This match is basically the Pontings is greater than Kallis argument in a nutshell. Ponting has worse overall stats, played in easier home conditions, was way worse away from home, got big advantages from playing for AUS...
But then you see this.
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The Unpopular Opinions Thread
- Thread starter trundler
- Start date
But then you see this.
trundler
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Looks like we're going for 2 opposing extremes. Shows he was more versatile.
As an opening batsman of yore, the objective of the opener is simply this - see off the fast bowling attack.
It's a psychological battle. Dent their fastest bowler and watch him droop, along with his fielders.
With every passing over, the batsman gets more set, better sight, greater confidence.
The fastie starts to slow a tad, less aggressive, less expectant when his best deliveries are blunted.
Win the opening salvo and the confidence permeates thru to the rest of the team
It's a psychological battle. Dent their fastest bowler and watch him droop, along with his fielders.
With every passing over, the batsman gets more set, better sight, greater confidence.
The fastie starts to slow a tad, less aggressive, less expectant when his best deliveries are blunted.
Win the opening salvo and the confidence permeates thru to the rest of the team
TheJediBrah
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It's not tho
GotSpin
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What are you on about
cnerd123
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Form has been proven to be a myth (statistically anyways), but getting set feels like a real thing to me. There have been plenty of cases where a player is just in the zone from ball 1 though, so maybe that's what Gnske is referring to - that you don't always need to spend time in the middle to 'get set'. Or maybe he's just being Gnske
http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/42481-class-permanent-form-illusion.html
Seems the charts posted in this thread aren't working anymore.
http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/42481-class-permanent-form-illusion.html
Seems the charts posted in this thread aren't working anymore.
TheJediBrah
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Of course it's a real thing, it's a physical/physiological process that extends to everything in life, not just cricket.
Say you just wake up and walk out into the sunlight and someone throws a tennis ball at you hard. Then later after you've been catching a ball for 15 minutes they do the same thing for the 200th time. Which occasion are you more likely to catch it/drop it? Your body/hands adjust to conditions and get into sync with your senses. It's not debatable, Gnske's just a tool
I'm not sure if the way you have expressed this is intentional, but something like this can't be proven (or disproven) statistically. It uses a dataset to draw correlation. I'm not sure how strong the correlation is in this, but the data set in the OP seems to use just 1 player and doesn't control for any variables (home/away and opposition quality would be big ones for example), so it's just about meaningless in a statistical sense.
Without a comprehensive statistical study, we can see clear anecdotal evidence that form exists, depending on how we define it. See Botham or Waqars career, or the last year or two of just about every bat ever. We call this form while they are still playing. Or a bat that gets worked out by opposition bowlers and goes on to reshape their game. Or a quick playing with a niggle, etc.
It's a good idea to challenge just about all of the truisms in cricket. Too many things are repeated to the point where they are held to be self-evident truths. Form might (or might not) be severely overestimated, but I don't think it can be completely disregarded.
ankitj
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Disproving form is a thing should not be particularly hard. You just have to check time correlation. If someone has done it and found no correlation between one innings score and the next, I would take it that form has been disproven. Looks like the thread that you share does that, haven't checked in detail though.
Getting set is certainly a thing. I have earlier tried to fit geometric distribution to the scores that batsmen get out for using Tendulkar as an example (because largest sample size). See chart. This distribution assumes that probability of getting out before scoring another run is independent on the current score you are at. The distribution fits at most places but at the start of an innings the actual dismissals are more than those predicted by geometric distribution. See an old discussion on this here.
ankitj
Hall of Fame Member
Disprove what? The chart I attached says nothing about form.
cnerd123
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I was confirming the first part of your post - you said you didn't check in detail, just assuring that it is what the thread tried to do just that the charts they made disappeared
The OP in the thread is only looking at Tendulkar. It's ridiculous to extrapolate from a single player to every player ever, and the choice is extremely questionable because he is the most famously consistent bat I know of.
In a purely statistical sense it's not possible. We will end up with a correlation, and we can interpret deviation, possibly to a satisfactory regard, which we could maybe simplify to proof in conversational terms rather than statistical ones. But there are too many extraneous variables with too great an impact to simplify it this way.
Take a simple, and very plausible example of a bat who averages 60 home and 40 away. He plays 10 consecutive home tests at an average of 60. An analysis that does not control for home/away average would interpret this as moderate? 'proof' that form exists, because this run of 20 innings@60 would likely fall outside of standard deviation despite being exactly average if controlling for home/away.
There's an infinite number of extraneous variables at play here that we could control for. Most of them will not have such an obvious impact, but there are some that we can't ignore. Opposition quality and style and pitch conditions are the most obvious that spring to mind. It might be possible to set up a group of control variables in a way that gives us an answer that we are comfortable with come close to a proof, but I'm not sure anyone has done this, or that anyone will bother.
The majority of players have notable protracted highs and lows in their careers. Almost everyone dips at the end before getting retired or dropped. I'm happy to call this form, and for me it is proof that form exists
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Exactly. Getting set is a real thing.
And in cricket, it's a harder ball than a tennis ball. And it comes faster at you. And at your body.
This is why batsmen need to play at balls lightly bowled to them before the match begins. They need to get into a groove, a zone, a rhythm.
I recall watching Test batsmen like Clive Lloyd, Rahul Dravid, even AR Imran Khan persistently patting balls before an exhibition match - demonstrating their commitment to batsmanship.
I would practice the day before and the day of the match.
The practice bowler is instructed to not bowl very difficult balls as this could upset the batsmen's rhythm going into the match.
While 'getting set' applies to an innings, ' form ' extends to a series or season.
Just like one gets ready to bat, one has to get ready for the series/season.
There are more variables involved in ' form ', both physical and psychological.
I used to have a good year, where I could not get out even if I tried. And some bad years, where I constantly fought the ball.
Thus the saying ' form is temporary, class is permanent '
SillyCowCorner1
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Getting set as a batsman in cricket is like getting laid