive way of thinking. Let us now look at the tables now.
First the table of players, ordered by the % of SIs played. This is a reflection of the consistency of the players. Players such as Dravid, Border et al are likely to be at the top. They are likely to score two 75s in successive innings.
List of players, ordered by the % of SIs achieved
SNo Batsman Cty Mats Runs Inns SIs % of SI
The top three remain the same. A few minor changes down the table. Chanderpaul moves down a few places. Sutcliffe also moves down. Lara, Dravid and May move up. Andy Flower moves down a few places.
The most significant change is that of Tendulkar who moves up quite a few places into the top-20 table.
Now the table of players, ordered by the % of SIs played. This is a reflection of the extent of significance once the cut-off is reached. This is likely to have players like Sehwag, Lara et al at the top. They are likely to score a 150 and 0 in two successive innings.
List of players, ordered by the average SI index value
SNo Batsman Cty Mats Runs Inns SIs SII Avge Pts SII
A look at the bowlers who bowl the most and least wides and no-balls in Twenty20 internationals
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| ... © Getty Images |
No Bowler Ctry Mat Overs Wides NBs Total W+Nb
It is not a surprise that all the bowlers in the table are the quicker bowlers. They are all attacking wicket-taking bowlers. The spinner who has conceded the most wides and no-balls is Shoaib Malik with 21.
Now a look at the best performing bowlers in this classification.
2. Bowlers who have conceded the least number of wides and no-balls
No Bowler Ctry Mat Overs Wides NBs Total W+Nb 1 Mudassar Bukhari Hol 7 25.4 0 0 0 2 Haq R.M Sco 7 25.0 0 0 0 3 Seelaar P.M Hol 9 35.0 1 0 1 4 Borren P.W Hol 9 35.0 1 0 1 5 Dhaniram S Can 11 33.4 1 0 1 6 Patel J.S Nzl 11 33.1 0 1 1 7 Vaas WPUJC Slk 6 22.0 0 1 1 8 McCallan W.K Ire 8 21.5 1 0 1 9 Collingwood P.D Eng 30 32.0 2 0 2Quite a few bowlers from the unfancied teams have conceded one noball or wide. Vaas and Jeetan Patel have also bowled a single wide.
Now for some qualitative assessments. First a table based on the number of wides and no-balls conceded per match.
3. Bowlers who have conceded most numbers of wides & no-balls per match
No Bowler Ctry Mat Overs Total WNb/M W+Nb
A look at the significant innings played by batsmen in Tests, based on a certain set of criteria
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| Shivnarine Chanderpaul has a significant innings percentage of 46.7%, which places him fourth in the all-time list © Getty Images |
In this article I have gone back to the reader's suggestions, specifically Xolile. He had suggested a few months back that I should look at separating the significant Test innings based on runs scored and balls faced, wherever such information is available, and rating batsmen using this information. I have taken that suggestion and completed the analysis after significantly improving the basis.
He had suggested that I take 80 runs and 160 balls as the basis. I have instead worked on a dynamic fixing of the cut-off points based on the specific match conditions. The idea is that I should achieve the following inclusions and exclusions through this analysis.
The analysis should be done so that the following innings (just a few examples) are included.
- Gillespie's 9 (off 51) out of Aus total of 93 a.o (30 overs) at Mumbai
- Guptill's 30 (off 122) out of Nzl total of 157 a.o (59.1 overs) at Wellington
- Srinath's 76 (off 159) out of Ind total of 416 a.o (128.3 overs) at Hamilton
- Hutton's 30 (balls n/a) out of Eng total of 52 a.o. (42.1 overs) at Oval
- A.H.Kardar's 69 (balls n.a) out of Pak total of 199 a.o (91.3 overs) at Karachi
and so on.
and the following innings (just a few examples) are not included.
- Collingwood's 60 out of Eng total of 569 for 6 at Chester
- Clarke's 83 out of Aus total of 674 for 6 at Cardiff
- Ranatunga's 86 out of Slk total of 952 for 6 at Colombo
- Walcott's 88* out of Win total of 790 for 3 at Kingston
- Rae's 63* and Stollymeyer's 76* out of Win total of 142 for 0 at Trinidad
and so on.
I have taken one decision, slightly reluctantly. Any 100 would be considered to be significant. Although I do not consider a 100 by itself to be anything special, I think this is a correct decision since out of the 68,879 innings played to date only 3370 hundreds have been scored and this constitutes around 5%. It is not a bad premise to start with, banking one in twenty innings.
As far as the often quoted instances of batsmen scoring 100s in dead match situations, the following example will show the pitfalls.
Take a match where two days have been washed out. The match scores are
Team 1: 300 for 5. Team 2: 300 for 6. Team 1: 300 for 7 (Xyz 100+).
If the first two days are lost due to rain, the third innings century is a totally irrelevant one scored on the last day. On the other hand if the last two days have been washed out, the third innings century is a very relevant one made in a live match situation on the third day. If the rain had occurred on other days, the value of the 100 would oscillate significantly. Hence pre-conceived notions of the significance or non-significance of innings should not be used to come to conclusions. Also incorporating rain factor, when it happened, on what day the runs were scored all are virtually impossible in any analysis because of the absence of dependable data.
Since 80 and 160 are arbitrary, I have worked on a dynamic determination of the cut-off for each match, separate for either team. This makes sense since I should include an innings of 9 and exclude a 88* innings. There cannot be common cut-off criteria.
The cut-off methodology is explained below. Based on the cut-off points 2 to 5, 12,529 innings below 100 have got selected.
An innings is considered to be significant if it satisfies any one of the following five conditions.
1. The runs scored is greater than or equal to 100 (already talked of).
2. The balls faced is greater than or equal to 200.
3. The runs scored is greater than or equal to the cut-off figure for the team, as explained below.
- For batsmen 1-7, 1.333 times the Runs per wkt value for the team for the two innings together.
- For batsmen 8-11, 1.167 times the Runs per wkt value for the team for the two innings together.
4. The balls faced is equal to or higher than the cut-off figure for the team, as explained below.
- For batsmen 1-7, 1.667 times the Balls per wkt value for the team for the two innings together.
- For batsmen 8-11, 1.333 times the Balls per wkt value for the team for the two innings together.
5. To take care of very low innings totals, see Hutton example above, the runs scored is greater than or equal to one third of the team total. The team should have lost 5 wickets or more. Otherwise Stollymeyer-type innings would get through.
Seems complicated but all conditions are logical once the above 5 conditions are understood properly, and the fact that an innings has to adhere to at least one of these in order to be seen as significant in this analysis. Of course, a cursory glance would be woefully inadequate. These cut-off numbers have also been determined after a lot of trial work during the past few days. A higher cut-off will mean missing out of some significant innings while a lower cut-off will mean inclusion of ordinary innings. Overall this method is slightly unfair to older batsmen since they have only the "Runs scored" criteria available to them. However nothing can be done about that.
I got a massive list of 15,899 innings, which is about 23% and this figure looks good. Then I posted these into the player database and got the player table. This table is sequenced on the % of significant innings since the number of innings played varies considerably. The cut-off for batsman selection is 3000 runs and above. 159 batsmen qualify.
The top 20 entries are listed below.
Table of batsman by % of significant innings
Now the biggest surprise. The unheralded and unsung Chanderpaul clocks in at 46.7% ahead of his more illustrious contemporaries. It shows the solidity and quality Chanderpaul brought to position No. 6. He could very well improve in the years to come. Barrington and Sutcliffe come in next, both great defensive batsmen. Hutton chips in in the 10th position.
Now we have two modern greats, Lara and Dravid. Lara's playing in a weaker team has helped a bit in this regard, but there can be few detractors to the claims of his greatness. Same applies to Dravid. What he has achieved for India has not been acknowledged, especially on the Test front. It is very pleasing to see some of the Indian greats of the past eras, viz., Viswanath, Umrigar, Manjrekar and Gavaskar appear in the top-20. They played in tough times and this has been recognised. Rounding this table in the 9th position is Andy Flower, one of the greatest modern batsmen ever, slightly benefiting from playing for a weaker team.
To view/down-load the complete table, please click/right-click here.
I have also given below the top 10 batsmen in terms of number of significant innings.
Table of batsman by number of significant innings
There were a number of useful comments to my previous post on best averages at each batting position
1. The first table is a very important one asked for by Abhi. This is a matrix of Decades and Batting Position Averages.
Decade Tests <---------------Batting average----------------> Opening BP 3 BP 4 BP 5 BP 6 BP 7 Op-7
Let me first explain the two 50+ averages. The very high average at BP3 during the 1930s is solely because of Bradman's 98 average until end of 1939. The 50+ average during 1940s at BP4 is mainly because of the 50+ averages in this position of Hassett, Compton and Hammond. Morever only 44 Tests were played during this decade.
My thanks to Abhi for an excellent suggestion. A few comments, not necessarily a complete list. Readers can add their own observations.
- Barring the Bradman-centric 1930s, the 2000s have had the best averages in the positions, BP3, BP4 (again ignoring the 1940s with only 44 Tests), BP5 and BP7. Truly a batsmen-dominated decade.
- The best Opening figures have been during 1970s (Gavaskar, Boycott, Lawry, Glenn Turner et al).
- The best BP6 figures have been during the 1980s (led by Border).
- The change from 1990s to 2000s is truly amazing. A 10% increase in overall average value.
- Note also the very high BP7 average of the 2000s.
- It can also be seen that BP4 has a higher overall average than BP3. This is a slight deviation from the earlier discussions.
- Note also the discernible correlation between the Opening average and the overall average.
2. Now for a table which I thought of to provide additional insight to the way an individual batsman has batted. I have identified the top 3 favourite batting positions of batsmen based on runs scored and created a table of runs scored, % of total runs, batting average in this position and a comparison to the overall batting average.
SN0 Batsman Top Bat position Next Batpos Third Batpos Pos Runs Avge Pos Runs Avge Pos Runs Avge %Car ToBtAvg %Car ToBtAvg %Car ToBtAvg