Anantha Narayanan

The current article is a logical follow-up to that article and I will look at matches upto Test #1545. This covers 125 years of Test cricket. As such, I feel it is probably more important than the previous article. Some of the great confrontations ever took place during this long period.

Since no ball-by-ball data is available for these matches, this is really a pseudo-analysis of the head-to-head confrontations. However, the idea for this analysis originated from the previous one.

This analysis has been done using the single source available: the scorecard.

As astute readers would have guessed by now, the analysis is a tricky and involved one. Out of these 1545 Tests, we have data available for balls played by batsman for about 900 matches.

These represent interim levels of data. For the other 650 matches or so, we do not have the balls-played-by-batsman information. So I had to adopt different techniques to arrive at reasonable results.

For the 900 matches for which the balls-played-by-batsman information is available, I did a single extrapolation. Since I knew the balls played by each batsman, I needed to only allocate these balls between the bowlers who bowled in the innings based on the balls bowled by each of them. So this is a single extrapolation.

I had to be careful when I wanted to find out the runs scored off each bowler. This had to be a separate computation based on the runs conceded by the bowlers. This would ensure that the more accurate bowlers might bowl more balls at the batsmen but concede fewer runs.

I had to adopt a two-step algorithm for the 650 or so matches for which I had bare minimum information: only the runs scored. First I had to do an estimate of the balls played by each batsman by allocating the total innings balls based on a ratio of batsman runs and team runs.

Afterwards the allocation of balls and runs to the individual bowlers followed the method adopted earlier. These calculations are summarised below with couple of examples.

Two famous triple-centuries are used: Len Hutton's 364 in Test #266 for which the balls-played information is available (847) and Hanif Mohammad's 337 in Test #446 for which balls played information is not available, even though it is a later match.

I have avoided making any further assumptions such as batsman's batting position, bowler type, when the batsman started his innings and ended (anyhow this data is not available for these matches) et al.

"Keep it simple" has been my watchword.

Formula to determine the balls played by Batsman where not available
Batsman balls = Team balls * Batsman runs / (Sum of Batsman runs)
Hanif scored 337 out of 657 (Extras 33) in 319.0 overs.
    Balls faced by Hanif = (319x6) * 337 / (657-33) = 1034.

Common to both: Bowler allocation

Let us now move on to the tables.

The featured table lists all situations where the bowler bowled more than 160 balls at a specific batsman. The downloadable table lists all instances with 120 balls as cut-off.

Hutton's 364 was a monumental innings. Wally Hammond was determined to grind Don Bradman and his team into the dust and batted for nearly three days. Hutton faced 847 balls - no extrapolation needed for this, and scored 364 runs. Bill O'Reilly and Chuck Fleetwood-Smith had contrasting spells. They had spells of 85-26-178-3 and 87-11-298-1 respectively. This wide disparity in runs conceded is reflected in the numbers. Hutton faced 215 balls against Fleetwood-Smith as against 203 against O'Reilly. However he scored many more runs off Fleetwood-Smith. This shows the advantage of separate extraction processes for balls and runs. This is the only instance of a batsman facing over 200 balls off two bowlers in an innings.

Derek Randall's presence in third position is a way-out situation since he scored only 150 runs. Coming in after a rare first-ball dismissal of Geoff Boycott, Randall batted for nearly ten hours and faced a whopping 498 balls. This, coupled with the fact that Jim Higgs bowled nearly 40% of the team overs, contributed to this unlikely combination, reaching to 199 balls.

An interesting presence in this table is that of Sanath Jayasuriya and Roshan Mahanama. In that mind-numbing "Test of patience" in 1997, Sri Lanka's mammoth 952 required 271 overs to be bowled. Rajesh Chauhan bowled most, with 78 overs, and Anil Kumble and Nilesh Kulkarni followed with 72 and 70 respectively. Chauhan features here twice, and the other two hapless bowlers feature in the longer list. Jayasuriya faced 166 balls off Chauhan and Mahanama, 161. These two faced 154, 149 balls off Kumble and 149 and 145 balls off Kulkarni. Ah! My hands get tired typing out these numbers. Paralysis of the mind could very well set in.

The featured table covers Test confrontations of 200 balls and above.

Hammond scored 119 and 177 and played a total of 977 balls. A monumental effort indeed. Clarrie Grimmett bowled over 100 overs and Hammond played 265 balls of these. This was during Bradman's debut series.

Andy Sandham scored 375 runs in the nine-day Test in which there was no play on the last two days (yes, you read it right). It is amazing that the score stood at England: 849, West Indies: 286, and England batted again. Then they did not send the first-innings triple-centurion until the score was 176 for 5. Otherwise, Sandham might very well have upstaged Graham Gooch. Sandham faced 219 balls from Tommy Scott but more importantly scored 129 runs, the highest in all these matches.

Marcus Trescothick vs Muttiah Muralitharan just missed getting into the group of Tests with ball-by-ball data. It is noteworthy that Trescothick faced Muralitharan away for over 200 balls without giving his wicket once to Murali.

This table also features confrontations clocking at 200 balls and above.

First, let us not forget that this is a double extrapolation method. Peter May's 891 itself is a derived figure. This was a match in which May and Colin Cowdrey engineered one of the greatest comebacks in history. After two innings the scores stood at England: 186. West Indies: 474. Then England were tottering at 113 for 3. The amateur duo of May and Cowdrey came in and added 411 runs. Sonny Ramadhin bowled 98 overs in the innings which is a record even today. May faced 308 balls off Ramadhin, and that was some feat. It is the highest faced by a batsman off a bowler. Even allowing for a 10% variation, this is around 270 balls. Let us not forget that May, the captain, declared when he was 285, thus depriving himself of a triple-century. In the bargain West Indies scored 72 for 7 and narrowly escaped a defeat. Shades of New Zealand against India during 1965.

Ken Barrington's marathon effort of 256 runs translated to 757 balls and 246 balls off Tom Veivers. Not many runs were scored, though. Garry Sobers, in his record-breaking innings of 365, which transposed to only 587 balls, faced 241 balls off Fazal Mahmood. Hanif faced maximum balls from Denis Atkinson during his 16 hour epic of 337. This was extrapolated to 1034 balls, the only time in history of Test cricket that a batsman faced over 1000 or more balls in an innings, extrapolated or otherwise. There is a fair chance that this would be correct since Hanif was an eminently defensive batsman.

The cut-off for this is also 200 balls.

May's figures were derived separately for each innings and added. Since he played a reasonable number of balls in the first innings, the total comes to 891 and May faced a mind-boggling tally of 340 balls off Ramadhin. This is by far the maximum number of balls faced by a batsman off a single bowler. Look at how far off this is from the Cyril Washbrook v Alf Valentine and Washbrook v Ramadhin numbers.

I am happy to see the presence of Allan Watkins' defensive classic during England's tour of India, with a virtual "B" side. Hutton, May, Cowdrey, Fred Trueman, Denis Compton, Trevor Bailey and Alec Bedser were missing. Watkins handled Vinoo Mankad very effectively. This is nostalgia for me since the first cricket book I ever read was the one on this tour.

Comparison of extrapolated values with actual values for selected combinations
Single innings
Test Year Batsman          Bowler          Ext Actual Diff (Act to Est)
1810 2006 DPMD Jayawardene N Boje          201  221  - 9.1%
1563 2001 JH Kallis        RW Price        188  189  -0.05%
2034 2012 Azhar Ali        MS Panesar      164  163  +0.07%
1641 2003 SP Fleming       M Muralitharan  160  185  -13.6%
1696 2004 BC Lara          GJ Batty        150  161  - 6.9%
Single Test
Test Year Batsman          Bowler          Ext Actual Diff
1641 2003 SP Fleming       M Muralitharan  249  265  - 6.1%
1572 2001 BC Lara          M Muralitharan  213  240  -11.3%
1952 2010 HM Amla          Harbhajan Singh 188  177  + 6.2%
1743 2005 Younis Khan      A Kumble        185  208  -11.1%
1562 2001 A Flower         CW Henderson    176  202  -12.9%

In this table I have compared the actual head-to-head values as determined in my previous analysis with values extrapolated using the single extrapolation method. The differences are of the order of 15% on either side. In general, the actual values tend to be higher than the extrapolated values.

Finally, a question might arise as to what degree of confidence I have on the extrapolated results. I would say around 80% for the single extrapolation and 70% for the double extrapolation method. In other words I would expect values to be around 10% either side for single extrapolation and 15% on either side for the double extrapolation. Just a gut feeling. That is all. I agree that this is an estimate. However, when we have figures like May scoring 285 runs out of a total of 547 in 258 overs, we are not going to be far off if we say, with 70% degree of confidence, that May would have faced 811 balls (1548*285/547).

Readers are requested to come up with suggestions on how the ball-by-ball data available for the recent 550 matches can be used. I have one idea, provided by Ashwin Krishnamurthy, which is to look at how players played during the period close to reaching landmarks, such as hundreds.

I have created a document file containing all the qualifying performances. There are about 380 Innings-level selections and 270 Test-level combinations, shown in four tables. To download/view this document, please CLICK HERE.

I will not comment on the South African tour happenings since ESPNcricinfo does not like outsiders using strong comments on these matters in their space, and my choice of words cannot be mild.

However, I cannot but pass a comment or two on the Indian bowling woes attributed to the new rules. The sardonic smile you see on the horizon is mine on hearing that the new rules are not helping MS Dhoni. How do the same rules that help the India team plunder 120 runs in the last ten overs become unfair when it comes to the India bowlers? Without the new rules, India might well have finished at 270, in Mohali. And how do the new rules bring down R Ashwin's skills, someone who has opened the bowling in all formats of the game regularly, and who is not a guileful Erapalli Prasanna, by a long mile. And Ravindra Jadeja's flat fastish slow left arm is not going to be affected a lot by a fresher ball. The plain truth is that, barring Mitchell Johnson (and Mohammad Shami at Ranchi), the bowling across the board has been awful. And that is the difference in the series scoreline.

Until now I have analysed the head-to-head confrontations across these 550 Tests and specific team contests, such as the Ashes series. In this analysis I have looked at the huge database, from the perspective of a single Test. Some fascinating facts emerge and offer us hitherto-unavailable insights. The unit of data in this analysis for me is a bowler-batsman combination in a single innings or Test. The analysis centres around the balls bowled, runs scored, scoring rate and percentage of balls bowled in the innings. The wickets captured is not relevant for this analysis since we have gone to the lowest level and there can only be one wicket capture per innings and two wicket captures per Test. Whether the bowler dismissed the concerned batsman or not is (almost) completely irrelevant. I am also not sure whether the boundaries information is relevant. It is obvious that MS Dhoni would have hit Nathan Lyon for quite a few and Faf du Plessis hit virtually nothing off Lyon. Actual number of boundaries probably does not mean much.

I considered doing a similar analysis for the Tests #1-#1545 through extrapolation and post tables in this article itself, but I realised that it was a lot more complex than I envisaged and would warrant a separate article. For some innings such as Len Hutton's 364 at the Kennington Oval in 1938, I have the actual balls faced by Hutton and this analysis would then have required a single extrapolation amongst the Australian bowlers, based on actual balls bowled by each of them. On the other hand, for Hanif Mohammad's 337 in Bridgetown in 1958, I do not have the balls-played information and I would have to do two levels of extrapolation. First one, to determine how many balls Hanif would have faced among the Pakistan batsmen and then, to determine how many balls Hanif would have faced off each West Indies bowler. Hence there is need for two clearly delineated threads for that article. So that analysis would be done in a separate article.

Let us now see the tables.

This table of maximum balls bowled by a bowler to a batsman is headed by a very unlikely bowler. Nicky Boje bowled 221 balls to Mahela Jayawardene during the batsman's magnificent innings of 374 against South Africa in Colombo in 2006. This is not surprising since the two Sri Lanka maestros scored 661 of their team's 756 runs. In second place is another unlikely bowler, Ray Price, who bowled 189 balls to Jacques Kallis, interestingly, in Kallis' innings of 189 against Zimbabwe at Bulawayo in 2001. In third place is Muttiah Muralitharan's effort against Pakistan at Karachi, when he bowled 187 balls to Younis Khan, who scored a triple-hundred at Karachi in 2009. Muralitharan's tally of 187 balls against Stephen Fleming at Colombo follows next. Then comes the recent bowling stint by Lyon against du Plessis during the latter's defensive match-saving classic of 110 at Adelaide Oval. Look at the scoring rate of this marvellous innings. It is of interest to see that all ten head-to-head confrontations featured here are by spinners. It is understandable. Nowadays even medium pace bowlers rarely bowl more than 40-50 overs in an innings.

This table is ordered by runs scored. Chris Gayle, during his epic innings of 333 against Sri Lanka in Galle, scored an amazing 143 runs off Suraj Randiv. Note the wonderful strike rate. And this haul was out of the 183 runs conceded by Randiv. Next comes Brian Lara, who, during his watershed innings of 400 in St John's, Antigua, took 130 runs off Gareth Batty. It is interesting to note that Batty conceded only 185 runs in this innings. We have already talked of Boje v Jayawardene. Jayawardene took 125 runs off Boje. Again we see only spinners occupying all the bowlers featured here. Marvel at Lyon v Dhoni, about which I will speak more in the next table.

This table is ordered on scoring rate. I have selected confrontations which contained either 100 balls or 100 runs. The recent blitzkrieg of Dhoni in Chepauk is still fresh in everyone's memory. If ever a captain made a statement and placed a marker, this was the occasion. Facing 380, India were 196 for 4 and one would have expected a war of attrition. Instead Dhoni scored a 265-ball innings of 224. Lyon bore the brunt of this effort, conceding 104 off 85 balls: the only effort in these 550 Tests of a better-than-run-a-ball effort with the said criteria.

Inzamam-ul-Haq, in his masterpiece of 329 at Lahore in 2002, took Daniel Vettori for a nearly run-a-ball 114 runs. Gayle also plundered Randiv for 143 runs in 154 balls. Suddenly we see two medium pace bowlers here. S Sreesanth against Alastair Cook, during the latter's 294 at Edgbaston in 2011 and Ishant Sharma, against Michael Clarke, during his triple-century in Sydney in 2012, during those two disastrous tours: both went above an average 75 runs per wicket.

Since this is a table on strike rates I have presented the other end also: the low scoring rates. Muralitharan tied Stuart Carlisle down completely, allowing only 11 runs in 121 balls at Galle in 2002. Similarly Lyon's effort against du Plessis also was similar. Although one must admit that du Plessis was the winner. Price was very good against Younis Khan, although it must be conceded that Younis played a match-winning innings.

These tables are ordered by the percentage of balls to a specific batsman as compared to the balls in the innings. For some inexplicable reason, this table is headed by a non-regular bowler. Tillakaratne Dilshan bowled 32 overs and he bowled 22 of these to Taufeeq Umar at Abu Dhabi in 2011. Then comes Enamul Haque, who bowled nearly 65% of the innings balls to Tatenda Taibu in Dhaka in 2005. Another unlikely bowler, Vasbert Drakes, bowled 62% of his spell to Ricky Ponting in Port-of-Spain in 2003. Probably the most significant of these entries is Muralitharan's 61% of his spell to Lara during Lara's double hundred at the SSC in Colombo in 2001. More about this later as we move the analysis from single innings to single Test.

This table is one after my heart. It is headed by two of the greatest confrontations between bowler and batsman in modern Test cricket. Both involved Muralitharan, bowling at home, against two wonderful, if contrasting, left-handers. The first was during 2003 when New Zealand toured Sri Lanka. Fleming was absolutely outstanding in the first Test played at the P Sara Oval, Colombo. He scored 343 runs in 710 balls and faced Muralitharan for 265 out of these. He was not dismissed in the match. He played Murali with circumspection, scoring only 118 runs.

One of the greatest contests ever was enacted during the completely one-sided tour of Sri Lanka by West Indies during 2001. The teams played three Tests, which were won by margins of ten wickets, 131 runs and ten wickets. The West Indians, barring Lara, had no answer for Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas. Lara made scores of 178, 40, 74, 45, 221 and 130. The last Test features in this table. Muralitharan v Lara at the SSC, Colombo. Murali bowled 240 balls but could not dismiss Lara even once. Lara scored 164 runs at more than four runs per over. This was a contest the gods would have stopped to watch.

Lyon against du Plessis was an equally stirring contest. Where it lacked excitement like the first two, it did not lack in intensity. Two lesser lights were at work. Lyon, yet to be established. du Plessis, on debut for South Africa. du Plessis had one of the best debut Tests ever for a batsman by battling for 535 balls and 188 runs (less relevant) and saved South Africa. Out of this, Lyon bowled 227 balls but could not breach du Plessis' defence even once. The scoring rate was a lowly 15.0 but really did not matter.

Lara leads the Runs scored table, with 164 runs. Then comes Gayle's 143 off Randiv, already discussed. Lara's 130 runs off Batty follow afterwards. The next two entries are those of Jayawardene and Younis Khan. Sachin Tendulkar makes a rare appearance in these tables with a rich haul of 121 runs off Hauritz in Bangalore during 2010. Younis Khan makes a second appearance in the top-ten with his compilation of 111 runs off Muralitharan during his epic 313 in Karachi. Incidentally, this match produced 1400 runs for 13 wickets in the first innings.

Dhoni's onslaught against Lyon leads this table also since this confrontation passes the 100-balls or 100-runs test. Inzamam-ul-Haq's clinical dismembering of the usually accurate Vettori follows next. He scored at 95.6. Gayle's 82.9 against Randiv is next. Then comes the brutal innings of Virender Sehwag in Chennai. During his better-than-run-a-ball innings of 319, he scored exactly 100 runs off 108 balls against Paul Harris. One could say that Harris did well, considering that Sehwag scored 211 runs off the other bowlers in 196 balls. There is a surprise entry of the normally sedate Wasim Jaffer against Sohail Tanvir at Eden Gardens in 2007. This table is quite close to the single innings table.

At the other end, unsurprisingly, du Plessis against Lyon props up the table, with a scoring rate of 15. VVS Laxman, facing a disastrous 15 for 5 against New Zealand at Motera, Ahmedabad in 2010, understandably was quite slow against Vettori. Graham Thorpe's two innings were also match-saving efforts.

Tharanga faced 64.2% of the balls bowled by Mohammad Rafique at Shaheed Chandu Stadium, Bogra in 2006. Cook, while scoring 67 and 235 at the Gabba, Brisbane in 2010, faced 58.7% of the balls bowled by Doherty. In his historic double effort, Lara faced 54.8% of the balls bowled by Muralitharan. A very significant entry is to be found later. Jason Gillespie against Mohammad Rafique. Not Gillespie the bowler, but Gillespie the batsman. Gillespie, confirming his position as the best late-order batsman ever, during his farewell innings of 200*, faced 150 of the 291 balls bowled by Rafique in Chittagong in 2006.

At some suitable time in future, depending on when I would be doing the series wrap-up of Pakistan-South Africa, I will do an analysis, similar in intent, but totally different in methodology, of the first 1545 Tests for which ball-by-ball data is not available.

After sending this article for publication, the news of the little maestro's retirement broke. I salute one of the greatest cricketers who ever took the field from the bottom of the heart. Tendulkar was a true gentleman, on and off the field, and was a role model extraordinaire. I will come out with a two-part analytical tribute to the extraordinary cricketer on whose shoulders the word "great" sits very lightly, starting November 24.

One of the best cricket news recently has been Afghanistan's qualification to the 2015 World Cup. They are a much-loved team and possibly the best-supported among the Associates. I love both the Ireland and Afghanistan teams and would be quite happy to see both these charismatic teams make it to the second round. Add to this mix, Netherlands (why cannot they persuade Ryan ten Doeschate to play for them since there will be no T20 bash scheduled at that time) and Scotland (UAE is a team with 11 expatriates - not my cup of tea), the tournament will be colourful.

I have created a document file containing all the qualifying performances. There are 242 Innings-level selections and 61 Test-level combinations. To download/view this document, please CLICK HERE.

This is a follow-up article to the previous one in which I had introduced a new concept of measuring the status of ODI matches using the resources available for the team. In the first article, I had looked at the wins by second batting teams, from perilous situations. In this article I will look at losses by teams batting second, from seemingly impregnable positions.

Target Score-at-FoW Target-% BallsRes% TRF-B  WktRes-%  TRF-W

 200     20/2( 60)    90.0      80.0    1.12    69.13    1.30*
 200     50/0( 60)    75.0      80.0    0.94*  100.00    0.75
 200    100/5(150)    50.0      50.0    1.00    31.16    1.60*
 300     40/1( 90)    86.7      70.0    1.23*   82.47    1.05
 300    200/6(210)    33.3      30.0    1.11    22.61    1.47*
 300    210/8(240)    30.0      20.0    1.50     9.84    3.04*

Javed Miandad, Lance Klusener, Brendan Taylor, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Ed Rainsford and Ryan McLaren have won ODI matches with sixes off the last ball. It is possible that the TRF-B in these matches at the beginning of the last ball was as high as 6. But the purpose of this analysis is much more than identifying such instances.

First let us look at a table containing the details of ten matches.

There are ten matches which had TRF values exceeding 3.0 and these are featured here. A brief perusal of the scorecards will clearly reveal how tough the task for the chasing team was. Most of these situations have occurred at 7/8/9 wickets down and only one has been at the fall of the fifth wicket. The TRF-B values are also calculated and shown in this table. The table is self-explanatory. The potted scores for the other 18 matches are available in the downloadable document which is in text format and can be viewed by Notepad or similar editor.

The potted scores of the top ten matches, along with brief commentaries, are detailed below.

1. ODI # 3065. Australia vs Sri Lanka.
Played on 3 November 2010 at Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Sri Lanka won by 1 wicket. Mom: Matthews A.D.
Australia: 239 for 8 wkt(s) in 50.0 overs
   MEK Hussey          71*( 91)
   NLTC Perera         8.0  0  46  5
Sri Lanka: 243 for 9 wkt(s) in 44.2 overs
   AD Matthews          77*( 84)
   SL Malinga          56 ( 48)
   XJ Doherty         10.0  1  46  4

2. ODI # 26. Pakistan vs West Indies.
Played on 11 June 1975 at Edgbaston, Birmingham.
West Indies won by 1 wicket. Mom: Sarfraz Nawaz.
Pakistan: 266 for 7 wkt(s) in 60.0 overs
   Majid Khan          60 ( 90)
   Mushtaq Mohammad    55 ( 82)
   Wasim Raja          58 ( 87)
West Indies: 267 for 9 wkt(s) in 59.4 overs
   CH Lloyd            53 ( 76)
   DL Murray           61*( 95)
   Sarfraz Nawaz      12.0  1  44  4

This was one of the matches in which even the early situations such as 151 for 7 and 166 for 8 produced TRF values exceeding 2.75. But the worst situation was at the fall of the ninth wicket.

3. ODI # 2499. Kenya vs Ireland.
Played on 2 February 2007 at Ruaraka Sports Club Ground, Nairobi.
Kenya won by 1 wicket (with 6 balls remaining). Mom: Odoyo T.M.
Ireland: 284 for 4 wkt(s) in 50.0 overs
   WTS Porterfield    104*(131)
   KJ O'Brien         142 (123)
Kenya: 286 for 9 wkt(s) in 49.0 overs
   N Odhiambo          66 ( 82)
   TM Odoyo            61*( 36)
   AC Botha            9.0  0  42  4
   WK McCallan        10.0  2  36  4

4. ODI # 1028. Australia vs West Indies.
Played on 1 January 1996 at Sydney Cricket Ground.
Australia won by 1 wicket. Mom: Reiffel P.R.
West Indies: 172 for 9 wkt(s) in 43.0 overs
   CL Hooper           93*( 96)
Australia: 173 for 9 wkt(s) in 43.0 overs
   MG Bevan            78*( 88)
   CEL Ambrose         9.0  3  20  3

5. ODI # 1976. Australia vs England.
Played on 2 March 2003 at St George's Park, Port Elizabeth.
Australia won by 2 wickets. Mom: Bichel A.J.
England: 204 for 8 wkt(s) in 50.0 overs
   AJ Stewart          46 ( 92)
   AJ Bichel          10.0  0  20  7
Australia: 208 for 8 wkt(s) in 49.4 overs
   MG Bevan            74*(126)
   AR Caddick          9.0  2  35  4

6. ODI # 2922. Bangladesh vs Zimbabwe.
Played on 5 November 2009 at Zohur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium, Chittagong.
Bangladesh won by 1 wicket. Mom: Naeem Islam.
Zimbabwe: 221 for 9 wkt(s) in 50.0 overs
   BRM Taylor         118*(125)
Bangladesh: 222 for 9 wkt(s) in 49.0 overs
   Naeem Islam         73*( 90)

7. ODI # 3323. South Africa vs New Zealand.
Played on 19 January 2013 at Boland Park, Paarl.
New Zealand won by 1 wicket. Mom: Franklin J.E.C.
South Africa: 208 all out in 46.2 overs
   F du Plessis        57 ( 72)
New Zealand: 209 for 9 wkt(s) in 45.4 overs
   JEC Franklin        47*( 61)
   R McLaren           8.4  0  46  4

8. ODI # 2182. England vs West Indies.
Played on 25 September 2004 at The Brit Oval, London.
West Indies won by 2 wickets. Mom: Bradshaw I.D.R.
England: 217 all out in 49.4 overs
   ME Trescothick     104 (124)
West Indies: 218 for 8 wkt(s) in 48.5 overs
   S Chanderpaul       47 ( 66)
   A Flintoff         10.0  0  38  3

9. ODI # 241. Pakistan vs West Indies.
Played on 28 January 1984 at Adelaide Oval.
West Indies won by 1 wicket. Mom: Marshall M.D.
Pakistan: 177 for 8 wkt(s) in 50.0 overs
   Wasim Raja          46 ( 40)
West Indies: 180 for 9 wkt(s) in 49.1 overs
   MD Marshall         56*( 84)
   Wasim Raja         10.0  1  33  3
   Abdul Qadir        10.0  1  34  3

10. ODI # 2794. Bangladesh vs Sri Lanka.
Played on 16 January 2009 at Shere Bangla National Stadium, Mirpur.
Sri Lanka won by 2 wickets. Mom: Sangakkara K.C.
Bangladesh: 152 all out in 49.4 overs
   Raqibul Hasan       43*(107)
Sri Lanka: 153 for 8 wkt(s) in 48.1 overs
   KC Sangakkara       59 (133)
   M Muralitharan      33*( 16)
   Nazmul Hossain     10.0  3  30  3

I have created a document file with details of all matches in which the TRF values exceeded 2.5. This includes multiple occurrences within the same match. This document also includes the potted scores of the 18 matches which contained TRF values between 2.5 and 3.00. To download/view the document, please CLICK HERE.

While I was working on this article I realised that this analysis has a lot of implications for evaluation of live matches. I hope no broadcaster picks up the idea from here without giving me credit! Let me give a few examples from recent matches.

1. Ireland: 269. England: 48 for 4. The TRF-W was 1.95 (82.22/42.03). England won from this position. But they would not have made it to a list of top 50 matches.
2. Australia: 315. England: 103 for 5. The TRF-W was 2.14 (66.77/31.16). But they did not win.
3. Australia: 315. England: 169 for 8. The TRF-W was 4.72 (46.52/9.84). But they did not win.

So this is only a theoretical exercise at the end of the match if the chasing team did not win. But it indicates the difficulty of the task ahead of the teams and has a lot of relevance during a match. It also puts in perspective what the teams featured here achieved.

Australia
Bowlers: Ryan Harris, Peter Siddle, Mitchell Starc
 and Nathan Lyon.
Batsmen: Chris Rogers, David Warner, Shane Watson, 
Michael Clarke, Steven Smith and Brad Haddin
 (for want of a suitable batsman).

England
Bowlers: Graeme Swann, James Anderson, Stuart Broad
 and Tim Bresnan.
Batsman: Alastair Cook, Joe Root, Jonathan Trott, 
Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell and Jonny Bairstow.

Kindly note that there are no exclusions. If you are going to lose sleep if you did not know how Bairstow faced up to Ashton Agar or Simon Kerrigan bowled to Watson, please refer to the Excel chart.

Let us move on to the tables now.

It is very difficult to get a high A-R Index. The concerned player would have to be within the top-80% level in each of the four measures. That is what Ryan ten Doeschate has achieved. His numbers are, to say the least, Bradmanesque! In 33 matches, he has scored 1541 runs at an average of 67.00 and captured 55 wickets at an average of 24.13. Individually, these are figures which would put him at the top of the batting tables and the top-15 of the bowling tables. To the sceptics, let me say that he has played eight matches against Test-playing countries and 25 against very tough teams such as Ireland, Kenya and Afghanistan et al. He plays for an average team and does not get as much support as the other big-team players. If he has not played more matches, then that is the problem playing for an associate country. He does not seem to have played in the recent Netherlands-matches. Probably was trying to earn a living. But let us give credit to the best allrounder the world has ever seen: Ryan ten Doeschate of Netherlands.

ten Doeschate is a clear ten points ahead of Andrew Flintoff who has 73.32 points. He has been excellent: 3394 runs at 27.81 and 169 wickets at 24.83 indicate that he has every right to be called the best allrounder ever, only the freakish short-career numbers of ten Doeschate are better. I get the feeling that Flintoff's ODI skills are rather underrated and overshadowed by his Test exploits. Next in the list is Shane Watson. May not be everybody's favourite with his Test woes now but one of the greatest ODI allrounders ever. 4795 runs at 34.25 and 156 wickets at 28.98 illustrate that he is only marginally behind Flintoff. And both these wonderful allrounders have strike rates around 88+.

These are followed by two explosive batsmen but no mean bowlers. Viv Richards must be the most underrated ODI bowler ever. Coming as the fifth bowler, he plundered 118 wickets, albeit at a reasonably high average of 35.83, to go with his 1980s compilation of 6721 runs at 47.83 (and a strike rate of 90.2). A surprise at No.5 is Virender Sehwag. A very much underrated bowler like Richards, he still managed to capture 96 wickets (albeit at 40.14) to go with his 8273 runs at a strike rate exceeding 100. Shahid Afridi is in the eighth place confirming his status as one of the top allrounders ever. And nice to see Kevin O'Brien in the top ten.

This is a simpler measure. I divide the Batting RpI by Bowling average to get an Index value. This is my favourite measure and tells a lot about a player's all-round abilities. The ratio is superior to the difference. A player with values of 30 and 25, will have a difference of 5 and a ratio of 1.20. A player with values of 40 and 35 will have the same difference of 5 but a lower ratio of 1.14. It is obvious that the first player is a better allrounder since the lowering of 10 in bowling average is more valuable than the dropping of 10 in batting.

Since this is a performance oriented measure there are some juxtaposition of players at the top from the previous table. Ten Doeschate is at the top with an index value of nearly 2.0, more Bradmanesque than the previous table, since the next value is Watson's 1.18. Jacques Kallis, Flintoff and Richards complete the top-five positions with index values just over 1.12. Watson and Kallis are separated only at the fourth decimal.

This is a measure of the actual performance delivered per match. For this, I valued a bowler wicket at 32 runs. Arbitrary? No way. In the 3403 matches played until 3 August 2013, 42832 wickets were captured by bowlers at a total cost of 1372875 runs. This works to 32.05 RpW. I rounded this to 32. So no one can say this is arbitrary. Of course it has changed over the years. However let me give the readers the following summary.

 
	1971-1984 281 3469 99425 28.66 
	1985-2013 3122 39363 1273450 32.35 
	

So this confirms that for 29 years and for 92% of matches, the average wicket value has been slightly above 32. Just to firm up this number, let me say that, for the period 1985-1989, the average was 32.09.

Ten Doeschate has delivered an equivalent of 100 runs per match. I feel this is one of the most significant figures in the ODI game. A player from an Associate country walked in and delivered the equivalent of a hundred in every match he played. I checked his match performances. He has failed to deliver in either batting or bowling in just two matches out of 33. That means he has delivered in 94% of the matches. I am glad to see the equally talented Shakib Al Hasan in the second position, delivering the equivalent of 68 runs per match. Imagine what these two would have achieved with better support. Then comes the giant, Kallis, with 62.7 runs. Greg Chappell is placed next just behind and then come Flintoff and Watson. Imagine these players guaranteed 60+ runs each time they took the field.

Now the final table. This is the same table as previous one but ordered on the total match deliveries, in terms of run-equivalence. Sanath Jayasuriya stands on top with 23766 "runs". When we talk of Jayasuriya the destroyer we forget the fact that he also captured 323 wickets. A very canny bowler who averaged 0.75 wickets per match. Sachin Tendulkar, again the 18000+ runs over-shadowing the fact that he also captured over 150 wickets, is close behind. He has 23354 "runs". Then comes Kallis, with 20138 "runs". Now we get two Pakistani giants, Wasim Akram, with 19781 "runs" and Shahid Afridi, with 18759 "runs". This is a tribute to the longevity of these outstanding allrounders.

This is a quirky report. I have divided the batting rating total points by the bowling rating total points. This ratio reveals the nature of the player's all-round abilities: ranging from bowlers who could bat through genuine allrounders to the batsmen who could bowl. The first five belong to the bowling allrounders classification. One surprise there! Chaminda Vaas, Richard Hadlee, Manoj Prabhakar and Wasim Akram were top bowlers first and their batting skills were only add-ons. However Mudassar Nazar is a surprise. My conclusion is that, for a batsman, his batting numbers are quite average.

The middle five, either side of a ratio 0f 1.00, are here only because of the way the numbers fell. Shoaib Malik is the only allrounder whose batting total matches the bowling total exactly. The others are all good allrounders.

The third group is quite clear. All five were far superior batsmen than bowlers. Jayasuriya does not appear here because his bowling numbers are quite impressive.

Finally, who do I salute? I will doff my imaginary hat at ten Doeschate, Flintoff, Watson, Jayasuriya and Afridi, in that order. I will end with an additional salute to ten Doeschate.

I have created an Excel sheet with complete details for these 65 players. To download/view the document, please CLICK HERE.

One final comment on ten Doeschate. He can only play the cards dealt to him. Since he made his debut and got a permanent place, Netherlands have played 50-odd matches. As I have mentioned before, he missed playing the last few matches for his country. So 33 matches in six years is the limit for a player like him. Anyhow if any reader does not want to consider Tendo, he only has to take off the top entry in the relevant tables.

To round off the article I have given below what I feel, based on a number of relevant objective measures, the five greatest all-round performances ever in ODI matches.

1. Shahid Afridi's 76 and 7 for 12 against West Indies during 2013. That an all-round performance contains the second best bowling spell ever speaks volume of this superb effort. And not to forget that the 76, made out of a middling total of 224 for 9, and a recovery from 47 for 5, was itself a truly match-winning effort.
2. Scott Styris' 63 and 6 for 25 against West Indies during 2002. This was a low scoring and close match. New Zealand scored 212, mainly due to Styris lovely innings late in the order. Then he captured 6 for 25 to restrict West Indies to 202 for 9. I would say this performance is only bettered by Afridi's recent effort.
3. Richards' 119 and 5 for 41 against New Zealand during 1987. Until Paul Collingwood's effort this remained a unique effort. Richards' 119 comprised of more than 50% of his team total. The next highest score was 48. Four of his five wickets were of top order batsmen.
4. Paul Collingwood's 112 and 6 for 31 against Bangladesh during 2005. Granted that this was against Bangladesh but let us not forget that no one has scored a century and captured 6 wickets in a match.
5. Tendulkar's 141 and 4 for 38 against Australia during 1998. This was a big innings and the four late order wickets arrested Australia push towards a win. This was also the quarter-final of the Wills International Cup.

My next article will again be the first of a kind. I will apply the ball-by-ball data to a single event, in this case the Ashes series, and come out with the highlights of head-to-head confrontations.

This is the article, the third of a series, using ball-by-ball data, which the readers have repeatedly asked for during the past three years. For an introduction to that work please refer to the first article on contemporary bowlers. I had followed this with another article on contemporary batsmen.

First, let me present a paradox while determining a bowler-batsman confrontation metrics. This relates to the grey area in handling no-balls. The no-ball related runs are charged to the bowlers but not to the batsmen. The ball itself is added to the batsman but not to the bowler. This leads to the following anomaly.

Let us take an over by Mitchell Starc to Alastair Cook, which is the first over of the match.

Ball 1: Dot ball.
Ball 2: 2 runs scored by Cook. 2 runs for team and against Starc.
Ball 3: Wide. 1 run to team and 1 run against Starc.
Ball 3: 2 leg byes. 2 runs to team.
Ball 4: No ball. 1 run scored. 2 runs to team, 2 runs against Starc and 1 run to Cook.
Ball 4: 4 byes. 4 runs to team.
Ball 5: Dot ball.
Ball 6: No ball. 1 run to team, 1 run against Starc.
Ball 6: Dot ball.

At the end of the over the team score is 12 for 0 (9 extras). Starc's analysis reads 1.0-0-6-0 (6 balls and 6 runs (3 to Cook and 3 wide/no-balls)). Cook's score reads 7 balls and 3 runs (2 & 1). No problem about the runs. But the head-to-head confrontation between Starc and Cook has a problem. Do we take six balls or seven balls? I have taken the no ball as a ball for the combination. That is common-sense.

The present article covers the batsmen and bowlers, some who rank amongst the best whoever wielded a bat or held a ball, who have fewer than 75% of ball-by-ball data available. I have changed the format of this article as compared to the previous two. In those I had covered bowlers and batsmen separately and featured four bowlers and batsmen and created a number of tables for each of those. I had also created a downloadable Excel sheet which contained the complete data for the selected batsmen and bowlers.

In this analysis, I have gone about it differently. Since 100% data is not available for these players nothing is gained by doing an elaborate analysis. There would always be that feeling of incomplete data around these tables. Hence I have selected six batsmen and 6 bowlers each from the collection of players who have between 40% and 75% ball-by-ball data available and presented a single table for each player. The comments are thus specific to these players.

I have also uploaded an Excel sheet containing all instances of bowler-batsman combinations with 100 balls or more, extracted from the entire ball-by-ball data. There are 2844 such instances. In addition I have included 110 instances where three or more wickets were captured and fewer than 100 balls bowled. Thus, the data would almost be complete if one downloads all three Excel sheets. A hundred-balls represents a good cut-off. It is of very little relevance to know that Shane Warne bowled ten balls to Dinesh Karthik and 16 runs were scored or that VVS Laxman bowled ten balls to AB de Villiers and 3 runs were scored.

The players selected are given below. The percentage value on the left shows the extent of ball-by-ball data available. Sachin Tendulkar's ball-by-ball percentage is slightly higher since he is still active and each new Test adds to this component. If, as expected, he retires at the end of the South African tour, he is likely to finish at around 60%.

Batsmen: 
    45.1%  Brian Lara
    58.2%  Sachin Tendulkar
    71.3%  Rahul Dravid
    71.9%  Jacques Kallis
    67.4%  Mohammad Yousuf
    72.5%  Shivnarine Chanderpaul
Bowlers:
    54.1%  Muttiah Muralitharan
    40.2%  Shane Warne
    43.0%  Glenn McGrath
    50.2%  Shaun Pollock
    66.7%  Shoaib Akhtar
    53.7%  Anil Kumble

Justification of these players' selections would be akin to gilding the lily. Most of them select themselves. I selected Mohammad Yousuf instead of Inzamam-ul-Haq since there is a lot more data available for him. Shoaib Akhtar is a late selection. Daniel Vettori was an alternative. Similarly, Stephen Fleming for Shivnarine Chanderpaul was another possibility.

I would like to emphasise that the ball-by-ball data availability for these players is around 50%. This has to be remembered when deriving insights. It is also a fact that the 50% mark pertains to the latter half of the concerned player's career. My suggestion is not to extrapolate. Just take the figures at their face value.

Selected 6 Batsmen

1. Muttiah Muralitharan bowled millions of balls to Brian Lara, 709 to be precise (for whatever part of the ball-by-data available career of two). But it is safe to say that Lara mastered Muralitharan: and how? Strike rate over 50, average of 124 and a wicket every 40 overs. Not forgetting that most of these balls were bowled in Sri Lanka.
2. On the flip side, a fairly ordinary bowler like Andre Nel had the complete measure of Lara. Eight wickets at a strike rate of 42. Andy Bichel was also quite successful: four wickets, striking every 43 balls. This is difficult to explain considering that he handled much better fast bowlers better.
3. Lara took Danish Kaneria to the cleaners. A scoring rate of more than 87 over nearly 300 balls. He had a scoring rate of over 70 against six bowlers out of these 20.
4. Glenn McGrath, Shaun Pollock and Jason Gillespie kept Lara in check, but with very little success. In fact, Kallis and Gillespie bowled a lot at Lara but did not dismiss him even once. Lara attacked Warne but also lost his wicket often.

1. James Anderson had the complete measure of Tendulkar. He got his wickets nine times at a strike rate of 39 balls.
2. In view of the contest at year-end, it is significant to note that Tendulkar has handled Dale Steyn quite comfortably.
3. Tendulkar has been circumspect against most bowlers. There is only one bowler, Nathan Hauritz, against whom Tendulkar had a scoring rate exceeding 70.
4. Possibly because this pertained to Tendulkar's second half of his career, there seems to be a cautious handling of the bowlers. Most spinners have kept Tendulkar quiet.

1. Rahul Dravid has been quite careful against almost all bowlers. There is only one scoring rate in excess of 60: against Stuart MacGill.
2. No bowler has quite mastered Dravid. The lowest strike rate in this collection is 75, that of Gillespie.
3. Dravid faced Vettori very comfortably: 609 balls and only 2 wickets.

1. Anderson has been very successful against Jacques Kallis: 7 wickets at a strike rate of 60. Mitchell Johnson has also been quite successful.
2. Barring a few pace bowlers, Kallis has been quite successful against most bowlers.
3. Kallis vs Anil Kumble is simply amazing. 500 balls and a single dismissal. Similarly Graeme Swann has not been successful against Kallis. A single wicket in the 288 balls bowled.
4. Kallis has handled all bowlers quite well but at relatively low scoring rates: all, barring Steve Harmison, below 60.

1. Mohammad Yousuf against Matthew Hoggard is something. A single wicket in 376 balls.
2. Rangana Herath had the measure of Yousuf. He dismissed him six times in 244 balls. Similarly, Irfan Pathan.
3. Kumble bowled the maximum balls and had only reasonable success. Many bowlers had fair strike rates against Yousuf.
4. Yousuf attacked Harmison and Jerome Taylor.

1. This has already been discussed when looking at Harbhajan Singh. Chanderpaul was dismissed only twice in 790 balls.
2. Still more dominant is Chanderpaul against Harmison. A single dismissal in 464 balls. On a normal day this represents nearly a day's bowling.
3. But look at Chanderpaul's scoring rates. Plenty of instances below 40. He attacked only one bowler: Stuart MacGill.

Selected 6 Bowlers

1. We have already talked of the dominance Lara had over Muralitharan. VVS Laxman and Cook were equally effective. Dravid suffers only in comparison.
2. The top batsmen seem to have played Muralitharan quite well. Only the English trio of Paul Collingwood, Michael Vaughan and Marcus Trescothick seem to have a fair time, at best, against Muralitharan.
3. However the best against Muralitharan is undoubtedly Fleming. Over 453 balls and no dismissal. Shoaib Malik has been equally good.
4. Tendulkar has attacked Muralitharan but also been dismissed frequently. Lara and Tendulkar have been quite aggressive against Muralitharan.

1. What do we see with Ashwell Prince? In the earlier article we have already seen Prince's three dismissals by Swann in five balls. Now we see that Warne has dismissed Prince 11 times at a strike rate of 40 balls.
2. Mark Boucher was dismissed nine times at a strike rate of 46, Andrew Flintoff seven times at 58, Alec Stewart five times at 59 and finally Andrew Strauss eight times at 30. Warne seems to have had the measure of all.
3. Kevin Pietersen has attacked Warne and has a high strike rate. Look at the way Shaun Pollock has handled Warne very effectively.
4. Look at how effectively Thilan Samaraweera has handled Warne.

1. With whatever data available, it is clear that McGrath has dominated quite a few batsmen. Fleming has the lowest strike rate: seven wickets at 32. Mike Atherton, six at 35. Pietersen and Ian Bell have similar figures.
2. Only Herschelle Gibbs has really dominated McGrath. To a lesser extent, Kallis and Strauss.
3. The metronome that McGrath was, it is amazing to see Nathan Astle taking him quite comfortably at a very good strike rate. Nasser Hussain found it difficult to get McGrath away.

1. Shaun Pollock has had the measure of Flintoff and to a lesser extent, Dravid.
2. Mike Hussey has handled Pollock very well. 312 balls and a single dismissal tells the story. A few Australian top order batsmen and Lara have also been quite effective.
3. Chris Gayle has attacked Pollock's bowling with lot of success.

1. Many of the batsmen who faced Kumble have played him quite well. We have already seen Kallis' 494 balls per wicket.
2. For all the accurate bowling Kumble was famous for, quite a few batsmen have very good scoring rates, led by Inzamam.
3. Look at how comfortably Hussey and Misbah-ul-Haq have handled Kumble.
4. Damien Martyn is the one Kumble had some measure of.

1. Shoaib Akhtar has been quite effectively handled by the Indian batsmen, led by Dravid and Laxman. Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag have had mixed time against Akhtar.
2. Matthew Hayden is the batsmen against whom Akhtar has had some success.

One final reminder that we are looking at ball-by-ball data of around 50% for the players concerned. However, it should be noted that in certain cases, because one part of the concerned bowler-batsman pair could as well have complete data, the data presented is complete for this combination. Examples are Steyn vs Tendulkar and Warne vs Pietersen.

These are just samples of the type of insights which can be drawn. I have created an Excel sheet with 2954 instances of ball-by-ball data where the number of balls exceeds 100 or number of dismissals exceed 3. To download/view the document, a veritable treasure-trove of information, please CLICK HERE.

These three articles complete the first phase of analysis using the ball-by-ball data which has been extracted by Milind. After a break of an article or two I will look at some special analysis using this priceless data. Any suggestions from readers will be welcome. To start with, I may start with a single-Test based analysis.

This is the second article of a series, using ball-by-ball data, which the readers have repeatedly asked for during the past three years. For an introduction to the work done, please refer to the first article on contemporary bowlers.

I have given below the revised plan for the analyses which would be done. Readers can contribute their bit in suggesting whether anything else can be done.

1. The top three modern bowlers: with over 85% of ball-by-ball data available (15 bowlers: Steyn/Anderson/Harbhajan are featured). This article has already been published.
2. The top four modern batsmen: with over 75% of ball-by-ball data available. Clarke, Pietersen, Cook and Amla are featured in this article, which is the current one. Thirteen other batsmen are included in the downloadable tables.
3. The third analysis will be a combined analyses of the entire data. I will look at all the batsmen and bowlers together and bring out tables of bowler-batsman combinations exceeding 100 balls. There are 2831 such combinations. This will mean that there will be no artificial restrictions or cut-offs. This table will be available in two orders: by bowler and by batsman.
4. Special analyses, to be decided as we go on, based on reader inputs.

The current analysis will cover the batsmen for whom over 75% of data is available and over 5000 Test runs have been scored. I have selected 17 batsmen and featured four batsmen in the article. This article features four top batsmen of the current generation. The batsmen featured are Michael Clarke, Kevin Pietersen, Alastair Cook and Hashim Amla. Virtually no one will have any problems with this selection. The others considered are Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, VVS Laxman and Ricky Ponting. These eight batsmen, along with eight others form the complete selection. Jacques Kallis, Rahul Dravid and Shivnarine Chanderpaul just missed the cut-off of 75%. Brian Lara, Sachin Tendulkar and Stephen Fleming are way below the cut-off, in fact, below 60% mark. However, I can assure all readers that all these great batsmen are very well represented in the third article.

I am not going to spend too much time on explaining the types of analyses which are possible. It is better that we move on to the tables. There will only be minimal comments. There is, however, a summary at the end. There are six tables for each of the featured batsmen since the balls/runs ones have been combined into one and the late order batsmen table, which was there in the bowler analysis, does not have a place here.

Michael Clarke

James Anderson moved to top of Clarke dismissals with his Trent Bridge dismissal. Ravindra Jadeja is a surprise presence here. And at a very low average.

The increase in India-Australia contests has propelled four Indian bowlers to the top of this table. And then two South African bowlers.

Andrew Flintoff and Tim Southee have not managed a single dismissal despite bowling 650 balls. It is surprising that R Ashwin has been mastered by Clarke but in Jadeja, he has found his Waterloo.

Simon Jones, in the 2005 Ashes series had the complete measure of Clarke. A very surprising bowler at the top: Narsingh Deonaraine. Then there are Shaminda Eranga, and Jadeja. Is there a chink in Clarke's armour when it comes to fairly ordinary bowlers?