Cover Points : Fab Four

Dandling Ganguly

dcsiva — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:02:00 GMT

Looks like the new broom will be sweeping out the Fab Four some time soon. Straight Point doesn't think much of Srikkanth's apparent plan to make the retirement process public:

i don't have problem with...that knowing their future plans they will groom certain set of players which they deem fit as their reasonable replacements...

i don't even have any problem with management planning their farewell...befitting their stature and the services they rendered...and i sincerely believe...without an iota of doubt that......if we are treated as some force in world stage...most of that credit should go to them...

but what you get in return...this media trial?

Who is the most under pressure. The Press Trust of India reporter thinks Ganguly might be the first to go:

Will Srikkanth and co-selectors Yashpal Sharma, Narendra Hirwani, Surendra Bhave and Raja Venkat pull the rug on the career of Ganguly is the big question ahead of one of the most interesting selection panel meetings.
The 36-year-old Bengal stalwart, who staged a spectacular entry into Tests with a debut ton at Lord's in 1996, made a storming return to the five-day game in South Africa [Images] in late 2006 after losing his place earlier that year.
The classy left-hander amassed over 1100 runs with 239, his career-best score, against Pakistan in Bangalore in late 2007, at a fantastic average of 61.44 last year which compares very favourably with his career average of 41.74 in 109 Tests.
He has been unable to maintain that high in the current year though he has come up with important knocks like the 87 he made against the visiting South Africans at Kanpur that helped India level the three-Test rubber in April.
This, however, was followed by the left hander's poor run in Sri Lanka where his best score was 35 in six innings.

And Dileep Premachandran puts in a strong defense of Laxman:

Ganguly's time already appears to have run out, and it will be interesting to see if either Rahul Dravid or Sachin Tendulkar stay on past the tour of New Zealand next April. Laxman isn't even 34 yet, and calls for his head are utter nonsense. Against his favourite opponents, he may just prove why.

Here's an old post of mine defending the Fab Four as a whole. Finally, in some good news for Ganguly, a new type of reverse swing specifically for medium pace bowlers!

Champions, but not in Pakistan

dcsiva — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:45:00 GMT

Much electronic ink has been refreshed on the topic of the Champions Trophy and playing in Pakistan. Here's Amit Bajaj's take on the contrast between the BCCI and ACA:

The ACA has given more weightage to the report given by Reg Dickason, based on his short stay in Karachi. You can't blame the PCB for being unhappy as the ACA has largely ignored the more comprehensive report provided by Nicholls Steyn, the security experts hired by the ICC.

The BCCI's stand is not any show of bravado - it just shows a more intelligent understanding of the situation in Pakistan. Imran Khan does have a point when he points out that no cricket team or player has been the target of any terrorist activity ever. With the Australian players, it looks like their wives, girlfriends and the ACA have a bigger influence on their decision than an official ICC report. What remains to be seen now is how Cricket Australia reacts. Or will it be ICC that comes to its rescue?!

Here's Ottayan on the relationship between the ACA and the Players' Association in Australia:

However, yesterday’s statement from the Player’s Association that they will not play in Pakistan has added a new twist to the story. ICC feels that Cricket Australia is using the Players Association to escape making a decision.

In fact, an ICC source, who refused to be named, questioned whether the governing boards were hiding behind their "players" so as not to further antagonise India and the powerful Asian bloc which effectively rules the game.

This seems disingenuous to me at best. What on earth is wrong with having a Players' Association that wants to look after its members? There argument is wrong-headed, but they should have some input into the process surely?

Ottayan also links to an article by Mukul Kesavan on Indian batsmen and Ajantha Mendis. And, finally, Kartikeya also on the Fab Four as media project.

Fab Four not over yet

dcsiva — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:04:00 GMT

Straight Point recently wrote about the Fab Four for those who might be sleeping. And there has been a chorus of disapproval of their recent lack of runs.

I too am wary of statistics. What is the value of a statistical analysis? Or, even simpler, just the numbers themselves as a record of achievement? I simply don't know.

When the IPL started there was a lot of discussion about the value of numbers in evaluating performance. See the following old post by David Barry for an account of sabermetrics and cricket. Barry's excellent most recent post looks at bowlers' performance over time, asking if they get better with experience.

If a rolling five match Test bowling average is good enough for him, it's good enough for me. Here, more precisely, are graphs of each of the Fab Four's rolling 10 innings Test averages (edit: click on the images to see the full graph):

I defy anyone to pick out any kind of meaningful pattern here. For example, one might be tempted to say: "Look at Dravid's numbers over the last year...they're consistently hopeless...he ought to be dropped immediately." Well then just glance at Tendulkar's graph instead and note the low 10 innings average in 2006. Would dropping him then have been a sensible thing to do? Second guessing your way through all of this noise is a bad idea.

Here's the average of the rolling 10 innings average of the Fab Four (gulp!):

There have been very very few times that the average of the each of the Fab Four's rolling ten innings average has dipped well below 40. The last time in fact was at the tail end of 2000. That is, just after India doing very badly in Australia, before some easy Tests against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, and then the epic battle with Australia in that series.

If there's any value at all in looking at past performances, these graphs suggest that there is no long term decline in Fab Four efforts. Let them figure out when to retire by themselves. Or am I not awake yet?

Lanka progress and Fab Four decline

dcsiva — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 12:57:00 GMT

As England wrap up a final Test win against South Africa, with that cynical little man back in action, Sri Lanka win the series against India. Straight Point breaks out a statistics analysis against sleepy Fab Four supporters to argue that the Fab Four are in permanent decline not just in a temporary dip:

i wanted to put stats of other two (sehwag and gambirs) but i dropped the idea coz figures were embarrassing to compare...

if you further break it series per series basis...i.e. starting from Oz series to SA to SL series or breaking it from last 20 innings to last 15 to last 10 to even last 5 innings...

whichever way you wanna look at it...i am sure that...the decline will appear more continuously downwards...almost like a pattern...indicating that the fall in form is not temporary...or sudden...as we are being made to believe...

I'm not sure I'm awake yet. Mohan meanwhile sees a silver lining in Tendulkar getting injured---Badrinath gets a recall. But as Ottayan points out, the Vir-Gati opening combination that Tendulkar would have disrupted means that Badrinath is unlikely to play.

Lastly, a quiz from Patrick Kidd to help wake me up.