Richard said:
I think shorter bowlers who get outstanding averages (eg Marshall) have bowled better than taller ones, because everyone knows taller bowlers have a bigger margin-for-error in length.
Only with respect to catches in slips or short leg -
everybody knows that (that statement ought to be banned, incidentally).
In order for the taller bowler to hit the stumps, he has to pitch the ball closer to the 'driving length' than the shorter bowler.
Thus the Munchkin bowler has the bigger margin of error for bowled or leg-before dismissals.
Strangely enough, by the same token (or by the same 'what you're toking) it could be argued that shorter batsmen have an unfair advantage over taller ones for reasons less obvious than the usually quoted 'good balance'.
Short batsmen wear smaller pads. Consequently, there is a greater chance of them being struck above the knee-roll - an anea so frequently taken as an indicator that the ball might well have gone on to pass over the top of the stumps. Consequently, they are less likely to be given out leg before wicket.
Therefore, smaller batsmen are lucky.
Most batsmen are right-handed, most bowlers are right-handed. Most bowlers deliver the ball over the wicket. Therefore, all left-handed batsmen face a right-handed bowler delivering the ball over the wicket most of the time.
Few right-handed bowlers can bowl a decent out-swinger to a right-handed batsman. Even fewer can repeat the exercise when they have to change their line to a left-hander (in-swinger here). How often have you heard commentators say "he set the ball off outside leg and it didn't swing?".
Not many balls, therefore, will be pitching outside off stump yet offering a leg-before threat to a left-handed batsman. Most balls which would go on to strike the stumps would be pitching close to or outside leg stump.
There is a lesser chance that left-handed batsmen will be dismissed leg before wicket. Therefore, left-handed batsmen are lucky.
Therefore, smaller, left-handed batsmen are doubly lucky -
everybody knows that..