Averaging 35 will be accepted again

[Xix2565]

They are totally different ball games. Till recently, in ODIs, no one went after the ball from ball one. A lot of test logic of settling in and then going after tired bowlers happened in ODIs too. Now, the advent of T20s impacts ODIs too which is a dying format right now caught in the middle.

I mean ODIs have been around for far longer and should've had a larger impact on the game than what people suggest T20s have had. Yet no one seriously suggests ODI batting influences are what let people stack their averages in the flat pitch eras from 2000-2017 as far as I know, instead pointing to the environmental conditions and general strength of the available bowlers and batters.

 

[cnerd123]

The T20 argument is the same kind of argument that can be made for ODIs yet no one really suggests anymore that ODIs are affecting Test cricket batting.

ODIs were definitely credited/blamed for how much quicker paced Test cricket became from the 1990s onwards. People also blamed ODIs for flatter pitches, saying that the focus of cricket had shifted towards runs and boundaries.

 

[Xix2565]

ODIs were definitely credited/blamed for how much quicker paced Test cricket became from the 1990s onwards. People also blamed ODIs for flatter pitches, saying that the focus of cricket had shifted towards runs and boundaries.

It still doesn't suggest a strong relationship between Test batting and other format batting compared to Test batting and Test conditions/bowlers/etc. The focus of cricket shifting sounds strange to me, I'd have thought people wanted runs or wickets depending on their objective at the time in the game always.

 

[Starfighter]

I mean ODIs have been around for far longer and should've had a larger impact on the game than what people suggest T20s have had. Yet no one seriously suggests ODI batting influences are what let people stack their averages in the flat pitch eras from 2000-2017 as far as I know, instead pointing to the environmental conditions and general strength of the available bowlers and batters.

The advent of ODIs did not impact the first class season nearly as much as T20 leagues. One day cricket has been a fixture in the English season since the mid sixties yet only recently was the FC game sidelined.

It still doesn't suggest a strong relationship between Test batting and other format batting compared to Test batting and Test conditions/bowlers/etc. The focus of cricket shifting sounds strange to me, I'd have thought people wanted runs or wickets depending on their objective at the time in the game always.

If you actually watched the game, you'd be able to see the technical and temperamental changes.

 

[cnerd123]

It still doesn't suggest a strong relationship between Test batting and other format batting compared to Test batting and Test conditions/bowlers/etc. The focus of cricket shifting sounds strange to me, I'd have thought people wanted runs or wickets depending on their objective at the time in the game always.

For a long time in the 90s and 00s broadcasters and administrators thought fans wanted to watch high scoring games with a lot of fours and sixes, so playing conditions and pitches were geared towards that.

ODIs were a factor but never the only factor. T20 is a factor but not the only one.

And it's not just the advent of limited overs cricket in the International schedule that has impacted batsmen development. It's how much more limited overs stuff is played at junior and domestic levels that's the problem. As others have said, the advent of T20 leagues and playing more T20s/white ball cricket in domestic/junior leagues has been a real factor in how young batters develop.

At least if you're playing 50 over cricket as a developing top-order batsman you have the opportunity to bat for a 100+ balls in an innings, or to occupy the crease for more than 90 minutes. With T20s there is really no space for that. It's just too short a format for upcoming players to learn how to build a long innings.

 

[morgieb]

Yeah I'd argue (especially in the 20th Century) that ODI's were closer to Tests than T20's are to ODI's. That has to have an impact especially given T20 gets specialist windows which List A cricket did not.

Doesn't make it the only factor, but it pretty clearly hurts.

 

[morgieb]

@morgieb not sure that MCG test was really the tipping point - there's cricket outside of Australia, but the embrittlement of batting was certainly becoming noticeable before then. But things have gotten a lot worse since then.

Look at Trent Bridge 2015. A classic brittle collapse. One notable thing is that when teams make a low score these days, they do so quickly rather than gritting it out. But if you look at the batting lineups - there's hardly anyone with the FC accomplishments of, say, Bell, Voges or Rogers.

Yes, batting became a lot more brittle on spicier decks much earlier than 2018. But I think out and out roads kind of died after that MCG Test, and it makes sense when you look at the overall averages from 2011-17 and 2018-now.

And yeah the current generation lacking those very good FC players who weren't out and out freak talents hurts a lot too. I look at Australia and shudder at our backups. And we're still much better off than England or the West Indies.

 

[Starfighter]

But I think out and out roads kind of died after that MCG Test

Now I'll get pernickety. The Melbourne pitch had nothing, yet we still got bowled out for 327. England relied on an enormous innings from Cook (an ideal, pre-T20 batsman for the situation), even then 491 isn't an exceptionally big total.

The very next test we scored 7/649. Yes England lost, but it was still a very flat pitch for much of the test. And it helps highlight what seems different these days. Teams can't seem to take advantage of friendly conditions as easily. The smallest amount of bounce or pressure they fold like a deck of cards. Adelaide against Pakistan was also very flat, like a billiard table on the first couple of days. But Pakistan weren't in much position to match our total after being torn apart. Teams can be beaten in conditions that they should have been able to draw in. IMO the main change in Australian pitches around 2018-20 compared to around 2015 is not that they're necessarily less flat but that they've slower and dryer, so favouring a grinding style that is out of step with modern batting temperaments (obviously that excludes the last series, I think you have to go back to 78/79 to find one where the ball was so dominant. There were only two pitches in the previous decade (both at Hobart) at friendly as those three of the five tests IMO).

I think the reduced warmups and lower quality FC cricket means that teams are less adaptable now even on roads than they used to be. Look at SA's last tour of India. Were they road or turners? Yes India won the toss in all three, but SA couldn't adapt in either department, so conceded big scores the was bowed out cheaply. Not surprising when you've mostly got green seamers domestically. Teams are sorely lacking in resilence now, hence the paucity of draws regardless of pitch conditions.

 

[Xix2565]

The advent of ODIs did not impact the first class season nearly as much as T20 leagues. One day cricket has been a fixture in the English season since the mid sixties yet only recently was the FC game sidelined.


If you actually watched the game, you'd be able to see the technical and temperamental changes.

The FC game in England is its own separate matter though, and kind of transcends this whole conversation, since other countries run their domestic structures differently. What problems England have aren't necessarily going to be the same elsewhere or to the same degree.

On the flipside, does that mean everyone who got to bat in the 2000s on dead pitches would suddenly be able to handle the current bowling landscapes? Just because these changes from the T20 game weren't there? I don't really see anything supporting that when they still struggled against the good bowlers of that era. I don't think everyone who's reputed for having a solid defence would just carry on like they did over their careers.

 

[Magrat Garlick]

The advent of ODIs did not impact the first class season nearly as much as T20 leagues. One day cricket has been a fixture in the English season since the mid sixties yet only recently was the FC game sidelined.

agree mostly but a lot of talent disappeared from the English FC competition in particular when the national teams started playing practically year round schedules

 

[cnerd123]

On the flipside, does that mean everyone who got to bat in the 2000s on dead pitches would suddenly be able to handle the current bowling landscapes? Just because these changes from the T20 game weren't there? I don't really see anything supporting that when they still struggled against the good bowlers of that era. I don't think everyone who's reputed for having a solid defence would just carry on like they did over their careers.

I think they'd adapt better. More willing to leave the ball, grind out scores. They'd average less, but we'd see less collapses and more regular scores around 250.

Some players from the 2000s wouldn't adapt well at all. A guy like Afridi, for example, wouldn't average close to 36.5 in the modern era.

 

[Xix2565]

Look at SA's last tour of India. Were they road or turners? Yes India won the toss in all three, but SA couldn't adapt in either department, so conceded big scores the was bowed out cheaply.

I'd argue they were more roads than turners, considering the latter Tests had pacers split the wickets evenly with the spinners. And even then in the first Test SA managed 431 before they began the slide down in runs made and in that innings Indian spin took 9 out of the 10 wickets.

I think they'd adapt better. More willing to leave the ball, grind out scores. They'd average less, but we'd see less collapses and more regular scores around 250.

Some players from the 2000s wouldn't adapt well at all. A guy like Afridi, for example, wouldn't average close to 36.5 in the modern era.

It's one thing to adapt to the occasional good bowlers, but nowadays the attacks are more deeper and get to play more often in favourable conditions so it's not merely the case of seeing one guy off to feast on the other one when attacks are good.

A small tangent on collapses since you brought it up, there was this recent essay on Substack by an English cricket fan who wrote about English batting collapses and tried to put them into context using his own standards for collapses and such that I think would be interesting to read. If people want, I could post this elsewhere or delete it if they disliked it.

 

[cnerd123]

The age of bowling

Stunning strike rates, incredible depth in attacks, battered batters: a deep dive into an unparalleled era of bowler domination in Test cricket

www.thecricketmonthly.com

I found this very interesting:



Imagine what Steyn's numbers would be if he was playing and at his peak in the last 4 years

 

[The Sean]

I found this very interesting:

View attachment 30690

Imagine what Steyn's numbers would be if he was playing and at his peak in the last 4 years

Google, show me the definition of the term "in a class of his own."

 

[Fuller Pilch]

I found this very interesting:

View attachment 30690

Imagine what Steyn's numbers would be if he was playing and at his peak in the last 4 years

Also other quicks with 50+ since 2018 (Ngidi and Nortje just miss out):

Wagner 94 @ 24.11
Afridi 86 @ 23.89
Holder 85 @ 20.03
Ishant 85 @ 21.37
Roach 84 @ 23.36
Hazlewood 79 @25.69
Gabriel 78 @ 29.25
Lakmal 72 @ 24.73
Stokes 72 @ 30.23
Abbas 67 @ 23.59
Hasan Ali 66 @ 21.07
Woakes 65 @ 26.56
Jamieson 62 @ 17.43
Yadav 59 @ 22.23
Wood 55 @ 27.54
Philander 51 @ 22.13

Plus throw in Boland 18 wickets in 3 tests @9.55 and Jansen who looks handy

Amazing bowling numbers.

 

[SteveNZ]

Marnus L started in 1st class in 2014.

He's an outlier, isn't he? Root is too, started in 2010 I think. I don't know their respective backgrounds but given their respective temperaments and dedication to batting, I would imagine there is a significant amount of technical work in their early days and desire to be long-form cricketers.

Of all the guys averaging 45 since 2018, and playing more than 10 Tests, the very vast majority of them started in FC cricket before 2008 (Williamson, Azam, Sharma, Smith, Alam, Karunaratne, Mathews, Kohli, Abid Ali). Add Rizwan in there too (43) because for all his T20 magic, he debuted in FC cricket in 2008 too. Ditto Mahmudullah and Warner.

The only ones who aren't are Marnus, Root and Latham/Nicholls. None of those four play any franchise cricket apart from their own country (Nicholls and Root played one stint for the Thunder), and all three make very sporadic appearances in domestic T20. None of them play T20 internationals with any regularity or have played them at all (Marnus).

So there is not a single Test batsman who plays all forms, franchise cricket, debuted after 2008 in FC cricket and averages over 45. Not a single one. You have Agarwal and Head who are the only guys playing all forms who average over 40 and didn't debut before 2008.

That's my case.

 

[Flem274*]

The 2008 cut off is also due to age rather than IPL. Of course guys who are 28-32 years old are far more likely to be the best in the world than a 25 or 35 year old.

Your year chosen is also very, very tenuous - they can't have played more than a couple of games before 2008 and to do so as teenagers already points to them being generational talents rather than solid batsmen like Tom Latham. I will also add an NZ specific rebuttal - KW was created in a far weaker FC system than the one of Tom Latham or even more recently an up and comer like Ravindra.

The biggest difference between the outlier of the batting boom 00s and today is pitch de-homogenisation.

Look at a team we both know well Steve. In 2004 and especially 2010 NZ sides who would be pulverized by Kane's side stood up to Indian sides in India despite those Indian sides on paper being far better. On the most recent tour, NZ found it a lot tougher to match a side their equal.

The biggest difference for the NZ sides was the Mumbai deck in particular compared to the worldwide average pitch of 2004 and 2010 and a lack of practice games. Pitches worldwide in the 00s had more in common with each other than those of today.

We've returned to the historical norm of pitch variety and it has been a savage adjustment.

I don't think blaming the IPL is looking deep enough.

 

[_00_deathscar]

Yes, but he doesn`t play IPL or T20s. I can bet his average will go down once he gets selected for those. Thinking of it, BCCI should have made some IPL team select him just for that

He’s a T20 whore. Loves getting mic-Ed up while bowling etc

 

[_00_deathscar]

I think they'd adapt better. More willing to leave the ball, grind out scores. They'd average less, but we'd see less collapses and more regular scores around 250.

We see those now too to be fair - it’s just that the games are done in 2.5-4 days rather than taking 5 whole days because some bat decided to leave every ball.

 

[SteveNZ]

The 2008 cut off is also due to age rather than IPL. Of course guys who are 28-32 years old are far more likely to be the best in the world than a 25 or 35 year old.

Your year chosen is also very, very tenuous - they can't have played more than a couple of games before 2008 and to do so as teenagers already points to them being generational talents rather than solid batsmen like Tom Latham. I will also add an NZ specific rebuttal - KW was created in a far weaker FC system than the one of Tom Latham or even more recently an up and comer like Ravindra.

The biggest difference between the outlier of the batting boom 00s and today is pitch de-homogenisation.

Look at a team we both know well Steve. In 2004 and especially 2010 NZ sides who would be pulverized by Kane's side stood up to Indian sides in India despite those Indian sides on paper being far better. On the most recent tour, NZ found it a lot tougher to match a side their equal.

The biggest difference for the NZ sides was the Mumbai deck in particular compared to the worldwide average pitch of 2004 and 2010 and a lack of practice games. Pitches worldwide in the 00s had more in common with each other than those of today.

We've returned to the historical norm of pitch variety and it has been a savage adjustment.

I don't think blaming the IPL is looking deep enough.

That's cool, I don't agree with a lot you said but mine is a perspective and so is yours. Didn't stop Smith, Williamson, Root, Kohli etc averaging 50+ in their 20s did it? In history there's been plenty of >28 year olds who have averaged 45+.

My year of 2008 isn't tenuous at all. It's a clear marker in terms of when the game became lucrative. You know that as an NZ fan, it was around the time that Brendon started to have reservations about whether he would continue to be an NZ player, turning up late to overseas tours, even those Champions League T20 tournaments became a major focus. Remember how much our domestic sides used to value our T20 comp?

It's not about debuting in 2008. It's about the fact they had built their games at age group and initially in senior cricket in longer form cricket before this time. They weren't building their games with any knowledge or idealism of being a short form gun for hire. And I'm also not talking about the quality of the FC comp. I'm talking about the way guys set up their games. Kane Williamson always wanted to bat time. He left balls. He knew where his off stump was. He played straight. That's not the modus operandi of junior players now.

I don't agree with those Indian examples, either. That 2004 side was a very, very good side and especially playing spin. Fleming was a genius on the sub-continent. Richardson worked feverishly on his game. Those teams prepared well - and what's more, they had time and space to prepare well. I think you're vastly overstating the pitch issue. Maybe it's a part of it, but if you consider (like me and others) that techniques are considerably compromised in the modern game, any chance in the quality of pitches would be exposed.

Again, I am not 'blaming' the IPL. The IPL is great for a lot of people. I'm talking about T20 and the ability to make money the world over. I've seen those graphs that show downward trends from 2008. How is that co-incidence? Even if you believe generational bowler quality is a factor and pitches as well, surely there'd be no one debating me that T20 focus has the real potential to erode techniques?