World Cup simulation update - 1 July

Here's the latest update to the simulation. The first two graphs disagree slightly, and that's because I have two different methods to calculate the expected net run rate. The first one seemed to be slightly more accurate than the second, but there was not a big difference when I tested them. (The margin of victory in cricket matches is actually really difficult to estimate - teams batting second tend to cruise to victory rather than try to win by as big a margin as possible) I decided to use both when doing the calculations. With the first method, New Zealand and India both have a higher than 99.98% probability of going through, while it's 99% for India and 97.7% for New Zealand with the second method. These seem more realistic.

The big thing to notice is the change to England's probability, and how England beating India damaged the chances of both Pakistan and Bangladesh. Pakistan's probability went down by slightly more than Bangladesh's probability because the ranking of India dropped slightly, and Bangladesh need to beat India to get through.

This graph shows expected value - not the most likely value. Those are actually different things. The expected value is the mean of all the expected outcomes. As a result, none of the teams will actually end up with the points that this shows, but they should mostly get close to it.

 It's now looking like there's a roughly 45% chance that net run rate will be a deciding factor in who goes through to the semi-finals.

If Bangladesh beat India (which is admittedly a fairly unlikely outcome), we could then see a situation where Pakistan and Bangladesh are playing for the opportunity to be level on points with New Zealand and India on 11 points. If that is the case, then (in all likelihood) the rained out match between New Zealand and India will have allowed both to progress at the expense of the winner of Pakistan vs Bangladesh.

The most likely semi-finals at this point are Australia vs New Zealand and England vs India, but these are by no means confirmed yet.

In individual matches, England effectively has a higher ranking than that, because teams playing at home get a ranking boost of 0.86 over their opponent. That's why I have England back on top in the next graph:
This one is quite different to what the book-makers have. I have England as favourites, while they have India and Australia both tied for favourite on roughly 30%. They also have Pakistan and Bangladesh at about double the probability that I do.

I used the first net run rate model for the winning probability, but the difference in numbers suggests that the bookies are possibly using a model that is more similar to the second one.

World Cup simulation update - 26 June

Are the wheels falling off?

England have now got a 4 win, 3 loss record, and, with 2 difficult matches coming up, have a genuine chance of not going through to the semi-finals. They are still not relying on other results, but they're getting close to the point where they are.

There's been a significant change, with Australia going up, and England going down. England are now expected to get to 10 points. That might still be enough. But it also might not be.

England's ranking has now dropped well below India's, to the point where the expected probability of England winning against India has dropped by almost 10%. They're still ahead due to home advantage, but the difference is decreasing.

There's about a 15% chance that a tie-breaker (total wins or net run rate) will be required. This may count out Sri Lanka, who have had two rain affected matches, and so will probably be on fewer wins than anyone else with the same number of points.

We see a huge drop in the semi-final probability of England, and a resultant increase in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Australia have qualified now, and there are fewer options now for New Zealand to be knocked out also (only 35 out of 50000 trials saw New Zealand miss the semi-finals.)

The decrease in England, and increase in probability of lower ranked teams making the semi-finals has meant that there are a lot more semi-final combinations with more than a 0.5% chance of happening. West Indies vs New Zealand was an epic match in the pool play, and that's now a reasonable possibility for a semi-final. The ICC and Star Sports will be licking their lips at the prospect of the 8th most likely outcome - an India Pakistan semi-final would be absolute ratings gold.

This is the first time that England has dipped below India on the winning probability graph, but it's hard to win the final if you don't get out of the group stage.

World Cup Simulation update 24th June

 Here's the update after the South Africa vs Pakistan match

Firstly, this pushed Pakistan's ranking back above Bangladesh's ranking, although they are both so close that the match between them is now predicted as 50.2% to 49.8%.

 Looking at the expected points, Pakistan have now jumped ahead of Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

It's looking fairly likely that 5th place will be on 9 or 10 points, while 4th will be on 10, 11 or 12 points.

My simulation only uses net run rate as the tie breaker. Accordingly, there's actually a slightly higher probability of Sri Lanka and Pakistan getting through than this shows, and a slightly lower chance of England and Bangladesh.

It's takes a lot of processor time to improve the simulation, and it's likely to be less than 1% difference, but I might have a go at improving it once we get to the last 5 matches.

England are still the overwhelming favourite to be the 4th team to go through. There were still 41 out of the 50000 trials where New Zealand hadn't made it. So nobody is guaranteed through just yet.

If you have semi-final tickets - this is who you're likely to see.

The probabilities for Bangladesh and Pakistan being so low here are understandable. They both have about a 5% chance of making the semi-final, but, given that they both have about a 1/3 chance of winning each match against the top teams, it gives them a roughly 0.5% chance of winning the tournament from here. However, if Bangladesh, Australia and Pakistan win the next 3 matches, that number will rise.

It's starting to look like England's style that is so effective in series may not be so effective in one off matches. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues.

World Cup Simulation Update, 23 June

Here's the latest outputs from the simulation.

England's loss to Sri Lanka opened the door somewhat, but we can still be fairly confident in who the semi-finalists are.

 England's ranking has gone down, after two losses to fairly ordinary sides.

It's looking like 10 points will be the magic number. Roughly a 10% chance that we'll rely on a tie-breaker.

The average points expected certainly favour England on that count to be in fourth


Accordingly, they have a much higher chance of making it through.

What the likely match ups are. (Teams in alphabetical order, rather than placings)

England are still firm favourites by my model. Home advantage is massive.

World Cup simulation update

The group stage of the World Cup is now roughly half way through, and there are 4 clear favourites to be the semi-finalists.

Afghanistan is the first team to be eliminated (they may have a mathematical possibility, but they don't have a statistical one). At this point, Sri Lanka are not far behind.

The rankings of the teams have remained fairly consistent, suggesting that the extra weighting for world cup matches is about right.

The fact that almost all the teams seem to have gone up is due to them all being relative to Afghanistan. Afghanistan do not seem to be quite as good as they were seeming to be and so they have dropped, but as they are set to 0, it's pushed everyone else up slightly.

The semi-final probability is the most interesting. 

I personally feel that this is underestimating the chances of South Africa, but we will see as the tournament progresses.

The key point on this graph is match 5, where Bangladesh overcame South Africa. If South Africa had won that match, they would be on about 40% and New Zealand and Australia would both be a lot lower.

The simulation also puts out the points for 4th, 5th and the difference between them. This suggests at the moment that there's only a fairly low chance that net run rate will come into play. However, one more rained out match, or a Bangladesh upset of Australia, and this could change dramatically. This makes the expected lines to be 9 points for 5th place, and 11 points for 4th place.

So far of the teams that I've had as favourite to win, 14 out of the 17 have won. Given the probabilities that the models assigned them, that's slightly higher than I would have expected - I would have expected there to have been 4 upsets rather than 3, but it's still telling me that my model is working quite well. That may be due to teams not always playing their best combinations in every match between the world cup, adding extra uncertainty to the results than exist inside a world cup.

It will be interesting to see if it continues to have the same success rate after the cup is finished.

Finally, applying the same system to find the probable winner gets the following results:

England are still favourites, but India are not far behind them.

Preview - World Cup group match 5 - South Africa vs Bangladesh - The Oval

Today Bangladesh get their campaign underway, and South Africa get a chance to bounce back from their early loss.

This is predicted to be a win for South Africa, but I think the betting market are overstating the difference between the teams. Most of the bookies have an implied chance of winning of about 76% for South Africa, but my early model had them at 67%, and after their loss to England and Bangladesh's recent series win over West Indies (which looks more impressive now that West Indies have turned out to be quite good), the gap has shortened to 66.6% for South Africa vs 33.4% for Bangladesh.

The Oval pitch is one where there has been variety of conditions recently, so it's hard to know what a good score is until both teams have batted. Here's the historical graph:

The numbers have all dropped down by 2 or 3 runs as a result of the last match. 

One thing that does not play to Bangladesh's advantage here is the pitch. This is probably the bounciest pitch in England, and is more like a South African pitch than a typical English pitch. Bangladesh, however, play on probably the lowest, slowest pitches in the world.

If this match was at Taunton or Old Trafford, then Bangladesh may well be favourites. But not at the Oval. I'd expect South Africa to do well here. If they don't, then the semi-finals suddenly look a very long way away indeed.

A simulation to see who will win the World Cup

One of the main purposes of statistics is to help inform decisions. Cricket statistics are often used when deciding on selection of players, or (more often) arguments about who is the best at a particular aspect. They can help decide which strategies are best, what an equivalent score is in a reduced match (with a particular case of Duckworth Lewis Stern) or which teams should automatically qualify for the World Cup (David Kendix). They are often also used by bookmakers (both the reputable, legal variety and the more dubious underworld version) to set odds about who is going to win.

I decided to attempt to build a model to calculate the probability of each team winning, based on their previous form. This was going to allow me (hopefully) to predict the probabilities of each outcome of the world cup, by using a simulation. It didn’t prove to be as easy as I had hoped.

My first thought was to look at each team’s net run rate in each match, adjust for home advantage, and then average it out. That seemed sensible, and the first attempt at doing that looked like it would be perfect. Most teams (all except Zimbabwe) had roughly symmetrical net run rates, and they fitted a normal curve really well. The only problem was that Afghanistan was miles ahead of everyone else. The fact that they had mostly played lower quality opponents in the past 4 years meant that they had recorded a lot more convincing wins than anyone else.

This was clearly a problem. India and England both had negative net run rates, while Afghanistan, Bangladesh and West Indies were all expected to win most of their matches.

I then tried a different approach, based off David Kendix’s approach of using each result to adjust a ranking. But rather than having a ranking that was based off wins, I based it off net run rate. So if a team had an expected net run rate of 0.5, and another had an expected net run rate of 0.6, the first team would have an expected net run rate of -0.1 for their match. If they did better than that, they went up, and if they did worse than that, they went down.

However, I found that some results ended up having too much bearing. If I made it sensitive to a change in the results, it ended up changing way too much based off one big loss/win. England dropped almost a whole net run per over based on the series in the West Indies. So this was clearly not a good option.

Next, I decided to try using logistic regression, and seeing how that turned out. Logistic regression is a way of determining probabilities of events happening if there are only two outcomes. To do that, I removed every tie or match with no result, and set to work building the models.

My initial results were exciting. By just using the team, opposition and home/away status, I was able to predict the results of the previous three world cups quite accurately using the data from the preceding 4 years. (I could not go back further than that, as they included teams making their ODI debut, and there was accordingly no data to use to build the model.

The results were really pleasing. I graphed them here, grouped to the nearest 0.2 (ie the point at 0.6 represents all matches that the model gave between 0.5 and 0.7 as the chance for a team to win), compared to the actual result for that match. It seems that they slightly overstate the chance of an upset (possibly due to upsets being more common outside world cups, where players tend to be rested against smaller nations), but overall they were fairly reliable, and (most importantly) the team that the model predicted would win, generally won.

I could then use this to give a ranking of each team that directly related to their likelihood of winning against each other. The model gave everything in relation to Afghanistan, with the being 0, and any number higher than 0 being how much more likely a team was to win against the same opponent as Afghanistan. (Afghanistan was the reference simply because they were first in the alphabet).

This turns out to be fairly close to the ICC rankings. So that was encouraging.

I tried adding a number of things to the model (ground types, continents, interactions, weighting the more recent matches more highly) but the added complexity did not result in better predictions when I tested them, so I stuck to a fairly simple model, only really controlling for home advantage.

Next I applied the probabilities to every match and found the probabilities of each team making the semi-finals.

The next step was to then extend the simulation past the group stage, and find the winner.

After running through the simulation a few more times, I came out with this:

A couple of points to remember here: every simulation is an estimate. The model is almost certainly going to estimate the probabilities incorrectly, but it will get them close, and they will be close enough to give a good estimate of the actual final probabilities. It is also likely to overstate Bangladesh’s ability due to their incredible home record; overstate Pakistan’s ability as a lot of neutral matches for them they have had a degree of home advantage in UAE; and understate West Indies, due to them having not played their best players in a lot of matches in the past 4 years. But these are not likely to make a massive difference to the semi-finalist predictions.

Given this, I’d suggest that if you are wanting to bet on the winner of the world cup, these are the odds that I would consider fair for each team:

I will try to update these probabilities periodically throughout the world cup, and report on their accuracy.

Updated QF prediction chart

In my previous post I ran a simulation to find out potential quarter-final places. I received some criticism for having England so low, and Bangladesh so high, but events over the past 48 hours have shown that the respective probabilities of the two teams qualifying may not have been so far off.

The program that I wrote to do the simulation was corrupted when my computer crashed and I foolishly hadn't saved it, so I've written a different one to re-calculate. This time I made a couple of modifications. I moved from an additive model for run rates to a multiplicative one, as that seemed to be more sensible (teams are realistically a % better than other teams, rather than a fixed number of runs better. We would expect the margins to blow out more in terms of runs on better batting pitches than on difficult tracks).

I also slightly reduced the standard deviation of the simulation by moving it to one quarter of the mean rather than one third. This again made the results seem more sensible. There were too many teams scoring over 400 or under 100 previously.

Here are the new results. This table shows the probability of each team qualifying in position 1, 2, 3 or 4 in their group, and then the total probability of qualifying. Again I have not factored rain into this, and with Cyclone Pam heading towards New Zealand that may be a little optimistic.

Team	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	Quarters
New Zealand	1	0	0	0	1
Australia	0	0.976	0.024	0	1
Sri Lanka	0	0.024	0.9725	0.0035	1
Bangladesh	0	0	0.0035	0.9965	1
-	-	-	-	-	-
India	1	0	0	0	1
South Africa	0	0.976	0.024	0	1
Pakistan	0	0.017	0.664	0.1165	0.7975
Ireland	0	0.007	0.312	0.1405	0.4595
West Indies	0	0	0	0.743	0.743

The potential group results look like this:

Group A

NZ Aus SL Ban	0.9725
NZ SL Aus Ban	0.024
NZ Aus Ban SL	0.0035

Group B

Ind SA Pak WI	0.5295
Ind SA Ire WI	0.1985
Ind SA Pak Ire	0.1345
Ind SA Ire Pak	0.1135
Ind Pak SA WI	0.011
Ind Pak SA Ire	0.006
Ind Ire SA WI	0.004
Ind Ire SA Pak	0.003

The three interesting potential quarter final match-ups to watch for here are

SA vs Aus	4.7%
Ind vs SL	0.35%
Ire vs Ban	0.02%

In reality the probabilities of Ireland vs Bangladesh and Australia vs South Africa are higher, as they are both much more likely if rain starts to fall.

World-cup quarter finals simulation

After Pakistan's tremendous win over South Africa, and Ireland's remarkable victory over Zimbabwe, the make up of the quarter finals is not really much clearer.

They question as to who is likely to be going through, and who will play whom has been the subject of many, many twitter conversations.

I thought it might be helpful to run a simulation to look at some of the possibilities.

I used Microsoft Excel as it's quite convenient. I used the scores already made in this tournament to decide the probable scores. For each team I got their average rpo scored in relation to the overall group run rate, and their average conceded in relation to the overall. Hence if a team in group A averaged scoring 5.5 rpo and conceded 5.3 rpo, they got values of +0.4 for batting and +0.2 for bowling (as the average rpo in group A has been 5.1 so far). From that point I then used an inverse normal, with a random number between 0 and 1 for the area, the group run rate plus the batting run rate modifier and the other team's bowling run rate modifier as the mean. For the standard deviation, I used the smallest of one third of the mean and 1.6. This allowed me to make sure there was (almost) no chance of a team getting a negative score, but that the scores weren't going to blow out too much.  I used 1.6 as that's the standard deviation of all innings run rates this tournament..  This gave me a 50 over score for each team, and so which ever was ahead got the points for the win.

There are a few limitations with this method. I didn't take into account the quality of the teams that each side had faced. England has played Australia, New Zealand and Sri Lanka, but has yet to play Bangladesh or Afghanistan. Their numbers are not going to necessarily show how well they will do against less fancied opponents. Likewise no adjustments were made for the pitch that the match is being played on. We know that South Africa have tended to favour playing on bouncier tracks, so an innings at the 'Gaba won't necessarily tell us much about how they would go in Dunedin. I also haven't taken into account player strengths. Bangladesh's batsmen tend to struggle against tall bowlers, such as Finn and Woakes. England can expect that those two bowlers will perform better than average against Bangladesh, and hence their team is likely to do better than the numbers would suggest.

Another major limitation is that I haven't made provision for rain. That would obviously throw off all calculations. However, given the limited information I felt that a more simple model was best.

I decided to do 2000 trials, so that I could feel that the major source of uncertainly was the assumptions rather than the natural sampling variability.

First I found the probability of the different teams making the quarter finals with my simulation:

Team	Probabiity
New Zealand	100%
Australia	100%
Sri Lanka	99.95%
Bangladesh	82.51%
England	17.54%
-	-
India	100%
South Africa	100%
Pakistan	74.71%
Ireland	61.82%
West Indies	63.47%

We can see that Pool A has one crucial match (England vs Bangladesh)
Pool B, however, is still wide open. Ireland vs Pakistan is the last game of the round robin, and it's shaping up to potentially be one that has 3 team's fortunes riding on the result.

If West Indies make the final 8, they will almost definitely face New Zealand. It's very unlikely that New Zealand will not end up on top of Pool A, and impossible that West Indies will end up 3rd or higher in pool B.

Here's the full results for all possible matchups

Pool A	Pool B	Probability
New Zealand	Pakistan	14.99%
New Zealand	South Africa	0.35%
New Zealand	Ireland	21.23%
New Zealand	West Indies	63.44%
Australia	India	2.30%
Australia	Pakistan	43.11%
Australia	South Africa	27.57%
Australia	Ireland	27.02%
Sri Lanka	India	18.18%
Sri Lanka	Pakistan	15.83%
Sri Lanka	South Africa	53.75%
Sri Lanka	Ireland	12.19%
Bangladesh	India	64.74%
Bangladesh	Pakistan	0.75%
Bangladesh	South Africa	15.88%
Bangladesh	Ireland	1.15%
England	India	14.79%
England	Pakistan	0.05%
England	South Africa	2.45%
England	Ireland	0.25%

I'll redo this after tomorrow's results, and then again on Monday.

The most likely scenario at the moment is India to play Bangladesh, Australia to play Pakistan, South Africa to play Sri Lanka and New Zealand to play West Indies.

I've updated this here

Mini-session Analysis 1st Test Bangladesh vs New Zealand from Chittagong 2013

Here is the mini-session analysis for the first test between Bangladesh and New Zealand at Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium, Chittagong

A mini-session is (normally) half a session, either between the start of the session and the drinks break or the drinks break and the end of the session. Occasionally a long session will have 3 mini-sessions where it will be broken up with 2 drinks breaks.

Have Australia's selectors selected the New Zealand squad

Earlier this year the Australian selectors picked Ashton Agar as their 13th player picked as a spin bowler in 5 years. Some of the names included in that list are the likes of Michael Beer, Xavier Doherty and Glenn Maxwell. The Australian selectors picked some of them despite a fairly ordinary domestic record.

During that same time New Zealand have picked 4 players as spin bowlers in test matches. Part of that is the presence of Daniel Vettori, probably the best New Zealand's ever spinner to have played for New Zealand. A couple of other players have been named in squads, or played short-form cricket, but Vettori, Patel, Martin and Todd Astle (one match) have been the only spinners used in the last 5 years.

Now in the squad for Bangladesh is the name Ish Sodhi. There's a chance that he's not going to get picked, and that New Zealand will continue to just use Williamson and Martin for the actual tests, but the decision to go with Sodhi is a strange one.

Sodhi looks like he could become a very good bowler. He's got a lot of people who know a thing or two about cricket talking, and genuinely turns the ball. However there's a difference between being able to turn a cricket ball and being a good spin bowler. The two are related, but they are not the same thing.

Sodhi has played 12 first class matches for 22 wickets at an average of 48.40. That's not a very encouraging record.

To be fair to the selectors, there are not many New Zealand spin bowlers with a great record recently, but Sodhi is the player with the worst record of the current crop.

Here are the records of all the potential rivals for the back-up role to Bruce Martin since 2012: (assuming Vettori is unfit)

Name	Wickets	Average
Sodhi	22	48.40
Nethula	37	45.32
Singh	13	39.15
Boult	9	23.44
Astle	41	44.68
McCullum	15	24.60
Patel	142	32.90

Jono Boult, Bhupinder Singh and Nathan McCullum have probably not played enough first class cricket in that time to really be able to read much into their records, but there is a name that stands out as a glaring omission: Jeetan Patel.

While I was one of the people who said things like "he should never play for New Zealand again" based on his somewhat insipid performance with the bat in South Africa, the selectors job is not to pick someone to face Steyn and Morkel, rather they should be picking the player who is the best equipped to take over if Bruce Martin gets injured. For me that's Jeetan Patel.

Bruce Edgar said that he picked Sodhi based on his good tour of India with New Zealand A. A tour where he took 2 wickets at 84.5. Astle ended with better figures in each innings that both bowled in. If Sodhi was being taken as a third spinner, then that would be a little more understandable. He's there to get experience, to get exposed to some quality coaching etc. But the risk of Martin getting sick or injured and having to thrust a player who has not yet earned his spot into a test match (against a team that is good against spin) is too great.

Cricket is littered with stories of young players who are picked too early, and either never recover, or take much too long to do so. It is one thing to pick a young player who (like was the case with Vettori) has put sufficient performances on the board to suggest that they deserve their spot. It is another thing to pick a young player who has yet to do that. It sometimes works (Doug Bracewell is a good example) but often doesn't. Martin Crowe has said repeatedly that he should not have been picked so young, as he hadn't yet convinced himself that he was ready to step up. Spin bowling (and legspin bowling in particular) takes a certain psychological strength. You have to be prepared to be hit, relying on your own ability to beat the batsman in the end. If a player doesn't believe in themselves, then the best laid plans are often irrelevant.

I believe this is a bad decision by New Zealand cricket. It is a big gamble with a promising young player's career, and also a gamble with a potential banana-skin test series.

Mini-session Analysis 2nd Test, Sri Lanka Bangladesh, Premadasa 2013

Here is the mini-session analysis for the second test between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh at Premadasa Stadium, Colombo, Sri Lanka

A mini-session is (normally) half a session, either between the start of the session and the drinks break or the drinks break and the end of the session. Occasionally a long session will have 3 mini-sessions where it will be broken up with 2 drinks breaks.

Mini-Session	Score	Winner
1-1a	Bangladesh 31/1 off 14	Sri Lanka
1-1b	Bangladesh 31/1 off 13	Sri Lanka
1-2a	Bangladesh 45/1 off 15	draw
1-2b	Bangladesh 48/2 off 13	Sri Lanka
1-3a	Bangladesh 41/1 off 16	Sri Lanka
1-3b	Bangladesh 44/4 off 12.3	Sri Lanka
	Sri Lanka 18/1 off 4
2-1a	Sri Lanka 34/2 off 12	Bangladesh
2-1b	Sri Lanka 29/1 off 12	Bangladesh
2-2a	Sri Lanka 51/0 off 16	Sri Lanka
2-2b	Sri Lanka 43/0 off 14	Sri Lanka
2-3a	Sri Lanka 56/0 off 15	Sri Lanka
2-3b	Sri Lanka 63/2 off 20	Bangladesh
3-1a	Sri Lanka 35/2 off 14	Bangladesh
3-1b	Sri Lanka 17/2 off 4.3	Bangladesh
	Bangladesh 23/0 off 7
3-2a	Bangladesh 50/0 off 15	Bangladesh
3-2b	Bangladesh 20/1 off 17	Sri Lanka
3-3a	Bangladesh 35/1 off 14	Sri Lanka
3-3b	Bangladesh 30/2 off 16	Sri Lanka
4-1a	Bangladesh 44/3 off 12.5	Sri Lanka
4-1b	Bangladesh 63/3 off 18.5	Sri Lanka
4-2a	Sri Lanka 46/1 off 9.1	Sri Lanka
4-2b	Sri Lanka 57/0 off 13.5	Sri Lanka
4-3a	Sri Lanka 47/2 off 14	Bangladesh
4-3b	Sri Lanka 10/0 off 4.4	-

Latest update, click here
Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 15 - 7


End of match, Day 4: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 15-7

This was quite a good test match. There were two decisive things in it. First the partnership between Sangakkara and Chandimal that put Sri Lanka into a dominant position, then the bowling of Herath in the second innings. Bangladesh are certainly improving as a test team. This was a genuine match, and while Sri Lanka were the better side, they are a very good team at home. - Mykuhl

Mini-session Analysis 1st test SL Ban Galle 2013

Here is the final mini-session analysis for the first test between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh at Galle International Stadium, Galle, Sri Lanka

A mini-session is (normally) half a session, either between the start of the session and the drinks break or the drinks break and the end of the session. Occasionally a long session will have 3 mini-sessions where it will be broken up with 2 drinks breaks.

Mini-Session	Score	Winner
1-1a	Sri Lanka 60/0 off 11	Sri Lanka
1-1b	Sri Lanka 72/1 off 15	Sri Lanka
1-2a	Sri Lanka 55/1 off 15	Sri Lanka
1-2b	Sri Lanka 60/0 off 18	Sri Lanka
1-3a	Sri Lanka 64/1 off 17	Sri Lanka
1-3b	Sri Lanka 50/0 off 9.3	Sri Lanka
2-1a	Sri Lanka 32/1 off 17.3	Bangladesh
2-1b	Sri Lanka 68/0 off 15	Sri Lanka
2-2a	Sri Lanka 97/0 off 14	Sri Lanka
2-2b	Sri Lanka 12/0 off 3	Sri Lanka
	Bangladesh 23/1 off 9
2-3a	Bangladesh 42/1 off 15	draw
2-3b	Bangladesh 70/0 off 19	Bangladesh
3-1a	Bangladesh 49/2 off 14	Sri Lanka
3-1b	Bangladesh 40/0 off 16	Bangladesh
3-2a	Bangladesh 61/0 off 17	Bangladesh
3-2b	Bangladesh 45/0 off 16	Bangladesh
3-3a	Bangladesh 56/0 off 18	Bangladesh
3-3b	Bangladesh 52/0 off 12	Bangladesh
4-1a	Bangladesh 45/1 off 15	draw
4-1b	Bangladesh 63/0 off 15	Bangladesh
4-2a	Bangladesh 43/2 off 14	Sri Lanka
4-2b	Bangladesh 49/3 off 16	Sri Lanka
4-3a	Sri Lanka 44/1 off 12	Sri Lanka
4-3b	Sri Lanka 72/0 off 18	Sri Lanka
5-1a	Sri Lanka 51/0 off 14	Sri Lanka
5-1b	Sri Lanka 63/0 off 16	Sri Lanka
5-2a	Sri Lanka 53/2 off 16	Bangladesh
5-2b	Sri Lanka 52/1 off 7	draw
5-3a	Bangladesh 51/1 off 15	Bangladesh

Final update, click here
Sri Lanka take the mini-session count 16 - 10

First drinks, Day 1: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 1-0

Sri Lanka have started off with a hiss and a roar. Dilshan is treating it almost like a T20 match. This could get messy. - Mykuhl

Lunch, Day 1: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 2-0

A wicket fell, 72 runs were scored, but for me the highlight was when Karunaratne came back out at the fall of the first wicket. I really enjoy watching him bat, and wasn't very happy with the idea of him not being able to play. - Mykuhl

Middle drinks, Day 1: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 3-0

I have watched an entire ODI series where there was not a single innings that went at this run rate. Sri Lanka going at slightly more than a run a minute, despite Bangladesh bowling less than 14 overs per hour. - Mykuhl

Stumps, Day 1: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 6-0

Sri Lanka roll on. They have scored at over 4 an over, and more than a run a minute. Sangakkara was immense, as usual. When he's in Sri Lanka he is just outstanding. - Mykuhl

First drinks, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 6-1

A good hour for Bangladesh, but it could have been a very good hour as Chandimal was dropped twice. How costly could that be. He's not a batsman that you really want to give extra chances to as he is really capable of punishing teams. - Mykuhl

Lunch, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 7-1

Normal service resumes. Bangladesh spend another hour chasing leather. It might be a reflection of the quality of the bowling and batting, but this pitch doesn't seem to have offered a fair enough contest between bat and ball. With Sri Lanka having Eranga in their team and Bangladesh's batting being dominated by right handers, it might have been more sensible for the groundsman to have left some more grass on the wicket. - Mykuhl

Middle drinks, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 8-1

It seemed like a bad idea at the time to drop Chandimal. It now seems like a very, very bad idea. Sri Lanka are giving the Bangladeshi bowlers what some people pay a dominatrix a lot of money for. - Mykuhl

Tea, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 9-1

The declaration was probably slightly earlier than normal, but 570 runs is probably going to be enough. Bangladesh are going to have to bat very well here. They are already one down, and it was Eranga that struck. He seems to have added something to his bowling in this innings, bowling a little quicker, and getting some to move in, rather than out. He may well be turning into a genuinely classy test opening bowler. Hopefully the Sri Lankan groundsmen don't work him into the ground by giving him too many mud pitches to bowl on. - Mykuhl

Final drinks, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 9-1

It would have been Bangladesh's hour if it wasn't for the last ball where Anamul Haque was deceived by a Mendis googly. As a bowler who never quite had enough control to rely on a stock delivery, and so bowled a number of variations, I do like it when Mendis gets a wicket, especially when it's with a googly. The batsman sets up for the off break, notices that the ball's actually been delivered with a leg-break action, so adjusts, only for it to come in anyway. It's a brilliant double cross by the bowler. However, it only works if the batsman is watching closely, but not quite closely enough. - Mykuhl

Stumps, Day 2: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 9-2

An interesting hour there. Ashraful was going for it in order to get through to his fifty. He had 54 off 68 balls, but then went into his shell, and actually started playing like a test batsman who wanted to see out the day. He scored only 11 runs off the last 40 balls. If he continues to bat like a batsman, and has some success it might actually (finally) be the making of him. - Mykuhl

First drinks, Day 3: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 10-2

When Mahmadullah played as a bowler, the thing that really impressed me was how serious he was about his batting. He approached it like a real batsman, waiting for the right ball to hit, knowing his areas. It was something that most of the Bangladeshi batsmen couldn't really be accused of. Now that he's primarily playing as a batsman he comes down the track and has a wild heave fifth ball. I guess if he was going to bat like a batsman when he was a bowler, he probably felt he could bat like a bowler now that he is a batsman. - Mykuhl

Lunch, Day 3: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 10-3

Mohammad Ashraful is playing the sort of innings that we've been waiting to see. Not a swashbuckling run-a-minute flight of fancy, but a proper innings where he punishes the bad balls, and accumulates when the ball is in his area. It's all rather exciting, even if it has 45 test after he should have. I guess it's better late than never. Hopefully this innings informs how he plays from now on. - Mykuhl

Middle drinks, Day 3: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 10-4

This is good cricket from Bangladesh. They are fighting hard. Mushfiqur Rahim is a real fighter with the bat. In his last 10 innings this is the 7th time he's made it past 35. He's not prepared to throw his wicket away. - Mykuhl

Tea, Day 3: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 10-5

Sri Lanka are not bowling particularly badly. They have had some bad luck, with a number of balls going past the edge. While this partnership is fantastic, it still feels like a devastating collapse is possible any second now. - Mykuhl

Stumps, Day 3: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 10-7

This is now Bangladesh's highest partnership, Ashraful has the highest score by any Bangladeshi batsman, and Mushfiqur Rahim is only 6 runs off second spot. Bangladesh are now in a position where they might even be able to consider declaring behind, to make Sri Lanka give them a target. They wouldn't want to do that until they have some more runs on the board, and have used up some time, but an attacking option like that may be a very good one for their future. - Mykuhl

Stumps, Day 4: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 14-8

Bangladesh managed to bat themselves into what looks like a no-lose position. Unfortunately it's also probably a no win position also. Perhaps the decision of the board to offer draw bonuses was a good one. Suddenly there is an incentive for their players to play for time, and, in putting a value on their wicket, they started to look like a proper test team. They still have a lot to thank the groundsman for, but they have folded on good batting tracks in the past, so it's good to see them actually applying themselves. - Mykuhl

First drinks, Day 5: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 15-8

Another hour of bowlers getting dealt to. It's not like the Sri Lankan batsmen are slogging, or going particularly crazily. It's just that they are scoring 30% faster than normal test batsmen would, and doing it without many risks. - Mykuhl

Lunch, Day 5: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 16-8

Another relentless hour of Sri Lanka batting. They have now scored 800 runs for the loss of 5 wickets. To put that in context, Bangladesh just had their best ever innings, and scored 638 runs for 10 wickets. If Sri Lanka keep batitng at this rate for another 14 overs then declare, Bangladesh would need to get 222 runs off 44 overs. Bangldesh have a history of crumbling in run chases, so that might be an option that Mathews might consider. Sometimes you need to use some bait if you want to catch a fish. - Mykuhl

Tea, Day 5: Sri Lanka lead the mini-session count 16-9

Sri Lanka batted well in this match, but they have batted the result out of contention. Baring a miracle new ball spell from Kulasekera and Eranga, Bangladesh will hold on for a draw, but they are not going to chase this target. - Mykuhl

End of the match, Day 5: Sri Lanka take the mini-session count 16-10, but the match is drawn.

Bangladesh get a creditable draw. Sri Lanka could have made a game of it by declaring at drinks. However if they wanted to do that they should have come out and really attacked the bowling during that hour between lunch and drinks.

There's no dishonour in the draw for either team, but there are questions over both teams heading into the next match. Can Sri Lanka improve their execution, take their missed chances and find a way through the Bangladesh line-up? For Bangladesh: can they back up one good performance with another?

Whatever happens, I hope the groundsman is going to prepare a pitch with some life in it at Premadasa. - Mykuhl

End of year Mini-session Analysis review 2

One of the advantages of the mini-session analysis is that it allows me to quantify how well or badly a team went in a match in a way that is reasonably even for both teams. As a result we can get a series score, and even an annual tally.

This wouldn't be CricketGeek without some tables summarising things, so here is the complete mini-session analysis tables for the year:

Team	Won	Lost	Winning %	Match w/l
Australia	145	100	59.18%	7.00
South Africa	133	97	57.83%	no losses
West Indies	116	108	51.79%	1.00
England	173	168	50.73%	0.71
Pakistan	65	69	48.51%	3.00
New Zealand	89	108	45.18%	0.33
India	87	108	44.62%	0.60
Sri Lanka	95	124	43.38%	0.60
Bangladesh	20	32	38.46%	0.00
Zimbabwe	2	11	15.38%	0.00

Interestingly Australia came out slightly ahead of South Africa, despite South Africa not losing any matches and Australia losing one. However South Africa drew half of their matches this year, while Australia had 7 wins, 3 draws and a loss, so it makes sense that both teams would come out at a similar level in the year.

The other big surprise was how high West Indies are. It has felt like there are three tiers of cricket at the moment, with Australia, South Africa, England and Pakistan in the top group, Sri Lanka, India, New Zealand and the West Indies in the second group and then Bangladesh and Zimbabwe in the third group. Each team is competitive with teams in their own tier and at home to teams in the group above. The only exception to that has been how badly England went in Pakistan and how easily South Africa seemed to cope with English conditions.

There is also something unfair in everybody not playing everybody else. For example, New Zealand thrashed Zimbabwe 11-2, but nobody else got to play Zimbabwe. As a result I produced a weighted score. Every team got a weighting based on their performance over the year, and then I used that to calculate a ranking. I don't think this is a ranking of how good the teams are, but it is an indication of how well they have played.

Another option would be to take a football style approach, where we award 3 points for a win and 1 point for a draw. Then we use the mini-session difference as the tie breaker. The problem with this is that England have played 15 matches, while Pakistan have only played 6 matches, so it is hardly fair to compare them with an overall score. As a result I've looked at points per match, and difference per match as the way of ranking the teams.

	Team	m	w	l	d	pts	diff	ppm	dpm
	Australia	11	7	1	3	24	45	2.18	4.09
	South Africa	10	5	0	5	20	36	2	3.6
	Pakistan	6	3	1	2	11	-4	1.83	-0.67
	West Indies	10	4	4	2	14	8	1.4	0.8
	England	15	5	7	3	18	5	1.2	0.33
	India	9	3	5	1	10	-21	1.11	-2.33
	Sri Lanka	10	3	5	2	11	-29	1.1	-2.9
	New Zealand	10	2	6	2	8	-19	0.8	-1.9
	Bangladesh	2	0	2	0	0	-12	0	-6
	Zimbabwe	1	0	1	0	0	-9	0	-9

This probably feels more like a fair summary of how the teams have gone this year.

Mini-session analysis, 2nd test, Ban WI, Khulna, 2012/13

The two Darrens, Sammy and Bravo, celebrate the wicket of Shahriar Nafees

© WICB Media

Here is the mini-session analysis for the second test between Bangladesh and West Indies at Sheikh Abu Naser Stadium, Khulna, Bangladesh

A mini-session is (normally) half a session, either between the start of the session and the drinks break or the drinks break and the end of the session. Occasionally a long session will have 3 mini-sessions where it will be broken up with 2 drinks breaks.

Mini-Session	Score	Winner
1-1a	Bangladesh 47/1 off 12	Bangladesh
1-1b	Bangladesh 41/2 off 14	West Indies
1-2a	Bangladesh 44/2 off 14	West Indies
1-2b	Bangladesh 54/1 off 14	Bangladesh
1-3a	Bangladesh 72/2 off 13	Bangladesh
1-3b	Bangladesh 107/0 off 19	Bangladesh
2-1a	Bangladesh 22/2 off 5.1	draw
2-1b	West Indies 62/2 off 21	Bangladesh
2-2a	West Indies 45/0 off 15	West Indies
2-2b	West Indies 39/0 off 15	West Indies
2-3a	West Indies 41/0 off 16	West Indies
2-3b	West Indies 54/0 off 15	West Indies
3-1a	West Indies 59/0 off 13	West Indies
3-1b	West Indies 69/1 off 16	West Indies
3-2a	West Indies 35/0 off 15	West Indies
3-2b	West Indies 58/0 off 15	West Indies
3-3a	West Indies 56/0 off 19	West Indies
3-3b	West Indies 46/1 off 12	West Indies
4-1a	West Indies 41/0 off 16	West Indies
4-1b	West Indies 34/4 off 10	Bangladesh
4-2a	West Indies 9/1 off 2.3	Bangladesh
	Bangladesh 51/3 off 8.4
4-2b	Bangladesh 34/2 off 12.2	West Indies
4-3a	Bangladesh 67/0 off 16	Bangladesh
4-3b	Bangladesh 74/1 off 19.1	Bangladesh
5-1a	Bangladesh 57/3 off 10.5	West Indies
5-1b	Bangladesh 4/1 off 3.1	West Indies
	West Indies 30/0 off 4.4

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First drinks, Day 1: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 1-0

What a start for Bangladesh. After the initial loss of Nazimuddin Bangladesh went on the offensive. 47 runs in 12 overs has meant that they have an immediate platform to build on. Sammy was worried enough that he brought himself on to bowl after only 4 overs. Often captains over bowl themselves, but if anything Sammy underbowls himself in helpful conditions. There is not much pace in this pitch, but Sammy probably brought himself on more to dry up runs than to take wickets. Whatever the idea was, it didn't seem to work, as he had 0-16 off his 4 overs.

Lunch, Day 1: The mini-session count is tied up, 1-1

Captain Sammy strikes back! Perhaps he did have a plan when he brought himself on to bowl. I would hazard a guess that that was the first time that Tamim Iqbal has ever been bowled without playing a shot. I certainly can't see him repeating that mistake too many times in the future.

Final drinks, Day 1: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 3-2

Bangladesh seem to be intent on not allowing this game to go into the fifth day. They have taken an all out attack approach to the day's play. The upside of this is that they will have plenty of time to bowl West Indies out. The downside is that they are unlikely to put together a big score.

One impressive thing is that despite the barrage, Darren Sammy has kept the field up. Traditionally he had conceded more single runs than boundary runs but he has obviously been less afraid to concede boundaries, and instead is still attacking.

Stumps, Day 1: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 4-2

Take a bow Abdul Hasan. A previous best first class score of 61, and he goes out and hits a magnificent 100 off 106 balls on test debut. That is really some fairy story. Bangladesh now have the opportunity to score over 400 in two consecutive matches for the first time in their history. Perhaps throwing the bat at the ball was a good tactic after all.

Lunch, Day 2: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 5-2

While Bangladesh have won the most hours, West Indies are probably slightly in the lead in the match. They need a big score here, however, as they are going to have to bat last on this pitch, which is already starting to keep low, and Sohag Gazi seems to be a quite tricky customer.

Middle drinks, Day 2: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 5-3

At the same time as Australia are hitting the South African bowlers to all partsin Adelaide, the West Indian batsmen are content to gradually accumulate their runs against Bangladesh here in Khulna. There don't seem to be too many terrors in this pitch, so Bravo and Samuels are being careful to make sure they don't get themselves out. I'm not sure how long they will keep this up. It will be interesting to see how long they can rein in their natural games.

Tea, Day 2: Bangladesh lead the mini-session count 5-4

Another steady hour from the West Indies. Samuels is starting to get into the swing of things quite nicely, where as Bravo seems to be almost batting himself out of form. Not hitting the bad ball to the boundary is not somehow being disciplined, it's actually just bad batting.

Stumps, Day 2: West Indies lead the mini-session count 6-5

Perhaps there was method to Bravo's madness. This partnership may have scored at a paltry rate of 2.85 an over, but both batsmen are still there. Marlon Samuels has never scored a big century. This is his 5th time reaching 100, but his highest score is still 123. He is having a fantastic year with the bat, (he's only scored less than 50 four times this year) but he really needs a big hundred to top it off. Perhaps tomorrow is his chance.

Lunch, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-5

Whatever Marlon Samuels had for breakfast today it had a different effect to yesterday's meal. Yesterday he scored 109 from 231 deliveries. Today he has scored 80 off 77. He has finally got past the "just got to 100" stage and is starting to build a big innings. This could be a long day in the field for Bangladesh.

Middle drinks, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 9-5

A double century for Samuels, his first in tests and third in first class cricket. However when the wicket fell, the match was set up for ready for someone to come out and attack. Instead Chanderpaul came out and scored 10 off 43. Not really what the situation called for.

Tea, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 10-5

I take back my slight on Chanderpaul. He was obviously just getting his eye in. And now that he is seeing it he is hitting it. Now that even Chanderpaul is going for it, we could be in for some fireworks.

Stumps, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 12-5

West Indies have mixed attack and defence well to put together a large lead. Three century makers already, and they still have 6 wickets in hand. Samuels worked hard for his 260. It has been part of a trend of dramatically improved performances with the bat for him since October last year. Before then he averaged 29, since then he has averaged 62.38. That is a phenomonal transformation. He is fourth this year (at time of writing) on averages (given at least 10 innings). He is really starting to repay the patience that the West Indies selectors showed him earlier in his career.

Stumps, Day 4: West Indies lead the mini-session count 14-9

West Indies are in a dominiant position now in this match. The only hope that Bangladesh have is that they could bat out the whole day and hold out for a draw, or that there would be a freak weather event. Neither of these seem even remotely likely.

First drinks, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 15-9

Bangladesh have managed to avoid the innings defeat. However they will not be happy with the way that some of the wickets have fallen. There have been some very injudicous shots.

Lunch, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 16-9

That brings a close to a game where Bangladesh have been willing, aggressive and somewhat brainless. West Indies have been clinical. I'd assume that Samuels will be man of the match, although Tino Best deserves credit for the fantastic 5 wicket bag in the second innings.

Mini-session Analysis Ban WI Dhaka 2012/13

Powell Solid in Defense © WICB Media

Here is the final mini-session analysis for the first test between Bangladesh and West Indies at Shere Bangla National Stadium, Dhaka, Bangladesh.

A mini-session is (normally) half a session, either between the start of the session and the drinks break or the drinks break and the end of the session. Occasionally a long session will have 3 mini-sessions where it will be broken up with 2 drinks breaks.

Mini-Session	Score	Winner
1-1a	West Indies 67/1 off 15	West Indies
1-1b	West Indies 40/2 off 14	Bangladesh
1-2a	West Indies 59/0 off 16	West Indies
1-2b	West Indies 62/0 off 15	West Indies
1-3a	West Indies 65/1 off 15	West Indies
1-3b	West Indies 68/0 off 15	West Indies
2-1a	West Indies 55/0 off 15	West Indies
2-1b	West Indies 21/0 off 13	Bangladesh
2-2a	West Indies 41/0 off 17	West Indies
2-2b	West Indies 49/0 off 9	West Indies
2-3a	Bangladesh 110/2 off 16	Bangladesh
2-3b	Bangladesh 54/1 off 20	draw
3-1a	Bangladesh 33/0 off 15	Bangladesh
3-1b	Bangladesh 55/0 off 14	Bangladesh
3-2a	Bangladesh 55/1 off 13	Bangladesh
3-2b	Bangladesh 42/0 off 12	Bangladesh
3-3a	Bangladesh 48/2 off 20	West Indies
3-3b	Bangladesh 58/0 off 16	Bangladesh
4-1a	Bangladesh 72/2 off 16	Bangladesh
4-1b	Bangladesh 29/2 off 6.3	draw
	West Indies 8/0 off 4
4-2a	West Indies 51/1 off 13	West Indies
4-2b	West Indies 65/0 off 16	West Indies
4-3a	West Indies 69/0 off 16	West Indies
4-3b	West Indies 51/5 off 15.5	Bangladesh
5-1a	West Indies 29/4 off 9.3	Bangladesh
5-1b	Bangladesh 45/2 off 16	West Indies
5-2a	Bangladesh 38/2 off 13	West Indies
5-2b	Bangladesh 46/3 off 13	West Indies
5-3a	Bangladesh 38/3 off 12.3	West Indies

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Tea, Day 1: West Indies lead the mini-session count 3-1

Chris Gayle started off with a bang, hitting the first ball for 6, but departed soon after. The real star of the day for West Indies so far is the much less flashy Nevisian opener, Kieran Powell. Powell has recently left his flashy stroke making behind, and has started to think like a boring but effective opening batsman. The result is that he has started to play in a boring manner, and do it effectively. While his strike rate of 65.7 may not look particularly boring, he has boosted that with an attacking spree just after bringing up his century, and was prepared to let balls go. During this innings he has the patience to play out 5 maidens. If he continues to bat with this discipline he could go on to a really big score.

Final drinks, Day 1: West Indies lead the mini-session count 4-1

Powell was out right at the start of the session, but the master of being "boring but effective", Shiv Chanderpaul didn't let up. He advanced to 88 in his customary fashion. It took him 38 balls to reach double figures, but he has accelerated steadily since then, scoring at a strike rate of just over 70 since then. The game is closer than 4-1 would suggest, but West Indies are certainly in control.

Stumps, Day 1: West Indies lead the mini-session count 5-1

West Indies are looking like they are in form, and ready to go. Bangladesh are going to need to find an extra gear to keep up with them in this game. Chanderpaul has another century. This is number 27. I've been told that conditions in Bangladesh are quite similar to Guyana, so perhaps it should be little surprise that Chanderpaul looks so composed there. What ever the reason, Bangladesh need some early breakthroughs tomorrow to avoid this match turning ugly.

First drinks, Day 2: West Indies lead the mini-session count 6-1

It would be hard not to drop your head at this point if you were Bangladeshi. The one bright spark is that their new spin bowler, Sohag Gazi has been tidy. He's gone for less than 3 an over in his marathon spell of 42 overs. He has averaged about 46 overs per match in his first class career, and bowled more than 50 in each of his last two first class matches, so he's obviously fairly fit. Less exciting is that he was the last to take a wicket, in his 21st over. Since then there has been nothing on offer for the Bangladesh batsmen as the West Indians have applied the pressure.

Middle drinks, Day 2: West Indies lead the mini-session count 7-2

Bangladesh managed to exert some pressure on the West Indians, as an epic battle of wills started to evolve between Chanderpaul and Shakib Al Hassan. Probably the best player on either side, this is what test cricket is all about. It's safe to say that Chanderpaul is winning this battle, but how he goes later on when the conditions are more in favour of the bowlers is another story. In a match like this it is the battles within battles that are the most interesting.

Final drinks, Day 2: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-3

And Tamim Iqbal decides to have a turn. After a peculiarly timed declaration from Darren Sammy, Tamim and Shahriar Nafees went crazy at the top of the Bangladeshi innings. However this was different from Tamim's usual innings. At drinks he has 67 off 54, which is a very fast scoring rate, but not out of the usual for him. He has been known to score quickly in the past. The difference here is that of the 67 runs, 52 are in boundaries. Generally he gets a lot of his runs by running, and normally only half of his runs come in boundaries. This departure from his usual trend may be due to the fields that Sammy set for the new ball, or it may signal that Tamim feels like he needs to hit his way into form. Either way it's going to be keeping the crowd happy. Perhaps there is a game on here after all.

Stumps, Day 2: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-3

A fairly quiet last hour. Tamim departed early and then Naeem and Shakib were content to accumulate slowly after that. My formula actually awarded that hour to the West Indies, but Bangladesh will certainly not be upset with 54 runs for 1 wicket so I called it a draw.

First drinks, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-4

A steady start for Bangladesh. They got through the potentially tricky start of the day and have made slow progress without losing a wicket. In some respect the way that they have ground this out is very promising. For too long Bangladesh have found impressive ways to lose. This stickability does them credit.

Lunch, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-5

Bangladesh are starting to impose themselves on the game now. These two batsmen are getting Bangladesh back into the match, in much the same way that Chanderpaul, Ramdin and Powell tried to bat them out of it.

Middle drinks, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-6

With the new ball approaching Bangladesh tried to increase the pace. They batted well, but lost Shakib. It was a risky shot, but a sensible risk. Now they will have to consolidate with the new ball approaching.

Tea, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 8-7

The momentum continues with the Bangladeshi batsmen. Naeem Islam has his first hundred, and he has batted well for it. Bangladesh have avoided the follow on, and can now look at trying to look for a first innings lead.

Final drinks, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 9-7

The game seems to be starting to advance quickly. However the match is still not looking likely to have a result unless something spectacular happens.

Stumps, Day 3: West Indies lead the mini-session count 9-8

Another hour where the scoring rate is roughly at a run a minute. It will be great if this pitch starts to disintegrate and there is a contest between bat and ball. At the moment it's a bit one sided. Just under 1000 runs for only 10 wickets.

Stumps, Day 4: West Indies lead the mini-session count 12-10

Five quick wickets, a potential injury to Chanderpaul and the pitch starting to play tricks means that this is game on here. Earlier Kieran Powell became the 56th batsman in the history of test cricket (and 8th West Indian) to score a hundred in each innings. He joins an impressive list: George Headley, Clyde Walcott, Lawrence Rowe, Rohan Kanhai, Gary Sobers, Gordon Greenidge, and Brian Lara being the previous West Indians to have achieved the feat.

This game may well rest on how well the Bangladeshi top order go, because once Narine gets into their tail on this pitch the game may end very quickly.

First drinks, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 12-11

Bangladesh have taken the ascendency. Sohag Gazi, after being the first bowler to ever be hit for six of the first ball of a match, now has the best figures on debut for Bangladesh. Tino Best got out playing a defensive shot, a mistake that he is unlikely to ever repeat. Now West Indies will need to bowl well to avoid going 1-0 down in the series.

Lunch, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 13-11

What a cracker of a last day, after a fairly dreary first 4. West Indies and Bangladesh are both mixing up some very good cricket and some awful stuff. West Indies will want to take 4 wickets in the next 2 hours, to give Narine a crack at the tail in the final session.

Middle drinks, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 14-11

Tino Best is having a good day. He's possibly the most temperamental cricketer who is not from Pakistan. When he is having a good day, he really has a good day. This is not looking good for Bangladesh.

Tea, Day 5: West Indies lead the mini-session count 15-11

After Tino grabbed his 4th, Verasammy Permaul has made his mark on the game on debut, with two big wickets. Mahmudullah is possibly the best number 8 in world cricket, but he has a lot of work to do, if he is to bat with the tail for the last 2 hours.

End of match: West Indies won the mini-session count 16-11

Bangladesh have followed up a score over 400 with a score under 200, like they have every time except 3 that they have scored 400. Tino Best managed to pick up 5 in dismissing them, but the star of the match was easily Kieran Powell.