Comedy Run Out Set to Music 5

In a field of strong contenders, this might be the best yet.

Will Somerville got hit by Ben Horne, dived, probably made his ground (based on fairly low quality video quality), then was given out.

It was clearly not his day.

Comedy run out set to music 4

Sean Solia has had a bit of a golden run recently. His List A averages are scarcely believable, averaging 56 with the bat and 18 with the ball. But he learned today that it's not a good idea to go out walking when the ball isn't dead.

Also watch for Henry Nicholls getting high fived in the face by Tom Latham.

Comedy run out 3

Time for the 3rd instalment of comedy run outs set to music.

The context here was that it was the start of the 46th over, Auckland vs Wellington in a 50 over match. The pair are the wicket had added 66 runs in just over 8 overs, but this started a collapse where Auckland lost 4 wickets for 21 over 3.4 overs.

I hope you enjoy.

CricketGeek Player Profiles: Colin Munro

Colin Munro is a left handed batsman and right-arm medium pace bowler from Auckland. He was born in Durban, South Africa, but moved to New Zealand as a teenager. His brother played youth cricket with Hashim Amla, but it wasn't until he came to New Zealand that Colin started to make a name for himself as a cricketer.

He played 5 matches for the New Zealand under 19 team, and then was picked in the Auckland team as a specialist bowler, batting at number 11. He has a strange delivery stride with his bowling, that causes the ball to skid onto the batsmen somewhat. As a result he has been an effective holding bowler, doing jobs like bowling into the wind, keeping things tight at the other end to a spin bowler, and seeing in the new ball.

Due to his aggressive batting style, and defensive bowling, he was typecast as a limited overs player, and he was worried that he had been pigeon-holed, and wouldn't play any first class cricket. He didn't play a single first class match between November 2010 and February 2012, and was stuck with a record of having played 6 first class matches, with a highest score of 37 and an average of 14.29.

However during this time he did start to score in the t20 and list A matches for Auckland, playing 18 t20 innings at an average of 30, and 18 list A innings at an average of 38.4. As a result the Auckland coach decided to give him another try in the first class team and he did not disappoint.

He hit a hundred in his first match back, and has averaged 77.54 in his 10 matches since his comeback as a batsman, with 4 hundreds and 4 fifties in 14 innings. The highlight of that time was a sensational 269* off 252 balls against Wellington, with an attack featuring 3 international bowlers.

Due to an injury to James Franklin, he's been picked to play in the 2nd test between South Africa and New Zealand at St George's Park in Port Elizabeth. It will be interesting to see if he can translate his domestic form to the international game.

Net Run Rate calculator Group A

Today there are 2 potentially interesting matches in the Champions League.

There are 3 basic outcomes possible from these matches (as well as a couple of unusual ones)

Option 1 - Auckland lose

Regardless of what happens in the second match if Auckland lose, both the Titans and the Daredevils are through to the semi-finals.

Option 2 - Auckland and Delhi win

If this happens then Auckland and Delhi are both through to the semi-finals.

Option 3 - Auckland and Titans win

It this happens then the Titans are through, and the team with the best net run rate out of Auckland and Delhi go through.

Additional options - rain stops play
If the first game is rained out, then Delhi are automatically through to the semi-final. Then if Delhi beat the Titans by a significant enough margin to cause the Titans' NRR to drop below Auckland's, Auckland would go through, otherwise the Titans would. Given that the Titans would know the formula, they would be likely to go for the lower target to ensure qualification.

If Auckland win the first game and the second is rained out, then again it would come down to NRR between the Aces and the Titans.

For any of those situations you can use this Net Run Rate calculator here:

6 reasons I'm not surprised by the Auckland Aces success

The Auckland Aces seem to have taken many people by surprise by being so competitive this far into the Champions League T20.

I predicted that they would make the semi-finals at the start of the tournament. Here's why:

1. Completeness.

The Aces have not lost any players to any other teams or injury. Every player was available for them. This is something that most teams can not say.

2. Composure.

The Aces have 12 players in their squad with international experience. This makes a big difference as they are more used to playing in different conditions, and in front of bigger crowds.

3. Conditions.

South Africa at this time of the year is similar to New Zealand in late November. The pitches are a bit unpredictable, the weather is changeable and the outfields are a similar pace. Not many other teams are comfortable in these conditions.

4. Competition.

The HRV Cup has only 6 teams in it. This means that the player pool is not diluted much. Most teams in the New Zealand competition have at least 6 international players in them, if not more. There are no easy games, and not many players that you can target. The proof of this is that most NZ players have significantly better averages when playing domestic cricket overseas than when playing at home (batting and bowling).

5. Collecting.

The Aces have a raft of players who are outstanding at fielding and running between the wickets. This is often the difference between teams in close matches. With Kitchen, Hira, Guptill and Vincent they have 4 of the best fielders in world cricket. There are less easy runs against Auckland, and they are so quick between the wickets that they find runs that many other teams can't score, by hitting the ball straight to a fielder and running.

6. Closeness.

For the last couple of years the Aces played a short walk from a good friend's place, and so I saw a lot of them play. This naturally results in me having a certain bias towards them. But at least I can admit it.

CricketGeek Player Profiles: Anaru Kitchen

Anaru Kitchen with a young Aces fan

courtesy @sillymidoff

One of the main reasons that the Auckland Aces have been the dominant team in New Zealand limited overs domestic cricket over the last two years is their extraordinary fielding. Guptill, Hira, Vincent and Cachopa have all prowled the infield, cutting off singles and saving boundaries. But there's another element to their fielding that is often ignored. The exceptional boundary fielding and outfield catching of Anaru Kitchen.

He is extremely quick, and at times seems to sense where the ball is going before it even leaves the bat. The result is that he has saved a number of runs, and made a significant number of catches for Auckland. He took more catches last season than any of the wicket-keepers. In fact, he took double the number of catches of the most prolific (Kruger van Wyk).

Sometimes outfield catching is merely a case of being in the right place at the right time. In Kitchen's case it is more that he covered so much ground, so quickly, that he caught batsmen who thought they had safely hit the ball into a gap. In one game he took a catch at deep backward square leg, while fielding at a wide mid on.

His ability to take catches has seen him placed high on the list of the most consistent catchers in T20 history:



To go with his remarkable catching he is also a competent batsman. His career started with a hiss and a roar, scoring 33*, 31, 0, 31, 61* in his first 5 matches, followed by a slump as bowlers figured out where to bowl to him. This often happens to players who have immediate success when they make the step up to the next level. The difference between good players and the rest is how they respond. Kitchen has found a way to score runs, faster and more consistently after his lean patch. His career strike rate has risen above 125 and his average is now over 25 (as shown in the graph below. He still has some work to go before his batting alone would be a reason to select him, but when combined his fielding prowess, it resulted in his being named in the 30 man New Zealand training squad for World T20.

Anaru Kitchen is someone to keep an eye on in the Champions League T20, both with the bat and in the outfield.

CricketGeek Player Profiles: Colin de Grandhomme

Colin de Grandhomme with 2 young fans. Courtesy @sillymidoff

When I was a child my father had season tickets to watch the Auckland rugby team play. I went along and watched them play almost every weekend of winter. That team was amazing. They won 75 consecutive regular season home matches. They would often be so far ahead at half time that they could try crazy, high-risk plays in the second half. And they were so good that they would often come off. Throughout the time that I watched them, there were two players who, more than any others, got the crowd excited. The first was a butcher from Mangere called John Kirwan. When he got the ball the whole crowd would rise as one, because he was unbelievably good. He was so fast and elusive. Whenever he touched the ball there was electricity. The other player was on the opposite wing, Va'aiga "Inga the Winger" Tuigamala. Inga was a very good player, but was not quite as good as Kirwan. Despite that he was the true crowd favourite because what he did was often more spectacular. He had the power and balance to get through the smallest of gaps. Kirwan scored 35 tries in tests for the All Blacks, Tuigamala scored only 5, and yet was clearly the crowd's favourite.

Likewise, Colin de Grandhomme has not scored nearly as many runs for Auckland as Martin Guptill, but when CdG walks out to the middle, there is a hush of expectation come over the crowd at Colin Maiden Park. Everyone knows that there is a chance that they will see something special from the big man. He is capable of making the largest grounds look ponderously small. When he hits a ball, they certainly stay hit.

I have been fortunate to have been able to see some of the biggest hitters in world cricket. I have seen the likes of Chris Gayle, Kieron Pollard, Chris Cairns, Adam Gilchrist, Viv Richards and Mark Greatbatch; but I'm not sure I've seen anyone hit the ball as cleanly or as regularly as de Grandhomme. I once saw him hit the ball out of Colin Maiden park, over the embankment and trees, across the road, over the fence on the other side and into the university car park. I'm not good at estimating distances, but I would be very surprised if it was less than 120 metres.

His career strike rate for the Auckland in T20 matches is a fairly impressive 170.83. He has hit 42 sixes and 47 fours off only 360 deliveries. That's basically a boundary every 4 balls. He's done all this while averaging a respectable 20.

But he's not just a lucky slogger. It has been in the longer formats where he has really excelled. Last season he averaged over 70 in first class cricket, and 43.8 at a strike rate just over 125 for Auckland in the list A matches. In a lot of ways his List A and First Class numbers show how good a player he actually is.

These numbers led me to write a post about his selection for the New Zealand team pointing out that they had picked him for the wrong format. However, when those two games got to the super over, I was wishing we had CdG in the side.

The fact that he is playing for New Zealand at all is a story in itself. He was born in Harare into a Zimbabwian cricketing dynasty. Both his father and grandfather represented their nation (Bunny for Rhodesia and Laurence for Zimbabwe). He looked set to follow in their footsteps, having played for Zimbabwe under 19's (alongside Brendan Taylor, Elton Chigumbura, Tino Mawoyo, Prosper Utsya, Sean Williams, Graeme Cremer and Ed Rainsford) before going on to play first class cricket for the Zimbabwe A and Zimbabwe under 23.

However he had different ideas. Realising that Zimbabwe was not quite the land of opportunity that it had been, de Grandhomme moved to Auckland in 2006.  It took a while for the move to pay off, but now "dutchie" makes the Auckland crowd move to the edge of their seats whenever he saunters to the middle.  If he gets going in the Champions League T20, I would definitely recommend moving to the edge of your seat also.

If you want a brief introduction to his (rather understated) personality, watch this video.

Big Occasion Bates

Yesterday the (mighty) Auckland Aces were playing in their third consecutive HRV Cup final. Auckland won convincingly. During the time between their first and third final they have also played Pakistan in a tour T20 match and played 2 Champions League matches.

Throughout these 6 big occasion matches one player has really been extraordinary: left arm quick bowler Michael Bates.

Here are his results:

Match	Opposition	Result	Figures
2009/10 HRV Cup final	Central Districts	Loss	4-0-61-3
Tour match	Pakistan	Win	3-0-11-4
2010/11 HRV Cup Final	Central Districts	Win	4-1-18-4
2011 Champions League T20	Kolkata Knight Riders	Loss	4-0-13-1
2011 Champions League T20	Somerset	Loss	4-1-13-2
2011/12 HRV Cup Final	Canterbury	Win	3-0-18-3
Overall			22-2-134-17

This gives him an average of 7.88, an economy rate of 6.09 and a strike rate of 7.64. If we just look at the last 2 years, removing the first final at the postage stamp sized Pukekura Park, his figures become 18-2-73-14. That is a breath-takingly low economy rate of 4.06, average of 5.2 and strike rate of 7.71.

How good are those numbers? Here are some comparisons: The best averaging bowler in the world is Krishmar Santoki from Jamaica who averages 8.56; the best economy rate is Samuel Badree from Trinidad and Tobago who's economy rate is 4.43; the best strike rate is also Santoki at 9.3. Bates's figures in the last 5 finals are better than all of these. Now it is true that 5 matches is a small sample size, but the results are still outstanding.

Given these numbers it is staggering that he hasn't been picked up by an overseas team of some variety. He hasn't even been picked for New Zealand A.

Now sometimes a bowler can get good figures by getting bad batsmen out. Not the case with Bates, here is the list of his dismissals:
Ross Taylor*
Kieran Noema-Barnett
Jacob Oram*
Mohammad Hafeez*
Shahid Afridi*
Ahmed Shezad*
Wahab Riaz
Peter Ingram*
Jamie How*
Ian Blackwell*
Doug Bracewell
Manvinder Bisla
Peter Trego
Nick Compton
Rob Nichol*
Andrew Ellis
Reece Young*
* - has batted in the top 6 in International Cricket

In his other T20 matches, when the stage is not so big, he has preformed reasonably well, but not nearly as well as he has on the big stage. Here are his stats excluding these matches: 86.5-1-755-25 Average 30.2, Economy Rate 8.73, Strike Rate 20.76.

Teams need consistent performers. But they also need players that can step up on the big occasions. So far Michael Bates has proved that he can do just that.

Running between wickets

I have long been a believer that running between wickets is the most important thing in a limited overs cricket match.

More important than catching. More important than bowling, more important than hitting boundaries.

It is difficult to quantify this, but the focus on it has meant that when I look at statistics I look at them slightly differently sometimes.

One of the main things that I look at when assessing a batsman is their activity rate. This is the number of run runs (ie runs that did not come from boundaries) divided by the deliveries that they did not hit to the fence.

This statistic is a good guide to the form of a batsman. The ability to accumulate runs without really taking risks is really the sign of a classy batsman.

But I wanted to look at who was the best between wickets. This has in part been due to watching Azhar Mahmood playing for the Auckland Aces. He has batted very well, but his running between wickets (and fielding) has been awful. He scored a brilliant hundred against Canterbury, but there were about 6 or 7 times that he wasn't quick enough to get back for a second, and so the team missed out on a number of runs. (He also let in about 6 or 7 runs in the field).

He has been out run-out in about half of his innings in the HRV Cup, which got me thinking about accounting for a batsman's propensity to get run out when I'm assessing how good they are between wickets. It would be better again to check how often there is a run out when they are batting, because a bad call that runs your partner out is as bad as a bad call that runs yourself out. However that data is very hard to get, and so I have to use what I do have.

So I decided to work out a metric for running between wickets. I started with looking at who scored the most run runs per dismissal in ODI's (ignoring how they were out). A couple of the results were quite surprising:

(all figures here are over the last 5 years, in ODI cricket. I have only looked at batsmen who have faced more than 1000 deliveries in that time period)

Run runs per dismissal

Name	Matches	Runs	Run runs	Run runs per dismissal
RN ten Doeschate (Neth)	27	1282	750	41.67
S Chanderpaul (WI)	63	2549	1653	38.44
IJL Trott (Eng)	40	1798	1222	34.91
TLW Cooper (Neth)	18	864	540	33.75
MS Dhoni (Asia/India)	137	4762	2890	33.22
HM Amla (SA)	54	2705	1555	32.40
JH Kallis (SA)	77	3154	1904	31.21
MJ Clarke (Aus)	112	3871	2537	30.20
MEK Hussey (Aus)	115	3408	2274	29.92
JP Duminy (SA)	77	2273	1557	29.38

I had to look up Tom Cooper, as I really knew very little about him. It will be interesting to see if he can keep that up as the Netherlands start to play more matches. From a quick look there are a lot of players that learned to play their cricket in the Southern Hemisphere, Dhoni and Chanderpaul being the exceptions.

Next I looked at the activity rates:

Activity Rates

Name	Run runs	Non-boundary balls	Activity rate
Shahid Afridi (Pak)	857	1254	0.683
JP Duminy (SA)	1557	2520	0.618
MEK Hussey (Aus)	2274	3699	0.615
DL Vettori (NZ)	569	928	0.613
JR Hopes (Aus)	730	1194	0.611
HM Amla (SA)	1555	2665	0.583
DJ Hussey (Aus)	562	967	0.581
MV Boucher (Afr/SA)	636	1106	0.575
IJL Trott (Eng)	1222	2147	0.569
AB de Villiers (Afr/SA)	2156	3802	0.567

The name at the top of the list here was a big surprise. When you think of Shahid Afridi, running between wickets is certainly not one of the things that you think of. However he has scored extremely quickly from run runs. Looking at different time periods and in different forms of the game another couple of names that occur regularly are Prior, Pollard and Dilshan. All three are thought of more as big hitters, but are also very effective at turning over the scoreboard. (Although this may be partially due to opposition captains being happy to conceded a single to them.)

The next thing that I looked at was the runs per run out. There were a number of batsmen who were not run out once, so I couldn't provide an average. In the interest of comparison, I have counted them as having been run out once for the sake of the average.

Run runs per run out.

Name	Matches	Run runs	Run outs	Run runs per ro
AB de Villiers (Afr/SA)	97	2156	0	2156
Yuvraj Singh (Asia/India)	115	1689	0	1689
WU Tharanga (Asia/SL)	95	1477	0	1477
Mohammad Yousuf (Asia/Pak)	60	1332	0	1332
IJL Trott (Eng)	40	1222	1	1222
EJG Morgan (Eng/Ire)	70	1142	0	1142
V Sehwag (Asia/India)	77	1067	0	1067
E Chigumbura (Afr/Zim)	90	928	0	928
S Chanderpaul (WI)	63	1653	2	826.5
AD Mathews (SL)	62	799	1	799

There are a number of batsmen who have been very careful between the wickets. However I think it is probably stretching the truth a little to suggest that Yuvraj Singh is one of the best between the wickets in the world.

So I combined these results using a variety of formulations until I found one that seemed to give the right results. (I can provide it if anyone is interested, it basically multiplies the activity rate by a modified run runs per dismissals, giving a higher weight to run out dismissals). Here were the best runners using my scoring system:

Name	Matches	Average	Activity rate	Score
IJL Trott (Eng)	40	51.37	0.569	22.82
AB de Villiers (Afr/SA)	97	52.46	0.567	22.79
RN ten Doeschate (Neth)	27	71.22	0.542	22.41
Mohammad Yousuf (Asia/Pak)	60	43.1	0.537	20.94
S Chanderpaul (WI)	63	59.27	0.492	19.64
JP Duminy (SA)	77	42.88	0.618	17.94
A Symonds (Aus)	41	44.3	0.549	17.93
MEK Hussey (Aus)	115	44.84	0.615	17.46
MS Dhoni (Asia/India)	137	54.73	0.562	16.72
Misbah-ul-Haq (Pak)	77	44.26	0.529	16.28

So the top of the pile is Trott, de Villiers and ten Doeschate.

An extra statistic that I found interesting was who relied on run runs the most and the least. This is a list of the run run percentages for batsman, ie for every 100 runs they score, how many are not in boundaries. The two surprises there are how high Kandamby is (I've only seen him bat twice, and both times he seemed only interested in finding the rope) and how low Herschelle Gibbs is. Gibbs is so quick between the wickets it is unusual that he scores such a low percentage by running.

Name	Matches	Runs	Run runs	Running %
GD Elliott (NZ)	37	716	500	69.8
JP Duminy (SA)	77	2273	1557	68.5
P Utseya (Zim)	82	849	579	68.2
IJL Trott (Eng)	40	1798	1222	68.0
AR White (Ire)	51	655	445	67.9
SHT Kandamby (SL)	34	847	571	67.4
MEK Hussey (Aus)	115	3408	2274	66.7
...	...	...	...	...
HH Gibbs (SA)	54	1752	728	41.6
JD Ryder (NZ)	37	1094	452	41.3
AC Gilchrist (Aus)	37	1127	457	40.6
PR Stirling (Ire)	34	1349	541	40.1
ST Jayasuriya (Asia/SL)	70	1988	756	38.0
CH Gayle (WI)	73	2454	898	36.6
V Sehwag (Asia/India)	77	3269	1067	32.6

Bring back the Tosh?

It is almost like the Auckland selectors were doing a favour for the New Zealand selectors by picking Tim McIntosh for their one day team. After all this is a guy who three weeks ago had a domestic record that was decidedly average. He averaged about 23 in List A matches at the start of the season, and scored his runs very very slowly. And yet for some reason the Auckland selectors felt that he would be worth giving a go opening the innings in the domestic game. There was a train of thought that they were trying to get him a chance to show the selectors why he should be in the test team.

However in 5 innings for Auckland he has scored 313 runs with one not out, for an average of 78.25 at a strike rate of 95.71. Even more interesting was the final innings. He scored 161 off 138, with a stunning acceleration at the end of the innings. He scored 50 off the first 62 balls, with 1 6 and 3 4's, (32 runs that were run off 58 that were not hit to the boundary - activity rate of 0.55, strike rate 80.6) The next 50 runs took 40 deliveries, and included 1 4 and 3 6's (28 runs that were run off 36 not hit to the boundary - activity rate 0.778, strike rate 125) then he really accelerated and hit 61 off the next 36 deliveries, including 5 4's and a 6, (35 runs that were run off 30 deliveries that weren't boundaries - activity rate an incredible 1.167, strike rate 169.4)

I've noted before how poor he is at collecting ones and twos, so the encouraging thing with this innings is the way that he got the runs. He was probably assisted in this by having Lou Vincent as a runner for the latter half of the innings, and having the nimble Gareth Hopkins at the other end. However it is an encouraging sign.

The other thing to note is that his 313 runs include 282 from 2 innings, and 31 in the other 3. This again goes to show that once he is in, he is very difficult to dislodge. The thing that he needs to do if he wants to cement his spot in the team is to get his feet moving early now. This is the last thing that he needs before I will start the "bring back the Tosh" calls genuinely, rather than in jest.

HRV Cup final

I've just returned from the HRV Cup final (New Zealand's domestic 2020 competition)

The right result happened, with Auckland winning. Something that I found interesting though was two little details. 5 times Auckland managed to turn 2's into 3's or 1's into 2's by running hard. During Central's innings there were 3 times where a great piece of fielding stopped them getting either the 2nd or 3rd run. The running and fielding made a difference of 8 between the two sides.

Auckland won by 4.

Perhaps there is a lesson in that.