World T20 outliers, and the inimitable Sehwag

After six months of sabbatical I am back. During the period I was away, Virender Sehwag retired. It would be a major lapse on my part not to do a special tribute to that wonderful cricketer. I could not accommodate this tribute in my last article. Also, the World T20 is round the corner. It is time to remind the readers about the soul-stirring performances in the previous five World T20s. Hence I decided to combine these two very interesting topics into one article.

In line with the totally differing strategies which are used in T20I matches as compared to the ODI matches, I have adopted a radically new set of ratings determination methodologies. Without going into too many details, I will summarise the bowling ratings as based on the following factors.

The rating points are on a scale upto 100. This maximum value would probably be reached if any bowler finishes with an analysis of 4-3-4-8 against one of the top teams.

Ajantha Mendis is an enigma. He bamboozled many teams with his bowling variations but could not really make a long-term impact on the game, especially in the Test scene. However, in T20s he was a destroyer. Two of the three greatest bowling performances were owned by Mendis. And the middle one by another Sri Lankan, Rangana Herath.

In the first league match of the 2012 World T20, Sri Lanka played Zimbabwe. They batted first and put up an imposing total of 182 for 4. When Zimbabwe batted, it was the Mendis show. If one Mendis did not get you, the other one would. But the real destroyer was Ajantha Mendis. He dismissed six Zimbabwe batsmen for a mere 8 runs in 4 overs. Since it is impossible to describe bowling efforts such as Mendis' spell, the only way out is to provide the 24-ball sequence. It is fully self-explanatory.

Twenty-four balls, four scoring strokes, eight runs, 14 dot balls and six wickets. Nothing more needs to be said. Zimbabwe were dismissed for 100 and Sri Lanka won by 81 runs.

Granted, that spell was against Zimbabwe. But what do we say about the next best one? During the 2014 World T20, Sri Lanka played New Zealand, a title contender, in a key league match. Sri Lanka fared poorly and were dismissed for 119. It seemed like an easy win for the strong New Zealand team. A loss would have meant that Sri Lanka needed the NRR route to qualify and also meet India in the semi-final.

What happened next was incredible. The strong New Zealand batting line-up was blown away for 60. Herath captured five wickets. His bowling sequence?

First over, first ball: run out
Fourth over, first ball: 1 run and a run out

This was an even more remarkable analysis than Mendis'. The first 12 balls were dot balls and produced four wickets. The spell: 21 balls, three scoring strokes, three runs, 12 dot balls, two run outs and five wickets. A total of seven wickets fell during Herath's spell.

The third spell is again by Mendis. This was the spell which should have won the World T20 for Sri Lanka during 2012. He took 4 for 12 off four overs, all top order wickets, limiting West Indies to 137 for 6. Unfortunately for Sri Lanka, Sunil Narine produced an equally good spell and supported by Sammy's tight bowling, won the World T20 for West Indies. Sri Lanka had to wait for two more years before winning the World Cup.

Narine's match-winning spell of 3.4-0-9-3 is placed fourth. West Indies were only defending a low total, as already mentioned. This is followed by two spells by Pakistani bowlers, Umar Gul and Abdul Razzaq. There are three spells by Indian bowlers: By Harbhajan Singh, Irfan Pathan and R Ashwin. Pathan's spell was in the final of 2007 World T20, which was won by India. The top ten is completed by Jacques Kallis' excellent spell of 4 for 15 against Zimbabwe in the 2012 World T20.

The bowling top ten is a predominantly Asian consortium of spinners. Three Sri Lankans, three Indians, two Pakistanis, one West Indian of Asian extraction and one South African. Of the ten, only two are pace bowlers.

Barring Mendis' 4 for 12 in the final of the 2012 World T20, the other nine are match-winning spells.

The batting ratings methodology is summarised below.

The rating points are on a scale up to 100. This maximum value would probably be reached if any batsman scores a match-winning 100 in 40 balls, coming in at 50 for 5, chasing a 180 target, against one of the top teams.

I have already touched on Hussey's performance. The situation is worth reiterating. Pakistan put up a huge innings total of 191. With the excellent bowling line-up Pakistan had, this was expected to be quite sufficient. Mohammad Amir and Abdur Rehman made early inroads and Australia were struggling at 105 for 5 when Hussey took the crease: batting too low for a batsman of his calibre. Australia needed 87 runs in 45 balls at 11.6. Just look at these three figures: 45.3% of runs yet to be scored, 37.5% of balls resource available and 31.1% of wickets resources available.

Hussey played, inarguably, the best innings in World T20 history and, arguably, the best ever T20 innings. He scored 60 in 24 balls, studded with three fours and six sixes. It was a truly a great innings culminating in an equally great win for Australia. Let me provide Hussey's batting sequence. In the last five balls, Hussey scored 26 runs, including 20 in the last over. Readers should note and admire the way Hussey settled down, scoring only 3 off 7 balls.

The second-best innings in World T20s was played by Marlon Samuels in the final of the 2012 World T20. Sri Lanka were the home team and favourites to lift the title. West Indies lost their first two wickets for 14 in six overs. From this terrible start, Samuels anchored the innings and was helped by Sammy towards the end of the innings. His 78 was scored quite quickly considering the low-scoring match this turned out to be. A total of 137 for 6 was not a great score but proved adequate through the wonderful bowling of Narine and Sammy. Without Samuels' innings, West Indies would not have reached 100.

Everyone knows about Yuvraj Singh's blitz against England during the 2007 World T20: 58 in 16 balls including a few sixes. However, a far more relevant innings was played by Yuvraj in the semi-final of the same World T20. This was a match-winning hurricane-like innings of 70 off 30 balls, against Australia. India was struggling at 41 for 2 in eight overs when Yuvraj walked in. By the time Yuvraj got out India had reached 155 for 4 in 17.3 and went on to reach 188. This was enough to win.

Tillakaratne Dilshan's 96 in the 2009 semi-final, Cameron White's 85* in 2010, Brendon McCullum's 123 in the early stages of the 2012 World T20 are in the next three positions. Gautam Gambhir's match-winning 76 in the 2007 final comes in next. This innings was as important as Irfan Pathan's spell in winning the World Cup. George Bailey's quick 63 - the only performance in a lost match in the top ten - in the 2012 semi-final is placed next. The top ten is completed by Chris Gayle's 75 in the 2012 semi-final and Ahmed Shehzad's 111* in the early stages of the 2014 World T20.

The batting top ten positions are distributed amongst six countries. There is no single-region domination as seen in the bowling top ten.

The only criterion for the all-round performance is that the bowler should have captured 2 wickets or more (or bowled exceedingly accurately) and scored 20 runs or more. The ordering is done based on the sum of rating points.

Samuels is an exasperation, enigma and enfant terrible: all rolled into one. He has promised a lot more than what he has delivered. However it is possible that on October 7, 2012, he made up and atoned for his failures before and after. He won the World T20, almost single-handedly, for West Indies with his batting and his bowling. He more than made up for Gayle's miserable innings of 3 in 16 balls and Johnson Charles' five-ball duck. At the end of the sixth over, the scoring rate was not even 2.5. How Samuels controlled the innings, with a masterclass of his own, has already been narrated.

When Sri Lanka batted, Samuels made sure that they had no chance of reaching their target by coming as first-change bowler, bowled two tight overs and later in the innings bowled two excellent overs. His four overs produced one wicket, a dropped catch and only 15 runs. Sri Lanka were nowhere in the chase. Samuels' all-round performance fetches him 121.5 rating points.

In the second position is the mercurial allrounder, Shahid Afridi. In the semi-final of the 2009 World T20, Pakistan batted first and could put up only 149. Out of this moderate score, Afridi contributed with a blazing 51 off 34 balls. South Africa was well-placed to win the contest. Afridi's mid-innings spell virtually settled the issue. He bowled four overs for only 16 runs and dismissed Herschelle Gibbs and AB de Villiers. That Pakistan went on to win the World Cup three days later adds immense value to Afridi's performance. His total points were 113.0.

In the final in 2012 World T20, Sammy also produced a stellar all-round performance. In West Indies' innings, Sammy's 26 in 15 balls gave the impetus to the innings and helped them add 30 runs in the last three overs. Sammy also bowled magnificently in the middle overs, capturing the important wickets of Angelo Mathews and Lahiru Thirimanne conceding only 6 runs. Sammy got 112.2 points for these two performances and is comfortably in the third position.

The allrounder table is quite different to the bowler table. Here the only Asian players are Afridi, with two entries and Jeevan Mendis. The other seven places are occupied by players from the non-Asian teams. Shane Watson also has two entries.

Based on the standard 2-1-0 method I have created a table of team performances. The cut-off is ten matches. Only two matches in World Cups, out of the total 142 played, were abandoned. There are three matches in the World Cups which ended with the scores level and declared as "tied matches". However the prevailing tie-breaker (bowl-out or one-over-eliminator) was used to determine the winner. The team performance points are shared at 50-50. However, there is a winner for the match.

Sri Lanka has the best record in World T20s. This is proved by the fact that the Sri Lankan teams have made it to the semi-final once, to the finals twice and have won the World T20 once. This means that they have missed reaching the knockout stages only once: In the initial World T20. Their overall performance record is over 70%.

India has a 66.7% record. They won the inaugural World T20 and reached the final in the fifth World T20. In between they missed qualifying three times. South Africa are yet to win the World T20. They reached the semi-finals during 2010 and 2014. They are performing at just over 60%.

Pakistan reached the final in 2007, won the cup in 2009 and reached the knockout stages in the next two World T20s. They are just behind South Africa, with 60%. Surprisingly for a team which won the 2010 World T20, England's overall record is below average. They did not reach the knockout rounds in the other four World T20s.

Who do I want to win the World T20? My sense of symmetry tells me that I would be very happy if one of the three teams which has yet to win the World T20, wins this one: That means any team from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. My further sense of righteousness makes me push towards a New Zealand win with Martin Guptill scoring a match-winning innings in the final: just to show what the IPL missed. But my mind says that India would be very difficult to beat. It would need an innings-of-a-lifetime from David Warner, Glenn Maxwell, Guptill, Corey Anderson or de Villiers to defeat India.

Sehwag had a magnificent Test career and a, fair at best, limited-overs career. So I will only comment on his Test career where his achievements are unlikely to be overhauled by any Indian batsman. In view of the length of the article I will use tables only where absolutely essential.

Sehwag finished his glittering career with the best strike rate any batsman ever achieved in Test cricket. Even in the absence of accurate data on balls played for about a third of the matches, it is certain no batsman, irrespective of the era they played in, comes anywhere near Sehwag.

Sehwag scored at a strike rate of 82.2. With a 2000-run cut-off, he is closely followed by Adam Gilchrist, striking at 82.0. Warner follows next, some distance away, at 76.1. Then comes Kapil Dev, whose strike rate is 69.1. Finally Stuart Broad clocks in at 66.8. It must be mentioned that Kapil's number includes a bit of extrapolation.

Some time back I had analysed the second positions in various tables by assigning 100 for the best and assigning pro-rated index values for the others. The index values for these five batsmen are Sehwag (100), Gilchrist (99.7), Warner (92.5), Kapil Dev (84.1) and Broad (81.2). The sixth placed batsman has an index below 80. That indicates the type of lead Sehwag and Gilchrist have built in. It may be possible, but very difficult, for Warner to overhaul these numbers.

Top 5 scores & Average
Some batsmen are not satisfied with mere hundreds. They go on to score huge hundreds. In this measure I have summed the top five scores and the average for leading batsmen. As expected, Brian Lara leads with 1499 (299.8). Another run and he would have averaged 300. Then comes Don Bradman with 1461 (292.2). It would not be a surprise to anyone that Sehwag follows next with 1376 at an average of 277.8. These three are the double triple-centurions, Gayle being the other batsman. In fourth and fifth position are the incomparable Sri Lankan duo, Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara, with 1368 (273.6) and 1338 (267.6) respectively.

Sehwag's hundreds: how fast did he score
Sehwag scored his 23 hundreds at the incredible scoring rate of 83.5, which is higher than his career scoring rate. The top five hundreds were scored at an even greater pace. He took only 1411 balls to score the 1376 runs. His scoring rate for these five hundreds was an unbelievable 97.5, almost at run-a-ball. Only four other batsmen in the history of cricket have scored their hundreds at a scoring rate higher than 70: McCullum (74.3), Kevin Pietersen (73.0) and Sanath Jayasuriya (71.9). Lara is quite close at 69.0.

Big hundreds %
I have heard a few commentators, Australians if I remember correctly, call any score of 150 and above as "daddy hundreds". Let me call these as "big hundreds". It stands to reason that the batsmen mentioned in the previous topic would do well in this measure, which is the percentage of hundreds which are big hundreds. The cut-off is ten hundreds. Bradman leads with 62.1% (18 out of 29). Sehwag follows closely with 60.9% (14 out of 23) of his hundreds being big hundreds. The next batsman is quite easily predicted. Yes, it is Lara, with 55.9% (19 out of 34). In a big surprise, McCullum is in fourth position, with 54.5% (6 out of 11). Len Hutton completes the table with 52.6% (10 out of 19). Half of Sangakkara hundreds (19 out of 38) are big hundreds. At the other end of the scale, just one out of the 20 hundreds scored by Mark Waugh was a big one.

Average hundred value
I will round off this fascinating topic of hundreds and big hundreds with a whopper. It is a look into the average hundred value. I like this metric since it gives a clear insight into the batsman's psyche. When he reaches 100, what does he do? How often does he go on to make big hundreds. Bradman leads with an average hundred value of 186.0. Zaheer Abbas follows at 179.8. Again it is a surprise that McCullum is next with 174.5. The top five is complete with the familiar duo of Sehwag, with 173.7 and Lara at 173.2. It is amazing that the list is dominated by the quicker-scoring batsmen.

Sehwag had two great years: 2008 and 2010. During these two years, he scored in excess of 1400 runs at averages exceeding 55. As an attacking opener, he did not benefit from many not outs. Hence his average does not go up like Sangakkara's or Mohammad Yousuf's in their "zone" years. He scored in excess of 100 runs per Test during these two years.

His worst year was during 2012 when he averaged just over 30. His last nine innings yielded only 163 runs. The decline probably started with the 2010 tour of South Africa. Since then he managed to score only a single hundred in 20 Tests.

Sehwag was devastating as an opener. He scored his runs at over 5 runs per over while opening. But he was also able to maintain a batting average of over 50 while opening. He is in very august company as openers who have scored in excess of 4500 runs at an average above 50. Sehwag and Sunil Gavaskar are the Indian opening batsmen in this elite list. Matthew Hayden is the lone Australia opener. Finally, there are the three great English opening batsmen, Hutton, Jack Hobbs and Herbert Sutcliffe.

Amongst the batsmen who have scored over 3000 runs, Andrew Flintoff and Gayle are exceptional. They have scored nearly two-thirds of their career runs in boundaries. Sehwag follows next with 63.8%. Gibbs and Marcus Trescothick complete the top five with 60+% values. These are the only batsmen with boundary percentage exceeding 60.

If there is a really poor spot in Sehwag's career, I have to point to what Sehwag did on the fourth and fifth days of the match. It was as if after three days Sehwag tuned off. Amongst the top 50 players, Sehwag has the worst first-second innings variance. He was a master of the first innings. He averaged 62.50, scored 22 hundreds at a very impressive frequency of one every 4.7 innings. He reached fifty 40 times and converting a whopping 55% of these into hundreds.

But when it came to the second innings, he was way below par. An average of just over 30 and a single hundred. The frequency thus came down to one every 76 innings. He struggled and struggled. How does one explain this anomaly? Did Sehwag lose interest? Did he not relish back-to-the-wall challenges? A conundrum indeed. Steve Waugh comes closest with average around 30 and two hundreds.

Sehwag loved Pakistan and Sri Lanka bowlers. He averaged 91.14 and 72.88 respectively against these two teams. He was way below par against England, averaging only 29.32.

What is his best Test innings? I would ignore the triple-hundreds and the near-300. The best innings Sehwag has played is his epochal 201* against Sri Lanka at Galle during 2008. The quality of this innings is so high that it has already found its way into the top-20 position of the revised top innings list.

Of all contemporary batsmen, I would pay to watch only four: Lara, Sehwag, de Villiers and Viv Richards. And of course, Chris Martin. If you blink during the innings of any of these batsmen, you would miss something special. In Martin's case, probably the entire innings!

Once again wishing all the readers a wonderful 2016.