Stats are important. Most cricketers, commentators & media folk love them. Just in the build up to this series we have been bombarded with stats. Nothing wrong there. Wisden is great. I always have one to hand. It is vital to know the facts. But, over the past few days I have noticed a great deal of additional comment and views, mainly on blogs, that is also pertinent. You see, if you look down any score sheet from any test it will tell you what happened. Who was bowled and by who. How many they scored, how long it took. Facts. Clinical. What they never show is Flintoff being bowled off a no-ball on 14 and going on to make a century; a disputed LBW; a catch that didn't quite carry. A good example of facts making someone looking better than they were is Shane Warne's figures for England's 2nd Innings of the first test:
S K Warne 34 overs 7 maidens 124 runs 4 wickets. Which gave him an average of 31 at an economy rate of 3.6. Not bad. But the reality of it was that Warne struggled at times. Both KP & Colly got on top of him. He was frustrated enough to throw the ball at his old mucker KP. His speed was different from the first innings, and at times he looked less than the great bowler that he is. That is why it is vital that the public record their own views. In the future technology will be such that before a journalist writes a preview article on a forthcoming test series it may be that he not only looks at Wisden, but also at the countless blogs for a real balanced view. Who knows, there may even come a time when the Selectors canvass our opinions before picking a squad!
2 comments:
I'm not sure that I'd want to be captaining a side where Joe Public had a hand in selection.
Here in Australia, selectors take the time to watch four day cricket, which the average punter certainly does not, so I'd still defer to the expert view of a selector ahead of my own.
Good point about journalism though.
I agree that we don't actually want the public to pick the side, but what we do want is less of a distance between the what the public would like to see and what the Selectors do. My point was that whilst they are the experts they are also out of touch with reality! Now, I don't want to make it into some mad reality TV show but surely as we are the people who pay for it all through our attendence at matches, buying the merchanising & subscriptions to sports channels, as consumers, that should give us a right to a point of view!
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