PlanetCricket
Bot
- Joined
- Jan 13, 2010
Article by AngryAngy -
The Ashes 2013 – Australia; Runs Scorers
As Australia ponders its 3rd Test XI, considerable thought will be given to bringing Nathan Lyon back in. Yet, pundits and members of the media will mention the above fact; Agar is in fact the leading run scorer for Australia in this series. Therein lies the devil of statistics.
Raise your hand (I said do it!) if you think Agar is most likely to remain Australia’s top scorer for the series. Well okay, I guess that doesn’t sound far-fetched if you expect Australia to make only 200 odd in every innings. But for those of you who dare think otherwise, I guess this is for you.
Cricket is a game which strangely hinges on fairly infrequent events. This is arguably the attractive element, that the game is surprising. If you pick a guy to make hundreds, you shouldn’t bank on him doing so every game, not even every second game.?In really great form, a player might stack together 2-3 hundreds a series, but you can’t bank on it. Every 4th or 5th game, now you’re talking realistically. Seven of those guys might give you multiple hundreds in the same match, or they might still get bowled out for 150.
Quite simply, they all normally spend half their time (and more) failing. Scoring less than 30 in an innings is exceedingly normal. Average isn’t really that average at all. Batting averages are extruded by high scores and not outs. For Australia, individual failure is being highlighted because so few of them have scored centuries, or even 50s, of late. They only need a couple of individuals to improve their fortunes to completely rewrite the narrative. For England on the other hand, most of their batsmen have also failed in the two matches, but it is covered by the net outcome of the team; both long term and also given that a couple of players have carried their innings in this series. While Australia has been propped up by the tail, Stuart Broad has also been far more essential to England with the bat than with the ball.
So therein lies the difficulty of selection and the danger of short-term form. This is why there’s a lot of heat on Watson in spite of him being Australia’s second highest scorer for the series. In other words, having the most of an insufficient quantity means absolutely nothing.
More...
The Ashes 2013 – Australia; Runs Scorers
As Australia ponders its 3rd Test XI, considerable thought will be given to bringing Nathan Lyon back in. Yet, pundits and members of the media will mention the above fact; Agar is in fact the leading run scorer for Australia in this series. Therein lies the devil of statistics.
Raise your hand (I said do it!) if you think Agar is most likely to remain Australia’s top scorer for the series. Well okay, I guess that doesn’t sound far-fetched if you expect Australia to make only 200 odd in every innings. But for those of you who dare think otherwise, I guess this is for you.
Cricket is a game which strangely hinges on fairly infrequent events. This is arguably the attractive element, that the game is surprising. If you pick a guy to make hundreds, you shouldn’t bank on him doing so every game, not even every second game.?In really great form, a player might stack together 2-3 hundreds a series, but you can’t bank on it. Every 4th or 5th game, now you’re talking realistically. Seven of those guys might give you multiple hundreds in the same match, or they might still get bowled out for 150.
Quite simply, they all normally spend half their time (and more) failing. Scoring less than 30 in an innings is exceedingly normal. Average isn’t really that average at all. Batting averages are extruded by high scores and not outs. For Australia, individual failure is being highlighted because so few of them have scored centuries, or even 50s, of late. They only need a couple of individuals to improve their fortunes to completely rewrite the narrative. For England on the other hand, most of their batsmen have also failed in the two matches, but it is covered by the net outcome of the team; both long term and also given that a couple of players have carried their innings in this series. While Australia has been propped up by the tail, Stuart Broad has also been far more essential to England with the bat than with the ball.
So therein lies the difficulty of selection and the danger of short-term form. This is why there’s a lot of heat on Watson in spite of him being Australia’s second highest scorer for the series. In other words, having the most of an insufficient quantity means absolutely nothing.
More...
