Warner in Perth

I have written before about how impressed I am with David Warner's running between wickets. I genuinely believe that he is one of the best at judging a run that I've seen.

Accordingly I was surprised to see that he had scored the same number of singles as boundaries in the second innings at Perth. I also heard the commentators describe it as a typical innings from Warner. It made me wonder if it actually was a typical innings.

First of all I looked at how Warner compared to other batsmen.  The method I chose to look at was to compare the boundary percentage (boundaries per delivery) and the activity rate (runs scored per non-boundary delivery). I filtered out any batsman who hadn't faced more than 650 deliveries since 2000, hadn't hit more than 50 fours and hadn't played in the past 2 years. I then put the rest of the batsmen on a single graph.

I divided up the batsmen into 4 categories. Aggressive, Block Bash, Pushers and Defensive. Close to the extremes of each group were players who have been reasonably successful.

In the defensive group are players like Rahul Dravid, Peter Fulton, Tino Mawoyo, Ed Cowan and JP Duminy.
Block Bash contains Angelo Mathews, Shane Watson, Chris Gayle and Yuvraj Singh.
Pushers includes Kane Williamson, Shiv Chanderpaul, Jonathan Trott and Thilan Samaraweera.
Aggressive include Ricky Ponting, Sachin Tendulkar, Darren Sammy and David Warner.

Warner has a higher activity rate than anyone in the list. But he also hits more boundaries than most batsmen.

 

Warner's activity rate for his career is 0.353 and his boundary rate is 9.3%. His innings in Perth lasted 140 deliveries. We would expect 13 boundaries, perhaps 12 fours and 1 six. Off the other 127 deliveries we would expect him to score 45 runs. Overall we would expect that he would be on about 99, rather than 112, so he scored slightly faster than we would expect, but the big difference was the make up of the innings.

Warner scored 80 runs in boundaries. That's about 40% more than we would normally expect him to get.

I used the same graph as above, to analyse Warner's other innings. I've included every innings where Warner has scored more than 30. I've drawn in lines to show which group the innings would have fit in.

We can see that Warner's innings does fit in with some of his other innings, but really is closer to the Block Bash quadrant than almost any of his other innings.

It was an interesting innings, because of the context and the opponent, but also because of the way that he scored the runs.

Test team of the year 2012

For the test team of the year, I’ve given extra weight to performances away from home. Often the mark of great players is that they can master foreign conditions. For each player I’ve generated a weighted average, and I’ve used that to pick the team.

I’ve also looked at openers as a separate skill to batting in numbers 3-5. I also feel that numbers 6 and 7 need to be multi-skilled players: who can contribute with the bat and either the ball or the gloves. As a result I’ve picked the best batsman among the keepers. It is very difficult to quantify the ability of keepers, and while I feel that Prasanna Jayawardene is currently without peer as a keeper, his batting (while improving) is significantly weaker than some of the other keepers.

With the bowlers I decided on at least 2 quick bowlers and at least one spinner. After that I picked the next best bowler. There were a few times that a team went in with either 3 spinners or 4 pace bowlers, but every time the results were not good enough to demand it being replicated in this team.

There were a couple of bowlers who had a good year without playing any away matches. For these players I looked at the average difference between home matches and away matches, and adjusted their weighted averages accordingly.

Openers: Alastair Cook and Graeme Smith.

While these two may not have the crowd in raptures with scintillating stroke-play, they have scored a lot of runs this year, both home and away.

Name	Overall Average	Away Average	Weighted average
AN Cook (Eng)	48.03	71.9	54.67
GC Smith (SA)	48.52	50.56	49.52
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	45.9	52.5	48.24
AN Petersen (SA)	47	43.06	45.09
TM Dilshan (SL)	40.13	42	40.67
DA Warner (Aus)	43.77	28.5	39.96

Numbers 3-5: Marlon Samuels, Michael Clarke and Shivnarine Chanderpaul

Michael Clarke has been amazing in Australia, but his away form was so poor that he was almost pipped for the spot by Amla.

Name	Overall Average	Away Average	Weighted average
S Chanderpaul (WI)	109.55	196	131.17
MN Samuels (WI)	86.6	94.71	89.94
MJ Clarke (Aus)	106.33	31.33	84.9
HM Amla (SA)	70.93	74.85	72.83
JH Kallis (SA)	70	56	63.3
Azhar Ali (Pak)	55.1	60	56.73
MEK Hussey (Aus)	61.61	36.5	53.68
AB de Villiers (SA)	58.21	46.78	52.5
Asad Shafiq (Pak)	47.11	64.25	52.38

All Rounder: Jacques Kallis.

While Samuels came out as the best all-rounder for the year, he is already in the team for his batting (and there’s also a chance he won’t be allowed to bowl). Kallis has had a much improved year with the ball, his averages were similar to Dale Steyn for the year.

Name	Batting	Bowling	Difference
MN Samuels (WI)	89.94	42.8	47.14
JH Kallis (SA)	63.3	30.89	32.41
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	48.24	28.36	19.88
KS Williamson (NZ)	30.52	41.67	-11.15
MEK Hussey (Aus)	56.73	73	-16.27
SR Watson (Aus)	31.7	48	-16.3

Keeper: AB de Villiers

De Villiers almost made the team as a batsman alone. Ramdin recovered well from having calls for his head at the start of the year.

Name	Overall Average	Away Average	Weighted average
AB de Villiers (SA)	48.55	48.55	48.56
D Ramdin (WI)	42.87	54.16	47.71
MJ Prior (Eng)	38.85	39.62	39.07
MS Wade (Aus)	36.27	39.6	37.31
MS Dhoni (India)	40.63	24.33	37.14
Adnan Akmal (Pak)	25.25	37.66	28.64

Bowlers: Tino Best, Tim Southee, Narsingh Deonarine and Vernon Philander

This was the big surprise for me. Where is Dale Steyn? Where is James Anderson? Probably the best two bowlers in the world and they don’t even feature. Likewise Saeed Ajmal just gets pipped. These are not the bowlers that I would pick if I were selecting a team other than on stats.

bowler	overall average	away average	weighted average
TL Best (WI)	16.27	14.92	15.69
TG Southee (NZ)	22.64	17.3	20.08
N Deonarine (WI)	19	-	20.27
VD Philander (SA)	21.11	21.83	21.45
BW Hilfenhaus (Aus)	21.67	20.8	21.49
Junaid Khan (Pak)	24.14	21.78	22.96
Saeed Ajmal (Pak)	20.56	29.93	23.17
PM Siddle (Aus)	23.09	38.33	24.14
KAJ Roach (WI)	22.25	34.25	24.3
MA Starc (Aus)	25.05	27.5	25.27
Abdur Rehman (Pak)	22.64	41.33	26.26
HMRKB Herath (SL)	23.61	62.16	27.12
MS Panesar (Eng)	26.03	29.31	27.23
GP Swann (Eng)	29.93	23.61	27.54
PP Ojha (India)	25.96	-	27.7
JM Anderson (Eng)	29.5	26.61	28.62
TA Boult (NZ)	30.77	27.05	29.1
DW Steyn (SA)	29.71	29.08	29.41

A tale of two bowlers

I was chatting to someone yesterday, and mentioned that I thought Shaminda Eranga was the real deal. That we might be looking back and say "I saw him at the start of his career." Not long after I said that he was smacked at more than 6 an over by the Australian openers. Fortunately I had put a caveat when I was chatting. I said "but he's still not very good against left handers. He looks amazing against right handers."

He seems to get a little swing, but then seam movement away from the right handers. The small bit of swing means that the batsmen start to follow the ball with their hands, and then he takes the edge with the seam movement. He doesn't swing it enough that they play and leave, but rather just enough to draw them into the shot. (Most balls seem to only swing about 5 cm - it's the movement off the seam that makes him dangerous). However against the left handers this small swing means that if it's straight, they tend to defend it, and if it seams back, they just hit an inside edge into their pads.

So I thought I'd go through his (brief) career so far and see if my feeling is correct. Here are Shaminda Eranga's test statistics against right and left handed batsmen (prior to the Melbourne test):

Hand	Average	Strike Rate	Economy Rate
Right	24.00	39.4	3.65
Left	101.50	195.0	3.12

There is a significant difference.

Of players who have bowled in at least 20 matches, the best strike rate ever is Sid Barnes, with 41.6. Next is Dale Steyn with 42.0 and the Waqar Younis with 43.4. Eranga to right handers has a better strike rate than any of these.

However the other end of the tail we see a bunch of part timers. With a strike rate in the region of 195 are the likes of Shivnarine Chanerpaul (193.3) and Geoff Howarth (204.6). Even Geoffrey Boycott had a bowling strike rate of 134.8. These are good people to be compared to if you are talking about defensive technique when batting, but not so much if you're talking about bowling.

If Eranga wants to make the most of his obvious talent, he will need to figure out how to bowl to lefties. He is a fantastic prospect for Sri Lanka, but they can't keep picking him if he's going to be two bowlers: Steyn to the right-handers but Boycott to the left handers.

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.