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

2012 ODI Team of the year

Last year I came up with a system for picking a team of the year for ODI matches.

Last years team had an extra weighting for World Cup matches. This year there's an extra weighting for matches against top 9 opponents (Bangladesh have performed well enough this year that any results against them are certainly valid) and also for matches away from home.

Openers: Amla and Nasir Jamshed

This is only chosen based on what the players did as openers, and only from players who played at least 5 innings as an opener.

Name	Innings	Runs	Weighted Index
HM Amla (SA)	9	678	77.05
Nasir Jamshed (Pak)	8	462	58.69
G Gambhir (India)	13	570	39.44
DPMD Jayawardene (SL)	12	425	36.52
IR Bell (Eng)	11	549	36.31
AN Cook (Eng)	15	663	34.09
TM Dilshan (SL)	30	1119	33.61

Jamshed probably secured his spot in the team with his big innings against India in the last match of the year. A not out hundred against one of the top teams, away from home at close to a run a ball is certainly a good way to boost your ranking.

Top order: de Villiers, Kohli, Morgan

Name	Innings	Runs	Weighted Index
AB de Villiers (SA)	10	597	105.21
V Kohli (India)	17	1026	59.54
EJG Morgan (Eng)	12	364	53.57
KC Sangakkara (SL)	29	1184	33.92
MJ Clarke (Aus)	13	619	33.66
SK Raina (India)	13	326	31.61
BB McCullum (NZ)	10	416	31.58
LD Chandimal (SL)	26	800	29.31
JP Duminy (SA)	8	273	27.75

When I looked at the batting of players while they were keeping there wasn't much comparison. AB de Villiers was 1st on 116.7, then BJ Wattling on 70.2 and MS Dhoni on 57.4. Given the massive disparity, the next thing that the team needs is an all-rounder who can close out the batting. We already have a keeper, so we need someone who can make a contribution with the ball occasionally.

Closer: Sammy

Name	Matches	Batting	Bowling	Difference
DJG Sammy (WI)	17	33.06	25.75	7.31
AD Mathews (SL)	21	33.56	34.13	-0.57
DJ Hussey (Aus)	15	42.89	53.91	-11.02
AD Russell (WI)	14	26.75	40.29	-13.54

I was expecting Andre Russell to come out on top here, but he actually came out last of the players who had batted and bowled enough to count.

Bowlers: Narine, Abdur Razzak, Morne Morkel, Finn, Roach

Name	Matches	Average	E/r	Weighted Index
SP Narine (WI)	17	17.64	3.66	13.01
Abdur Razzak (Ban)	9	20.75	3.95	16.40
M Morkel (SA)	11	21.15	4.89	16.71
ST Finn (Eng)	14	20	4.2	16.81
KAJ Roach (WI)	8	19.88	5.07	16.98
RS Bopara (Eng)	14	25	3.43	17.16
Saeed Ajmal (Pak)	17	21.12	4.31	17.39
SR Watson (Aus)	14	23.05	4.27	17.46
CJ McKay (Aus)	17	23.88	4.52	18.80

I had to make some decisions on the formula, as neither England or Bangladesh had played away from home, so I used a different formula for these teams. It seems a fairly balanced bowling line up, with Roach, Finn and Morkel bringing the heat up front, and then Narine, Razzak and Sammy to take the pace off the ball later on.

So the full team:

Hashim Amla
Nasir Jamshed
AB de Villiers (w)
Virat Kohli
Eion Morgan
Darren Sammy (c)
Abdur Razzak
Morne Morkel
Steven Finn
Kemar Roach
Sunil Narine

I made Sammy the captain, because I think he is fantastic at getting the best out of his players.

2012 Activity rates

A batsman's activity rate is the runs scored per delivery not hit to the fence.

For example two batsmen have 10 off 10. One has hit two 4's, two singles and faced out 6 dot balls. He would have an activity rate of 0.25 because he hit 2 runs off the 8 balls that he didn't hit a boundary off. The second batsman hit one 4, two 2's and two singles. He would have an activity rate of 0.67 because he hit 6 runs off 9 balls that didn't go to the fence.

Here are the batsmen with the highest activity rates:

Test Matches (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
NLTC Perera (SL)	2	54	56	0.434
MG Johnson (Aus)	2	28	74	0.416
Shakib Al Hasan (Ban)	2	104	101	0.391
V Sehwag (India)	9	322	183	0.368
MA Starc (Aus)	4	88	56	0.364
RJ Harris (Aus)	4	46	83	0.362
MJ Clarke (Aus)	11	792	803	0.361
DA Warner (Aus)	11	446	342	0.361
Mahmudullah (Ban)	2	80	89	0.353
RT Ponting (Aus)	9	232	368	0.341

This year the trend is that there are lots of Australians in the list, and particularly a lot of Australia bowlers. Two names that might surprise a lot of people are Warner and Sehwag. Sehwag certainly doesn't have a reputation for speed between the wickets, and does seem rather loathe to try for a 3, but he and Gambhir have made a real effort to step up their quick singles in the last year. It has certainly been shown out in Sehwag's numbers. Likewise Warner has scored almost as many runs by running as by hitting boundaries. His 50 at the MCG was remarkable for both the speed, but also for how well he ran between wickets. His 50 came up in 34 balls, but it only included four 4's and one 6. It meant that he had scored 28 runs off the 29 balls he didn't hit to the fence.

One Day Internationals (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
AB de Villiers (SA)	13	276	369	0.695
Shakib Al Hasan (Ban)	4	110	127	0.672
GJ Maxwell (Aus)	4	60	64	0.66
AD Mathews (SL)	27	180	354	0.659
V Kohli (India)	17	398	628	0.63
DJ Hussey (Aus)	25	264	464	0.629
SK Raina (India)	17	204	288	0.623
R Ashwin (India)	16	44	91	0.619
EJG Morgan (Eng)	15	164	200	0.599
Sarfraz Ahmed (Pak)	8	24	61	0.598

Last year almost the whole list was made up of spin bowlers (which is unsurprising, given that spin bowlers are generally smarter (and better looking) than most other players). This year the spinners still make their presence felt. Shakib is the only player on the Test and ODI list.

Twenty20 Internationals (min 100 balls faced, average of 15)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
AN Kervezee (Neth)	4	44	110	0.873
LRPL Taylor (NZ)	8	86	100	0.82
KC Sangakkara (SL)	10	94	103	0.78
DJ Bravo (WI)	10	128	132	0.776
JP Duminy (SA)	10	94	143	0.765
F du Plessis (SA)	7	102	90	0.763
SK Raina (India)	14	128	129	0.75
JC Buttler (Eng)	14	74	69	0.75
AD Hales (Eng)	10	188	155	0.745
MS Dhoni (India)	14	132	136	0.743

There was certainly a surprising name at the top of this list. Alex Kervezee was actually the highest averaging batsman in T20 Internationals too. Ross Taylor is also a surprise, as he had previously been someone who tended to score in multiples of 4. Suresh Raina is the only player in the top 10 for both ODI's and T20's.

The Block-Bash players:

At the other end of the spectrum are the players who specialise in blocking the good balls and cashing in on the bad ones. These players don't see a lot of value in singles, and prefer to get their runs in multiples of 4 or 6.

Test Matches (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
AB Fudadin (WI)	3	60	62	0.17
F du Plessis (SA)	2	178	115	0.171
JL Pattinson (Aus)	4	72	31	0.173
Mohammad Ayub (Pak)	1	16	31	0.189
Mushfiqur Rahim (Ban)	2	66	41	0.19
DR Flynn (NZ)	6	174	153	0.199
SR Tendulkar (India)	9	220	137	0.199
Taufeeq Umar (Pak)	6	164	82	0.2
N Deonarine (WI)	6	116	102	0.204
MJ Guptill (NZ)	10	306	261	0.208

Suprisingly, Martin Guptill makes this list again this year, despite improving his activity rate by quite a margin. Generally this is a list of batsmen who are not in great form, and with an average in the twenties despite his obvious talent, this is probably a fair reflection. Daniel Flynn is also on the list, but this possibly has more to do with the way that bowlers have often been trying to get him out playing at wide balls, so have been bowling a 7th stump line to him, trying to get him to give in and have a slash at one. It's hard to hit a single off a ball that you really shouldn't be playing at.

One Day Internationals (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
AB Barath (WI)	2	60	23	0.256
CH Gayle (WI)	11	252	93	0.279
CS Baugh (WI)	5	34	30	0.297
DM Bravo (WI)	11	104	113	0.298
MR Swart (Neth)	2	60	34	0.306
KJ O'Brien (Ire)	4	54	35	0.307
Anamul Haque (Ban)	5	110	85	0.343
Imran Farhat (Pak)	5	104	70	0.348
Mohammad Nabi (Afg)	5	62	67	0.358
MN Samuels (WI)	17	248	234	0.373

There are a lot of West Indians in this list. However, if I could hit the ball like Chris Gayle, I probably wouldn't bother running too much either.

Twenty20 Internationals (min 60 balls faced)

Player	Matches	Boundry Runs	Run Runs	Activity Rate
DR Smith (WI)	7	152	47	0.412
J Charles (WI)	11	176	75	0.434
C Kieswetter (Eng)	11	108	72	0.474
Imran Nazir (Pak)	9	126	50	0.476
CH Gayle (WI)	11	270	98	0.492
RE Levi (SA)	13	170	66	0.5
RJ Nicol (NZ)	17	194	121	0.515
WTS Porterfield (Ire)	13	148	64	0.516
Mohammad Ashraful (Ban)	6	60	58	0.527
KJ O'Brien (Ire)	13	78	64	0.533

It turns out that being a West Indian opener means that you are unlikely to be very good at running between wickets. Johnson Charles' numbers are even worse than last year when he had the lowest activity rate of any player. It's just that this year another West Indian has been even lazier than him. Rob Nicol is an interesting name there, because he's generally a very busy player in domestic cricket.

1000 test runs in a year.

Michael Clarke had a fantastic year in 2012. He scored 1596 runs at an average over 100. It brought up the question, how often do players score 1000 runs in a calendar year, and who has done it the most?

So I put together some data for all you trivia buffs out there

First the batsmen who have done it the most:

We can see that most of the players are from the modern era. The only players who are in this list who didn't play post 2000 are Taylor (retired '99), Border (retired '94) and Gavaskar (retired '87).

Interestingly Hayden managed the feat in 5 consecutive years, from 2001 to 2005, which is particularly impressive consistency. Mark Taylor is also quite impressive, because he only played test cricket in 11 years, so to score 1000 runs 3 times is outstanding.

The top few names are as we would expect for this sort of statistic. Tendulkar at the top, then Lara, Kallis, Hayden and Ponting. For me they are/were 5 of the 6 best batsmen of this era (along with Sangakkara).

The next list to look at is what countries have done the best.

Some countries play a lot more test matches than others. Of the 128 times that a player has scored 1000 runs in a year, only 11 times did that player play less than 10 test matches, and never less than 8. England have played 10 or more tests in a year 40 times, while Bangladesh have never played 10 tests in a year, so we would expect more English batsmen to have achieved the feat more often than Bangladeshi batsmen.

We would also expect batsmen from countries with easier conditions to do it more often than players who play half their matches on bowler friendly pitches. Since 1990, there have been more than 1.95 hundreds per match in India, Australia, England and Pakistan, but less than 1.7 in New Zealand, South Africa and Zimbabwe. As a result it's fair to expect there to be less South Africans, New Zealanders and Zimbabweans in the list than players from the India, Pakistan, Australia or England.

The surprise is that there are so many South Africans on the list. It is a clear example of their outstanding batting strength in recent years. Andy Flower managed it against the odds, having to play half of his cricket in Zimbabwe, and his team only playing 9 matches in 2000 when he achieved it. He was also keeping wickets that year, making him the only keeper to achieve the feat. He also lies second on the list for most runs in a year as keeper, with 899 in 2001, when he also only payed 9 matches.

The final thing to look at is how many times 1000 runs has been scored in any particular decade.

The trend towards bigger bats, shorter boundaries (except in the West Indies and New Zealand where cricket is being played more on single purpose stadia rather than rectangular ones) and more tests should lead to more players scoring 1000 runs in a year, and it has.

When Clem Hill scored 1060 runs in 1902 it was remarkable. Then Compton and Bradman joined the club in 1947 and 1948 respectively, with amazing years. However I don't think that Jonathan Trott scoring 1005 runs in 15 tests at 38.65 this year is quite as impressive an achievement.

It is another record who's significance has diminished somewhat in the age of the batsman, but that does not diminish from Michael Clarke's achievement. By any standard he has had a fantastic year.

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.

End of year Mini-sesison review 1

I started doing the Mini-Session analysis with the Boxing Day test last year. I decided to cover every test this year, and see what they showed up.

I've found them interesting (although time-consuming) to write, and have enjoyed the process of breaking down the tests into one hour slots. The formula that I developed will be tweaked before the next test, but I thought it was better to use the same formula for the whole year, than change it part way through.

At the end of the year I'm able to look back and see if breaking the games down hour by hour is a fair way to assess them.

There were 6 innings victories this year. Here's the margin and also the mini-session count for each of them

Winner	Loser	Venue	Margin	Mini-sessions
New Zealand	Zimbabwe	Napier	inns & 301	11-2
Australia	Sri Lanka	MCG	inns & 201	10-4
India	New Zealand	Hyderabad	inns & 115	13-5
Australia	India	SCG	inns & 68	16-7
Australia	India	WACA	inns & 37	9-6
South Africa	England	The Oval	inns & 12	18-9

We can see that generally if a team won by an innings, they generally won at least double the mini-sessions of their opponent. The exception is the Australia-India match at the WACA. There Australia took 4 wickets in an hour 3 times. Those three hours were decisive in the outcome of the match.

There were a couple of other matches which turned out very one-sided by the mini-session count

Winner	Loser	Venue	Margin	Mini-sessions
England	Sri Lanka	PSS	8 wickets	20-7
South Africa	Sri Lanka	Newlands	10 wickets	16-6
Australia	Sri Lanka	Bellerive	137 runs	18-8

All three of these were convincing wins, although the England win over Sri Lanka possibly wasn't as decisive as the mini-session count would indicate, as there were a number of mini-sessions where Sri Lanka scored about 35 and lost 1 wicket off 14 or 15 overs. These go in favour of the bowling side, but are really quite close.

There were some close wins this year here were the closest few by runs and wickets:

Winner	Loser	Venue	Margin	Mini-sessions
Australia	West Indies	Bridgetown	3 wickets	17-12
West Indies	New Zealand	Kingston	5 wickets	13-8
India	New Zealand	Bangalore	5 wickets	11-11
England	West Indies	Lord's	5 wickets	15-9
South Africa	England	Lord's	51 runs	14-13
Pakistan	England	Dubai	71 runs	14-10
Pakistan	England	Abu Dhabi	72 runs	11-13

The most interesting there are the Pakistan-England game at Abu Dhabi, the India-New Zealand match at Bangalore and the England-South Africa match at Lord's. In the match at Abu Dhabi England got out to a 70 run lead in the first innings and lead the mini-session count 8-6 just before the end of the first innings. Then they bowled out Pakistan to set up a chase of 145. At that point they led the mini-session count 13-8. But Pakistan (or more specifically Abdur Rehman) dominated the next 3 hours as Rehman picked up 6/25 and England were bowled out for 72. Most punters would have expected England to be successful chasing 145, but Rehman is a strange bowler. He often looks completely innocuous, expecially with a new ball, or on the first 3 days of a match. But once the pitch starts to play tricks, and he can get some grip on the ball he looks like the second coming of Jim Laker.

In the Bangalore test New Zealand got a small first innings lead after hundreds by Taylor and Kohli, 7 wickets for Southee and 5 wickets for Ojha. New Zealand led the mini-session count 6-5 just before the end of the first innings. Then New Zealand scored 248 to leave India a challenging target of 261. India looked in a lot of trouble at 166/5 at which point they trailed the mini-session count 11-9, but a good partnership from Dhoni and Kohli brought India home, winning the last two hours.

In the Lord's match the game was close throughout. England got a small first innings lead, but then an Amla hundred resulted in England having to chase 351. A devastating opening spell from Philander left England on 45/4 at the first drinks on day 5. At this point South Africa lead the mini-session count 13-10. England fought back well from that point, but didn't quite do enough to win the match. The crucial moment was the run out of Swann just before the new ball became available. England played very good cricket to come back into the match, but South Africa did just enough to win it.

We can also look at some draws. There were some draws where the match was quite close, but others where one team escaped:

Close draws:

Home	Away	Venue	Mini-sessions
India	England	Nagpur	12-14
New Zealand	South Africa	Dunedin	10-12
Sri Lanka	Pakistan	SSC	10-12
Sri Lanka	Pakistan	Pallekele	12-10
Australia	South Africa	Adelaide	16-13
West Indies	Australia	Trinidad	11-8

The interesting ones here were the matches at Dunedin and Adelaide. In Dunedin New Zealand needed another 264 with 8 wickets in hand and Ross Taylor and Brendon McCullum well set when the rain arrived. South Africa were in the lead, but not by much. In Adelaide, Australia were only a couple of wickets away from a convincing victory, but I awarded a number of the mini-sessions to South Africa as they were achieving their goal for the hour, of not losing wickets.

The next category are one-sided draws. While I would have expected Adelaide to have fitted into this category, some of these others didn't seem like such an escape.

Home	Away	Venue	Mini-sessions
Australia	South Africa	Brisbane	14-7
New Zealand	South Africa	Wellington	8-15
England	West Indies	Birmingham	4-7
England	South Africa	Leeds	9-15

One constant in these matches was rain. Each of them lost at least 80 overs to rain. I think the idea of a reserve day in case of weather is a good one, but I don't hear it from many people in power. The other thing they had in common was an outstanding innings. Alviro Petersen in Leeds, Kane Williamson in Wellington, Michael Clarke in Brisbane, and most surprisingly of all, Tino Best in Birmingham.

Overall I think that the mini-session count is a fairly good indication of how the games have flowed. It isn't a universally correct guide to the flow of a match, but it is a good guide none the less.

2011 End of Year Activity Rates

A batsman's activity rate is the runs scored per delivery not hit to the fence.

For example two batsmen have 10 off 10. One has hit two 4's, two singles and faced out 6 dot balls. He would have an activity rate of 0.25 because he hit 2 runs off the 8 balls that he didn't hit a boundary off. The second batsman hit one 4, two 2's and two singles. He would have an activity rate of 0.67 because he hit 6 runs off 9 balls that didn't go to the fence.

Here are the batsmen with the highest activity rates:

Test Matches (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
MJ Prior (Eng)	8	234	285	0.544
GP Swann (Eng)	8	46	49	0.516
SCJ Broad (Eng)	7	140	99	0.452
DL Vettori (NZ)	4	120	178	0.401
Shakib Al Hasan (Ban)	5	208	243	0.395
DA Warner (Aus)	3	94	101	0.388
BRM Taylor (Zim)	3	154	204	0.370
V Sehwag (India)	7	230	154	0.364
GC Smith (SA)	5	156	166	0.360
R Ashwin (India)	4	110	72	0.348
HMRKB Herath (SL)	10	140	154	0.347
IR Bell (Eng)	8	478	472	0.346

It's interesting to note the prevalence of spin bowlers in the list. Swann, Vettori, Shakib, Ashwin and Herath as specialist spinners and Warner, Sehwag and Smith as part timers. As a spinner (although not in their class) I normally liked it when batsmen tried to hit boundaries off me (particularly 6's) as it gave me a chance to get them out. I didn't like them milking singles off me (unless it was a really good batsman, in which case I didn't mind them being at the other end). If this is common among other (better) spinners, then this possibly translates into why they are so keen on running.

One Day Internationals (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
JP Duminy (SA)	15	152	411	0.688
Shahid Afridi (Pak)	27	250	212	0.688
KS Williamson (NZ)	9	100	170	0.669
AB de Villiers (SA)	10	208	259	0.652
MN Waller (Zim)	7	120	125	0.622
MG Johnson (Aus)	22	100	108	0.621
EJG Morgan (Eng)	16	176	267	0.611
DA Miller (SA)	5	48	69	0.611
MEK Hussey (Aus)	16	142	272	0.606
SK Raina (India)	29	332	390	0.601
F du Plessis (SA)	13	98	190	0.59
IJL Trott (Eng)	29	408	907	0.588
R Dravid (India)	5	36	88	0.583
IR Bell (Eng)	25	180	432	0.581
SPD Smith (Aus)	20	70	134	0.580

Again a number of spinners at the top of the list, with Swann, Botha and Ashwin all being in the unfiltered top 15, but missing out on not having a high enough average. This time the spinners and part timers at the top are Duminy, Shahid, Williamson and Waller.

Twenty20 Internationals (min 60 balls faced)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
Misbah-ul-Haq (Pak)	5	26	58	0.879
KC Sangakkara (SL)	4	46	60	0.800
Umar Akmal (Pak)	5	44	67	0.761
TM Dilshan (SL)	3	94	42	0.737
SPD Smith (Aus)	6	12	57	0.722
LD Chandimal (SL)	3	40	40	0.714
CL White (Aus)	6	58	61	0.709
RG Sharma (India)	3	44	36	0.706
BB McCullum (NZ)	2	100	45	0.703
MJ Guptill (NZ)	2	60	47	0.681
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	5	86	77	0.664

There are not many t20 internationals, so there were a much smaller number of players face 100 deliveries. Misbah-ul-Haq is an interesting person to be at the top of the list, as he is not someone that I think of as being quick between the wickets. Likewise Sangakkara. Although both of them have made a test career out of eeking out runs and managing to release pressure. In the t20 game they have obviously found ways of doing this faster. Players like this are actually remarkably useful.

The Block-Bash players:

At the other end of the spectrum are the players who specialise in blocking the good balls and cashing in on the bad ones. These players don't see a lot of value in singles, and prefer to get their runs in multiples of 4 or 6.

Test Matches (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
Nazimuddin (Ban)	2	76	45	0.153
MJ Guptill (NZ)	5	182	134	0.172
Naeem Islam (Ban)	2	38	46	0.174
Yuvraj Singh (India)	3	92	44	0.184
TMK Mawoyo (Zim)	3	156	154	0.190
BJ Watling (NZ)	1	20	22	0.195
Asad Shafiq (Pak)	9	208	201	0.197
SR Watson (Aus)	6	184	81	0.198
Tanvir Ahmed (Pak)	3	60	26	0.203
JL Pattinson (Aus)	3	44	44	0.206
Nasir Hossain (Ban)	4	122	87	0.208
CR Ervine (Zim)	2	56	40	0.211
NT Paranavitana (SL)	11	246	334	0.212

A surprising member of this list is Martin Guptill, in that he is probably the quickest between the wickets in world cricket. If he was to ever bat with Inzamam-Ul-Haq he could be turning for the third before Inzy was even thinking about the second. But he has tended to get bogged down in test matches recently, and he really needs to add an extra quick single finding shot.

One Day Internationals (min 100 balls faced, average of 20)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
W Barresi (Neth)	10	126	123	0.339
R Rampaul (WI)	15	84	46	0.341
TM Odoyo (Kenya)	5	56	46	0.354
Ahmed Shehzad (Pak)	15	208	163	0.357
Imrul Kayes (Ban)	18	206	215	0.358
S Randiv (SL)	7	50	33	0.359
Shahriar Nafees (Ban)	11	96	129	0.365
AS Hansra (Can)	10	116	176	0.367
CH Gayle (WI)	8	132	70	0.368
BJ Haddin (Aus)	24	350	284	0.377
Usman Limbada (Can)	4	50	51	0.378
CO Obuya (Kenya)	8	138	166	0.384
V Sibanda (Zim)	13	262	216	0.385
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	32	578	497	0.391

Both of the West Indians in this list, Gayle and Rampaul, score their runs at a strike rate over 80, and yet are poor at taking singles. To be fair, when Chris Gayle is on strike, it's probably better for him to see as much ball as possible, so a quick single is often not as good an idea as blocking one and hitting the next ball for 6.

Twenty20 Internationals (min 60 balls faced)

Player	Matches	Boundary runs	Run runs	Activity Rate
J Charles (WI)	2	28	29	0.475
DM Bravo (WI)	3	54	36	0.529
AD Hales (Eng)	4	38	37	0.536
SR Watson (Aus)	5	150	45	0.549
DA Warner (Aus)	6	76	53	0.558
SK Raina (India)	4	80	35	0.574
CJ Chibhabha (Zim)	4	70	42	0.583
DJ Hussey (Aus)	6	28	53	0.596
EJG Morgan (Eng)	4	98	55	0.604
LMP Simmons (WI)	3	58	39	0.609
Asad Shafiq (Pak)	5	68	56	0.629

The name that surprised me this time was David Hussey. He seems like a busy player who is always looking for runs. On closer inspection, he was still scoring a large proportion of his runs in singles, but was generally having a bad run. Still some of his knocks were vital. His 25 off 27, with an activity rate of 0.6 actually carried Australia home for a win.

Test team of the year

I put together an ODI team of the year, and I'm going to use a similar method for test team of the year.

The first thing that needs to be decided on is the balance of the team. Often the successful teams play with 4 bowlers and one batsman who can contribute with the ball. (There has only been one game this year where a team has won with only using 4 bowlers)

This time rather than using matches at the World cup as a premium, I'm looking at away matches as the premium. This year we have seen some very good performances by home teams, and only a few by away teams, so there needs to be a bonus for teams performing away from home. (For the purpose of this I don't consider games in UAE as away games for either team)

Openers, Alastair Cook & Tino Mawayo

This was selected from batsmen who had played at least 6 innings as openers.

The selection was fairly straight-forward

Player	Matches	Runs	Actual Average	Points
AN Cook (Eng)	8	927	84.27	84.31
TMK Mawoyo (Zim)	3	310	62.00	59.17
Taufeeq Umar (Pak)	10	831	46.16	46.55
DA Warner (Aus)	3	195	48.75	43.84
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	10	647	40.43	36.41
V Sibanda (Zim)	3	272	45.33	36.40
GC Smith (SA)	5	322	40.25	36.20

In reality Tino Mawoyo's first class record suggest it is unlikely that he will turn out to be a world class opener, but he has produced world class numbers this year (including carrying his bat for a particularly memorable 453 ball epic 163* against Pakistan). And Zimbabwe has produced some outstanding batsmen in their short test history.

Number 3 Rahul Dravid

This was not so straight forward, as the runs below were not just scored at number 3. Dravid did better when he opened the batting, and Amla did worse the one innings that he didn't bat at number 3. Sangakkara scored the most runs, but didn't manage any not out's so his average suffered accordingly.

Player	Matches	Runs	Actual Average	Points
R Dravid (India)	12	1145	57.25	59.05
KA Edwards (WI)	6	595	54.09	53.12
SE Marsh (Aus)	4	287	41.00	48.67
Azhar Ali (Pak)	10	732	45.75	45.14
KC Sangakkara (SL)	11	1034	49.23	43.93
HM Amla (SA)	5	423	47.00	42.27
IJL Trott (Eng)	6	365	40.55	36.47

Numbers 4 & 5 Younis Khan & Ian Bell

Ian Bell has batted at 6 for this year, but he has been a specialist batsman, rather than an all-rounder.

Player	Matches	Runs	Actual Average	Points
IR Bell (Eng)	8	950	118.75	110.24
Younis Khan (Pak)	8	765	85.00	83.93
Misbah-ul-Haq (Pak)	10	765	69.54	75.15
KP Pietersen (Eng)	8	731	73.10	65.07
DG Brownlie (NZ)	3	268	53.60	60.76
S Chanderpaul (WI)	8	646	53.83	54.21
DM Bravo (WI)	10	949	49.94	53.91
BRM Taylor (Zim)	3	358	71.60	50.44
SR Tendulkar (India)	9	756	47.25	49.62
MEK Hussey (Aus)	9	680	42.50	48.18
TT Samaraweera (SL)	7	501	41.75	46.82
Shakib Al Hasan (Ban)	5	451	50.11	46.54
JH Kallis (SA)	5	359	51.28	46.12

All rounder Mike Hussey

This was a surprise. I was expecting Shakib, Watson, Vettori or Kallis to come out on top here. Hussey was hardly a front-line bowler, but we are only looking for someone who can contribute, and of the players that do that he has been the most effective this year. Kallis has not exactly had a vintage year with the ball, bowling 61 overs for 232 runs. Watson however has been outstanding with the ball, but surprisingly poor with the bat, especially since I thought I remembered him batting really well.

Player	Batting	Bowling	Difference
MEK Hussey (Aus)	48.18	17.97	30.21
Shakib Al Hasan (Ban)	46.54	30.66	15.88
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	36.41	22.66	13.75
DL Vettori (NZ)	40.23	27.68	12.55
AD Mathews (SL)	40.52	30.58	9.94
R Ashwin (India)	34.59	27.25	7.34
SR Watson (Aus)	23.82	17.14	6.68
Azhar Ali (Pak)	45.14	38.92	6.22
DJG Sammy (WI)	18.19	30.13	-11.94
TM Dilshan (SL)	35.21	53.45	-18.24
MN Samuels (WI)	32.51	54.06	-21.55
IJL Trott (Eng)	36.47	110.09	-73.62
JH Kallis (SA)	46.12	257.98	-211.86

Wicketkeeper Matt Prior

This was the easiest decision of all.

Matt Prior is so far above the rest of the keepers in terms of batting that he really selects himself. His numbers don't indicate that he is the best keeper, but given that he concedes about 5 byes per innings, but his adjusted average is about 25 runs more than the next best with the bat, he can't be overlooked.

Here is the batting stats for everyone who averaged 35 or higher:

Player	Matches	Runs	Actual Average	Points
MJ Prior (Eng)	8	519	64.87	64.90
T Taibu (Zim)	3	267	44.50	39.17
Adnan Akmal (Pak)	8	211	35.16	36.54
Mushfiqur Rahim (Ban)	5	340	37.77	35.07

And their byes stats:

Name	Byes	Deliveries	Byes/100 overs
Adnan Akmal (Pak)	26	8559	1.82
T Taibu (Zim)	15	2581	3.49
Mushfiqur Rahim (Ban)	34	4741	4.30
MJ Prior (Eng)	65	8096	4.82

The intangible is dropped catches. It is more work than I'm prepared to do to go back and count the number of catches dropped. If Adnan or Taibu had not dropped any catches, and Prior dropped 1 per game, then there would be a difficult decision, but given that we don't have any data we have to proceed on the understanding that there is no significant difference between them.

Bowlers James Pattinson, Shane Watson, Doug Bracewell and Saeed Ajmal

Here I decided that a bowler had to have bowled 90 overs. I got this number as it was roughly the lower quartile of bowlers who had bowled in 5 innings. This was better than just using 5 innings, as measuring in overs allows more consistency (someone who bowls 2 overs in each of 5 innings just giving a rest to the other bowlers and picks up 3 wickets for 55 runs because the batsmen are slogging him would end up with a very good average despite not being a front-line bowler - for a less extreme version of this see Mike Hussey) Unfortunately Vernon Philander just missed out on this.

I also needed to have at least 2 quick bowlers and at least 1 spinner. The final position comes down to performance (although in reality it would probably come down to the conditions). As a result I have picked Saeed Ajmal, as the best spinner.

Name	Matches	Overs	Wickets	Actual Average	Weighted Average
JL Pattinson (Aus)	3	98.5	20	15.20	16.90
SR Watson (Aus)	6	113.5	14	19.07	17.14
DAJ Bracewell (NZ)	3	101	16	19.25	17.39
TT Bresnan (Eng)	4	139.3	21	19.09	20.95
Z Khan (India)	3	114.2	13	23.15	21.46
DW Steyn (SA)	5	178.4	28	19.57	21.76
Saeed Ajmal (Pak)	8	487	50	23.86	21.97
Mohammad Hafeez (Pak)	10	167	15	25.93	22.66
Aizaz Cheema (Pak)	4	146.4	19	24.78	23.38
U Yadav (India)	3	96.3	16	22.93	23.42
P Kumar (India)	6	268.3	27	25.81	23.92
Abdur Rehman (Pak)	8	412	36	26.27	24.39
SCJ Broad (Eng)	7	270.2	33	22.30	24.80
PP Ojha (India)	3	177.2	20	22.50	25.02
Umar Gul (Pak)	8	287.5	34	25.67	25.09
JM Anderson (Eng)	7	296.2	35	24.85	25.57
R Rampaul (WI)	8	283.1	31	25.03	26.20
R Ashwin (India)	4	221	26	24.80	27.25
DL Vettori (NZ)	4	228.1	16	27.12	27.68
CS Martin (NZ)	5	192	20	29.45	27.94
NM Lyon (Aus)	8	198.4	23	27.47	28.64
CT Tremlett (Eng)	5	207.4	23	27.17	29.71
HMRKB Herath (SL)	10	470.1	41	29.07	29.92

Most of the players selected have not played much cricket, and just scrape in on overs bowled. If we extended that to 150 overs required the line up would be Dale Steyn, Praveen Kumar, Saeed Ajmal and Mohammad Hafeez.

The team (in batting order)

Alastair Cook
Tino Mawoyo
Rahul Dravid
Younis Khan
Michael Hussey
Ian Bell
Matt Prior
Shane Watson
Doug Bracewell
James Pattinson
Saeed Ajmal

12th man Mohammad Hafeez

Surprisingly there are no South Africans or Sri Lankans in the team. There are also no West Indians or Bangladeshis either.

That's my stats based team. What is your team?

ODI team of the year

Well, it wouldn't be the end of the year, without people naming a team of the year.

Here is my attempt at ODI team of the year:

Method:
For batsmen I broke down the players into openers, top order and lower/middle order players.
I then looked at all batsmen's results batting in these positions throughout the year, giving a bonus for world cup matches and for games against harder opposition. I created a points system that took in account their runs scored, their wickets lost and their deliveries faced. The higher the score the better.

Openers:

Sehwag & Watson

Name	Matches	Runs	Average	Strike rate	Points
V Sehwag	12	645	53.75	122.58	133.432
SR Watson	22	1124	59.15	92.35	108.154
SR Tendulkar	11	513	46.63	91.98	99.282
HM Amla	15	632	45.14	87.67	73.667
MJ Guptill	16	650	54.16	68.58	73.338

Somewhat unsurprising, given that they have both dominated this year. Tendulkar was a close 3rd.

Top Order

de Villiers, Clark & Taylor

Name	Matches	Runs	Average	Strike rate	Points
AB de Villiers	10	467	51.88	108.28	113.889
LRPL Taylor	17	561	51.00	87.09	86.13
MJ Clarke	24	900	56.25	91.01	81.247
Yuvraj Singh	11	381	42.33	89.78	80.421
IJL Trott	28	1246	51.91	80.84	77.224
V Kohli	31	1349	49.96	81.49	76.953
KC Sangakkara	26	1127	51.22	83.78	75.762
G Gambhir	15	562	40.14	85.09	74.575
JP Duminy	13	523	47.54	87.61	70.696

This was a little more interesting. I was quite surprised bu Clarke's numbers, as I hadn't remembered him having such a good season. By the same token Kohli had an amazing season, but missed out.

Lower/Middle order

Dhoni & Duminy

Name	Matches	Runs	Average	Strike rate	Points
MS Dhoni	23	759	63.25	81.69	100.227
JP Duminy	11	451	50.11	100.00	79.152
KJ O'Brien	12	324	29.45	125.31	77.566
Umar Akmal	28	785	41.31	86.95	62.378
Misbah-ul-Haq	20	545	45.41	73.80	61.635
DJ Hussey	16	342	38.00	152.94	61.583
KA Pollard	20	528	31.05	151.26	57.963
YK Pathan	12	271	27.10	121.15	53.221
MEK Hussey	14	347	38.55	93.24	51.55
EJG Morgan	15	384	29.53	85.71	51.297
F du Plessis	13	288	28.80	84.12	50.829

Initally I was going to have this and wicket-keeper as separate sections, but given that Dhoni came first as a batsman and there is not a lot of point in having two wicket keepers, it's better to take an extra batsman. JP Duminy just edges out Kevin O'Brien, but O'Brien is an obvious choice for 12th man, as he can contribute with the bat or the ball. And because I like his style of play.

Bowlers.

Quantifying the records for bowlers is not as easy as batsmen. I again created a measure that valued dot balls and wickets, and put a higher value on performances in the World Cup and in matches against good teams. The lower the points the better.

Name	Matches	Wickets	Average	Economy	Points
DW Steyn	14	25	18.50	4.41	19.78
RJ Peterson	9	18	21.15	4.74	20.51
M Morkel	14	26	17.73	4.41	21.26
Shahid Afridi	27	45	25.65	4.35	21.76
Wahab Riaz	13	23	20.77	5.32	22.51
TG Southee	13	25	22.85	5.00	22.56
JDP Oram	12	23	23.88	4.71	23.13
SL Malinga	24	48	23.13	4.89	23.46
B Lee	19	33	23.03	4.62	23.47
Z Khan	14	30	23.75	5.08	23.64
M Muralitharan	11	17	22.35	4.22	23.81
BAW Mendis	14	17	24.13	4.46	25.15
HK Bennett	10	17	26.61	5.73	26.09
Mohammad Hafeez	32	32	24.06	3.43	26.64

There are a couple of interesting names here. Mohammad Hafeez misses out due to not taking many wickets in the World Cup. Perhaps this is a weakness in my system, as he was really one of the outstanding bowlers of the year. Peterson likewise only played 2 games outside the world cup, and went at about 6 an over in those matches. But he had a fantastic World Cup and it is fair that a player gets a bonus for performing at the highest stage.

The final team:

Sehwag
Watson
de Villiers
Taylor
Clarke
Duminy
Dhoni
Shahid Afridi
Peterson
Morkel
Steyn

12th man O'Brien

How does your team look?