A potpourri of World Cup numbers - I

Enough analysis is being done on the World Cup. I myself am doing quite a bit of analysis and preparing tables by the dozen. Hence I decided to take a different approach during the World Cup. This will be a potpourri of different types of World Cup related happenings: minimally analytical, part left field, some whimsical, possibly sarcastic, anecdotal at times, irreverent often but certainly not too heavy. I hope the readers have a lot of fun while going through these.

300s galore
The first four matches of the World Cup produced an ODI symmetry never seen before. In each of these matches the first batting team scored 300 or more. Their bowlers then dismissed the other team for 200 plus. Each of these matches resulted in comfortable wins. This has never happened in ODIs before. During 2002, there were four consecutive 300-plus scores but the responses were on either side of 200. During 2014 there were five consecutive 300-plus scores but included a successful chase. The similarity in matches was such that the team rating points for these four matches were in a tight band between 574 and 595.

That is not all. The World Cup opener was preceded by the match between New Zealand and Pakistan in which New Zealand scored 369 and restricted Pakistan to 259. So that makes it five consecutive matches of 3xx-2xx scores. The team rating points for New Zealand in that match: 588. This still does not end. The fifth match of the World Cup between West Indies and Ireland produced a first innings score of 304, making it six consecutive scores of 300: never happened before and very little chance of this sequence repeating yourself. As I complete this article there is another 3xx-2xx score in the West Indies - Zimbabwe match.

The agony and ecstasy of Solomon Mire
Mire, the Zimbabwean allrounder, experienced it all against South Africa. He bowled an eminently forgettable over to David Miller late in the South African innings. The sequence "6 4 4 6 4 6". Almost perfect over: three fours and three sixes. Although Mr. Monk would have interchanged the first two deliveries, for symmetry's sake! But Mire had his "15 seconds" when he batted. He took 16 off Dale Steyn's over (2 6 0 0 4 4) and followed with a six off the first ball of the Morne Morkel over. That was 22 off seven balls off a fearsome fast bowling pair.

Last five overs blues for India
The last five overs of the Indian innings against Pakistan produced only 27 runs. Contrast this with South Africa's last five overs against Zimbabwe: an unbelievable 96 runs. Then when these two teams faced each other, India could score only 36 runs. But South Africa, well they barely reached the 40th over. So India had the last word (or two) in both the matches. The Indians are going to say that it really does not matter if they score at only run-a-ball in the last five overs as long as they keep on winning.

The O'Brien family contribution
There have been the Waughs. The Flowers. The Mohammed brothers, four in all, for Pakistan. But there has never before been a family like the O'Brien brothers. What they have done for Ireland is something phenomenal. First let me present some numbers.

- Ireland has played 90 matches, won 42 and tied 3. That is a 50% success ratio.
- Kevin O'Brien has played in 84 of these matches and been part of 42 of these successful matches.
- Niall O'Brien has played in 64 of these matches and been part of 27 of these successful matches.
- In 31 of these 45 matches, the O'Brien brothers, either or both, have contributed in some form or other. A cameo, a big score, a good spell or couple of catches behind the stumps.

Hats off to the O'Brien brothers.

The plucky Ireland team's exploits
In each of the past three World Cups Ireland has beaten at least one top team: Pakistan, England and West Indies. This is known to everyone. Two of these three wins have been magnificent chases of 300-plus totals. When you add their successful chase of the Netherlands total of 300-plus, it makes three such successful chases: All in World Cups. And only two other teams, Sri Lanka and England, have done this in World Cups. Another doffing of the hat for Ireland!

Ducks by the dozen
What is with Australia and New Zealand pitches? We have already seen so many 300s being scored. But looking at the other side, the number of golden ducks is mind-boggling. Let me chronicle these.

- Scotland's innings against New Zealand had four golden ducks: Calum MacLeod, Hamish Gardiner, Preston Mommsen and Iain Wardlaw. Majid Haq managed to play two balls before being dismissed.
- Shane Watson and Mitchell Johnson were dismissed for golden ducks against England.
- Stuart Broad did not get bat on ball in the only ball he faced in the same match. The ball, instead, hit the stumps.
- Lasith Malinga at least connected but was dismissed first ball for a zero.
- Darren Bravo was out for a diamond duck against Ireland.
- Kevin O'Brien went for a golden duck in the same match.
- Hamid Hassan, later to shake the Sri Lankan top order, went first ball for zero.
- Younis Khan played a single ball and was caught behind for a golden zero.
- Finally, to cap it all, Lahiru Thirimanne and Tillakaratne Dilshan both went for golden ducks, having played a combined tally of two balls. Only the second time this has happened in ODIs and the first time, in World Cups.

What is happening? That is a tally 14 golden ducks in 11 matches. And today, Dwayne Smith was there, within a ball of the golden duck.

Who wants a hat-trick?
Steven Finn captured three wickets off the last three balls in the 50th over of the Australian innings. Let us leave aside the fact that this was the most expensive spell containing a hat-trick and converted a miserable 9.3-0-71-2 to 10-0-71-5. This was, inarguably, the most worthless hat-trick in the history of ODI cricket. Chetan Sharma, Saqlain Mushtaq, Chaminda Vaas, Brett Lee, Lasith Malinga, Kemar Roach, Malinga again and Finn have performed hat-tricks in World Cups.

Finn's and Malinga's efforts are the only instances of hat-tricks in losing causes. But Malinga's was one of the greatest bowling efforts in ODI history. South Africa, chasing 210 to win, were 206 for 5. Malinga captured four wickets in four balls (spread across two overs) and reduced them to 207 for 9. A coat of varnish prevented Malinga from capturing 5 in 5. Then, after a few nerve-wracking deliveries, Robin Peterson edges one past slips. That sombrero-trick was something out of the Malinga zone.

Continuing on Steven Finn (those 12 overs)
My apologies since I like Finn. He is a very hard-working and talented cricketer. But this is a story, waiting to be told. First Finn bowls a poor spell of 9.3 overs, concedes 71 runs and picks up two wickets. He would have expected to finish with 3 for 80. Instead he finishes with a wholly unexpected and useless hat-trick. Fine, let us close that.

Move forward six days and 2600 km east across the Tasman Sea. Finn bowls six balls to Brendon McCullum. He goes "6 4 0 4 6 0". Okay 20 runs, it happens to the best. After all Mire took 16 off Steyn a few days back. Then he starts the next over to Martin Guptill. A four is followed by a single. McCullum again. Finn is dismissed for four sixes and finishes with a spell of 2-0-49-0. What is the number for S̶P̶C̶A̶ S P C F (F for Finn)? An SOS has to be sent.

A footnote: I was happy that the English selectors did not drop Finn. He had an excellent spell of 3 for 26 against Scotland. Now Finn can look forward to the next match.

1 for 4 and the like
S Rajesh has covered this in his piece on World Cup numbers. I will look at this from a different angle. First, the irrefutable fact. Pakistan's 1 for 4 is the only instance of in 3600+ matches of such a disastrous start. Reminds one of India going 0 for 4 at Headingley during 1952. Now that that is out of the way, let us look at a few more similar situations.

- Pakistan went 0 for 3 against New Zealand during the 1983 World Cup. They did not recover and were dismissed for 186.
- Pakistan slumped to 0 for 3 against South Africa in 1997. All wickets were captured by Shaun Pollock. But, facing a formidable total of 271, Pakistan recovered to 262 for 9, thanks to Inzamam-ul-Haq, Moin Khan and Azhar Mahmood.
- Bangladesh was tottering at 0 for 3 in the 2003 World Cup against Sri Lanka. They then went to 5 for 4 and 25 for 5 and to 124. Vaas captured all the five wickets.
- Bangladesh was 1 for 3 against West Indies during 2011. They recovered to 220 but were swamped by West Indies.
- Finally Pakistan was 1 for 4 against West Indies last week and lost by a huge margin.

It is amazing that all the five instances are shared between Pakistan and Bangladesh.

ISV brought to the focus
In my earlier articles on World Cup, I had portrayed a new bowling measure called ISV (Inn Spell Value). This measure takes into account the batsmen dismissed, the score at which they were dismissed and the bowling accuracy, in absolute terms as well as with reference to the team score. The value of this measure can be explained by applying the concepts to the two leading bowling performances of the World Cup.

Mitchell Marsh captured 5 for 31. All five were top-order wickets. Ian Bell (RpI-34.1) at 36, Gary Ballance (20.8) on 10, Joe Root (34.4) on 5, Eoin Morgan (32.7) for 0 and Jos Buttler (26.1) on 10. His credit towards these five wickets is 237. He bowled at an RpB of 0.61. The team's RpB was 0.92. So he performed at a level 1.5 times better than the team. The net effect is that his ISV was 4.386.

Tim Southee dismissed Bell (34.1) at 8, Moeen Ali (34.9) on 20, James Taylor (32.7) for 0, Buttler (26.1) on 3, Chris Woakes (13.4), Stuart Broad (7.7) and Finn (4.9). His credit towards these seven wickets is 251. He bowled at an RpB of 0.61, identical to Marsh. The team's RpB was 0.61. So he performed at exactly the same level as the team. The net effect is that his ISV was 4.422, just above that of Marsh.

It can be seen that Marsh's five-wicket spell was as valuable as Southee's seven-wicket spell. Southee's sixth and seventh wickets were No. 10 and No. 11. The effect of these two wickets is almost cancelled by Marsh's relative accuracy.

Balls resource remaining: England lost their match to New Zealand with 226 balls remaining. It could have been much worse if Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor had not dawdled. Still this margin was huge. This was the tenth worst World Cup defeat in this regard. However let us look at this carefully.

The other losses were by Canada (277), Canada (272), Kenya (252), Ireland (240), Scotland (239), Sri Lanka (236), Bangladesh (228), England (226), Bangladesh (226) and Ireland (226). A careful perusal of the list will indicate that England has had the worst defeat among the Test teams. Do I hear the word Sri Lanka? But that was in 1975 when Sri Lanka was a non-Test playing team. If you were unkind, you could have called Sri Lanka a minnow. If you were kind, an Associate.

Bradman memorabilia

A chart depicting the journey of the 1938 team to England reflecting the facilities available during those times. Nearly a month in pre-tour matches across the Tasman sea and all over Australia, followed by a nine-day journey to Colombo. A halt and a match against Ceylon, then over three weeks of sea journey to Southampton. They reached Southampton two months after leaving home. To view this, please click on HERE.