Modern-day batsmen and flat pitches

[honestbharani]

I agree with all that, but I think the discussion becomes a bit more interesting when you're asking about a situation where the batsmen who can score runs in both conditions without being prolific is somewhat less successful overall. It's fine to say that player A who averages 50 and scores runs in all conditions is overall a more valuable player than player B who averages 50 but scores all his runs on roads, but what if the second guy averages 55, or 60? There's a certain point at which the weight of run scoring from player B becomes more significant than the occasional gritty 75* out of a team score of 140 that wins a test.

I wouldn't argue that Sehwag is a better batsman than Waugh based on that, but I do think it's an interesting point to raise in response to the usual arguments that essentially assume 99% of the runs Sehwag scores are irrelevant.

Runs are very, very rarely irrelevant in cricket. It is just unfortunate that we often have stuff like "he only scores in dead matches" or "he only scores on flat tracks" or "he only scores in draws" brought up often...


Deciding how the pithc played and how a batsman played through scorecards is my pet peeve about some CWers...

 

[GIMH]

Runs are very, very rarely irrelevant in cricket. It is just unfortunate that we often have stuff like "he only scores in dead matches" or "he only scores on flat tracks" or "he only scores in draws" brought up often...


Deciding how the pithc played and how a batsman played through scorecards is my pet peeve about some CWers...

While I agree that that is annoying, you're ignoring the fact that people who post here do also watch cricket and do declare tracks as being flat on that basis as well. Stats wars annoy me but let's not go too far the other way and pretend that nobody round here has ever watched a game of cricket and therefore have no right of opinion

 

[aussie]

Take the England team for example. Odds are that you'd expect every one of the top 7 including Bell/Bopara and Cook to score runs against NZ. However, you would not expect them to succeed consistently against Australia. Which is why someone like KP scoring runs against a top team like Australia is far more important than KP scoring runs against NZ. Because KP's failure against NZ is hardly of any importance to the side, if he doesn't score runs, heck even the likes of Swann and Broad can be expected to score against their bowling attack. A KP failure against Australia however, is in all likelyhood, likely to cost the team the entire series however.

Oh you have smashed the nail on its head with this one.

But this is minor issue in the general scheme of things:

The point that I would make is that a player who can score runs on *both* (Lara, Waugh, Dravid, Ponting etc) is a better player than a player who can only score on flat decks (Hayden, Youhana, Smith, Tendulkar).

Won't deliberate on Hayden since he is controversial figure although i disagree totally with him being in this group. But i can't see how Tendulkar fits into this group at all..

 

[Uppercut]

Take the England team for example. Odds are that you'd expect every one of the top 7 including Bell/Bopara and Cook to score runs against NZ. However, you would not expect them to succeed consistently against Australia. Which is why someone like KP scoring runs against a top team like Australia is far more important than KP scoring runs against NZ. Because KP's failure against NZ is hardly of any importance to the side, if he doesn't score runs, heck even the likes of Swann and Broad can be expected to score against their bowling attack. A KP failure against Australia however, is in all likelyhood, likely to cost the team the entire series however.

Yeah, but it's a very, very tenuous link.

KP was on a tour of Australia with England in 2007. England were hopeless, and Australia were one of the best teams of all time. Australia mauled England so violently it slightly hurt my eyes, but KP scored a fair few runs. Those runs were ****ing worthless, because England wouldn't even have won had the entire Australian team had their legs amputated before the first test.

The next winter England toured New Zealand, and in a hard-fought series, came back from 1-0 down to win 2-1. KP again scored well, with one particularly crucial, series-changing century on the first day of the (IIRC) second test, without which England might have lost the series. Those runs were worth much more to England than his contribution in 2007.

It's tenuous. How much runs are worth in the context of a match is only very, very loosely linked with the quality of opposition. So my question is, why are the runs against good attacks so invariably considered the sign of a better player? I don't think the reason you've given is the true one.

 

[Uppercut]

I would think that there are few players in the history of the game who failed extensively on flat tracks while succeeding often on seamer friendly tracks. The point that I would make is that a player who can score runs on *both* (Lara, Waugh, Dravid, Ponting etc) is a better player than a player who can only score on flat decks (Hayden, Youhana, Smith, Tendulkar).

Ahahaha. Heads will roll here.

 

[GIMH]

Yeah, but it's a very, very tenuous link.

KP was on a tour of Australia with England in 2007. England were hopeless, and Australia were one of the best teams of all time. Australia mauled England so violently it slightly hurt my eyes, but KP scored a fair few runs. Those runs were ****ing worthless, because England wouldn't even have won had the entire Australian team had their legs amputated before the first test.

The next winter England toured New Zealand, and in a hard-fought series, came back from 1-0 down to win 2-1. KP again scored well, with one particularly crucial, series-changing century on the first day of the (IIRC) second test, without which England might have lost the series. Those runs were worth much more to England than his contribution in 2007.

It's tenuous. How much runs are worth in the context of a match is only very, very loosely linked with the quality of opposition. So my question is, why are the runs against good attacks so invariably considered the sign of a better player? I don't think the reason you've given is the true one.

Kind of agree with your point, but to call Pietersen's runs in that series worthless is assuming that anything that happens in a lost cause has no effect on the future. That was the first time Pietersen made significant contributions in Tests outside of England and it answered A LOT of questions that people had about him. Who knows what effect it had on Pietersen after that? Of course, he's such an ego that failing might have only spurred him on, but I doubt it tbh because even people like Pietersen thrive on confidence.

It also has an element of backwards-looking to it. Certainly, nobody felt Pietersen or Collingwood's runs in the first innings at Adelaide were worthless going into the final day.

In all honesty, I think that that series did tell us more about Pietersen than his double-century against the West Indies a few months later, but similiarly it was important that he scored those runs and they certainly shouldn't be discounted when discussing him as a player.

So basically, I sort of agree with you in principle but think you're too quick to discount contributions in a losing cause.

 

[stephen]

KP was on a tour of Australia with England in 2007. England were hopeless, and Australia were one of the best teams of all time.

Actually there wasn't too much wrong with that England team. They were actually one of the better English teams to tour here over the previous two decades. Their problems were:

1) Selection of Giles over Paenessar.
2) Trescothic going home early due to mental illness.
3) Winning in 2005 and therefore going up against a team* crying out for blood.
4) A demoralising collapse to the greatest spinner of all time.

*not just any team, but arguably the best team in history

 

[tooextracool]

Yeah, but it's a very, very tenuous link.

KP was on a tour of Australia with England in 2007. England were hopeless, and Australia were one of the best teams of all time. Australia mauled England so violently it slightly hurt my eyes, but KP scored a fair few runs. Those runs were ****ing worthless, because England wouldn't even have won had the entire Australian team had their legs amputated before the first test.

The next winter England toured New Zealand, and in a hard-fought series, came back from 1-0 down to win 2-1. KP again scored well, with one particularly crucial, series-changing century on the first day of the (IIRC) second test, without which England might have lost the series. Those runs were worth much more to England than his contribution in 2007.

It's tenuous. How much runs are worth in the context of a match is only very, very loosely linked with the quality of opposition. So my question is, why are the runs against good attacks so invariably considered the sign of a better player? I don't think the reason you've given is the true one.

I am not denying that KP's runs in NZ probably did more for England's cause than his runs in Australia, although as has been pointed out, this is really in the benefit of hindsight and few players really know how valuable their runs are at the time when they are scoring them.

However, I am not sure I understand the logic of how scoring more 'worthwhile' runs for your team automatically make you a good player. Scoring runs against McGrath, Warne, Clark and Lee when almost none of your peers are able to do so is a sign of being a class above the rest regardless of how badly your team loses. Scoring runs against O'Brien, Mills, Oram and Vettori is great in that it may help your team win, however there is no logic behind saying that a player is more skillful for scoring runs against that attack than he is for scoring against McGrath and co simply because it helped his team win. By this logic, Andy Flower would have to have been a no-hoper given the number of times his knocks actually had any significance to his team's cause. Almost all of his runs were 'worthless'.

When rating a player, it is implicit sign of skill that runs scored against stronger attacks mean more than runs scored against poorer attacks because quite frankly scoring runs against stronger attacks requires a skill that few possess. This is analogous to scoring runs in county cricket vs scoring runs in international cricket.

I am not saying ignore all statistics against the weaker teams, Im just saying look at it in context. Someone like Yousuf can score billions of runs against the bottom four rated test teams, but what will truly end up separating him from the upper echelon of players is the fact that he couldn't buy a score against a bowling attack that wasn't in the bottom four of the test championship table. Couldnt care less how many games he won for Pakistan against WI, NZ, India and Bangladesh.

 

[Uppercut]

Kind of agree with your point, but to call Pietersen's runs in that series worthless is assuming that anything that happens in a lost cause has no effect on the future. That was the first time Pietersen made significant contributions in Tests outside of England and it answered A LOT of questions that people had about him. Who knows what effect it had on Pietersen after that? Of course, he's such an ego that failing might have only spurred him on, but I doubt it tbh because even people like Pietersen thrive on confidence.

It also has an element of backwards-looking to it. Certainly, nobody felt Pietersen or Collingwood's runs in the first innings at Adelaide were worthless going into the final day.

In all honesty, I think that that series did tell us more about Pietersen than his double-century against the West Indies a few months later, but similiarly it was important that he scored those runs and they certainly shouldn't be discounted when discussing him as a player.

So basically, I sort of agree with you in principle but think you're too quick to discount contributions in a losing cause.

Yeah, you're absolutely right. The point isn't that runs scored against a vastly superior team are worthless- far from it- it's that counting runs scored against a vastly superior side more heavily on the grounds that they're more likely to be worth something (which is what TEC initially implied was beind done) makes no sense. If any link at all exists between the quality of attack you're facing and how much your runs are likely to be worth, it's a very, very thin one.

 

[Uppercut]

However, I am not sure I understand the logic of how scoring more 'worthwhile' runs for your team automatically make you a good player. Scoring runs against McGrath, Warne, Clark and Lee when almost none of your peers are able to do so is a sign of being a class above the rest regardless of how badly your team loses. Scoring runs against O'Brien, Mills, Oram and Vettori is great in that it may help your team win, however there is no logic behind saying that a player is more skillful for scoring runs against that attack than he is for scoring against McGrath and co simply because it helped his team win. By this logic, Andy Flower would have to have been a no-hoper given the number of times his knocks actually had any significance to his team's cause. Almost all of his runs were 'worthless'.

Well, isn't helping your team win what cricket is all about? I mean, if we aren't measuring cricketing ability as how good a player is at helping his team win cricket matches, then what exactly ARE we measuring? I thought that was a universal standard.

No one's saying that scoring runs against Mills is more skilful than scoring runs against McGrath. But if someone is incapable of scoring runs against Kyle Mills, isn't that just as much a stain on their record as if they were incapable of scoring runs against McGrath? I propose that failing against a crap attack is every bit as bad as failing against a good one. Don't agree?

 

[Jono]

Ahahaha. Heads will roll here.

Not really. TEC has had this view for the 6 years I've been on this forum, and probably even before that. Nothing new. He's entitled to his opinion despite many disagreeing.

I just think its a shame because I generally agree with a lot of what he says.

 

[Uppercut]

It was just so subtly slipped in. I didn't even realise.

I'm interested in the reasons behind it.

 

[Jono]

Compared to his unsubtle signature of course...

Anyway, I'm sure you can do a search rather than re-igniting this

 

[Uppercut]

Haha, I think he's overrated too, but I still think he's ****ing good! Flat pitches have nothing to do with it.

 

[aussie]

Well, isn't helping your team win what cricket is all about? I mean, if we aren't measuring cricketing ability as how good a player is at helping his team win cricket matches, then what exactly ARE we measuring? I thought that was a universal standard.

No one's saying that scoring runs against Mills is more skilful than scoring runs against McGrath. But if someone is incapable of scoring runs against Kyle Mills, isn't that just as much a stain on their record as if they were incapable of scoring runs against McGrath? I propose that failing against a crap attack is every bit as bad as failing against a good one. Don't agree?

I cant see how TBF. Gary Sobers has poor record againts the NZ attack he faced during his career, but he dominated pretty much all the very good/great attacks he faced. His low average/failure vs NZ was just a statistical oddity, now way could you hold that againts him.

Then you have the example of Vettori success vs AUS & him not being so great vs everyone else (although you could argue other issues contribute to Vettori's bowling not being that superb overall).

Some players just rise up againts the big boys or when conditions are tough. So overall it would be fair to say a player batsman/bowler who probably does better in testing conditions/bigger teams - is better than a player who smokes poor attacks/on flat decks but is found wanting when conditions are difficult - even if as the case is in this 2000s era where you may find 1 bowler friendly deck out of every 20 innings.

 

[honestbharani]

While I agree that that is annoying, you're ignoring the fact that people who post here do also watch cricket and do declare tracks as being flat on that basis as well. Stats wars annoy me but let's not go too far the other way and pretend that nobody round here has ever watched a game of cricket and therefore have no right of opinion

I only said "some".. And I am pretty sure they haven't watched because of the games and knocks they generally refer to. If they did watch and still think this way, well, I am out of words...

 

[honestbharani]

Well, isn't helping your team win what cricket is all about? I mean, if we aren't measuring cricketing ability as how good a player is at helping his team win cricket matches, then what exactly ARE we measuring? I thought that was a universal standard.

No one's saying that scoring runs against Mills is more skilful than scoring runs against McGrath. But if someone is incapable of scoring runs against Kyle Mills, isn't that just as much a stain on their record as if they were incapable of scoring runs against McGrath? I propose that failing against a crap attack is every bit as bad as failing against a good one. Don't agree?

No.. "helping a team win" is quite completely different from going "I don't count runs made iin draws as they didn't help the team win"..


Well, it would have if his bowlers were better. The batter did what he can... OR he helped save a game that they would have lost, which is, in my book, "helping your team get the best result"...

 

[G.I.Joe]

Ahahaha. Heads will roll here.

I'd do the honours, but I don't have my handbag on me right now

 

[Ikki]

Well, isn't helping your team win what cricket is all about? I mean, if we aren't measuring cricketing ability as how good a player is at helping his team win cricket matches, then what exactly ARE we measuring? I thought that was a universal standard.

No one's saying that scoring runs against Mills is more skilful than scoring runs against McGrath. But if someone is incapable of scoring runs against Kyle Mills, isn't that just as much a stain on their record as if they were incapable of scoring runs against McGrath? I propose that failing against a crap attack is every bit as bad as failing against a good one. Don't agree?

I understand that. It can be noted that failing against weaker bowlers is worse than failing against top bowlers because you expect the latter to trouble you.

However, where it comes to records like Sobers' and his New Zealand failings I would hold it more against him if he had instead succeeded against them and failed against Australia for example.

In terms of being beneficial for the team, I expect, even if Sobers didn't do well, that the other players in the team were more capable of making up that difference. Whereas against the better teams, they'd be less able to help and hence the difference is greater when performing against the best.

 

[Uppercut]

I understand that. It can be noted that failing against weaker bowlers is worse than failing against top bowlers because you expect the latter to trouble you.

However, where it comes to records like Sobers' and his New Zealand failings I would hold it more against him if he had instead succeeded against them and failed against Australia for example.

In terms of being beneficial for the team, I expect, even if Sobers didn't do well, that the other players in the team were more capable of making up that difference. Whereas against the better teams, they'd be less able to help and hence the difference is greater when performing against the best.

Yeah, Sobers's runs against New Zealand were less beneficial than his runs against Australia. But KP's runs against New Zealand were more beneficial than his runs against Australia. Do you give those a higher rating?