And off we go...
For the last 50-over World Cup?
Warm-up games before, and during, bilateral tours are pretty much extinct now but they used to provide amusing sub-plots. Steve Waugh was the first captain to unapologetically treat them as net-sessions with fielders replacing the netting. On Ashes tours, when they occasionally lost a county game, he would smile sardonically, sometimes sarcastically, before reminding people about which results mattered. And which didn’t.
It’s taken a couple of decades but Waugh’s methodology is now in hyper-drive before the World Cup. Most teams have been going out of their way to make sure people know the results really don’t matter. Pakistan’s Babar Azam retiring on 90 within sight of Australia’s total of 350 being just one of a series of obvious examples. New Zealand’s batsmen just retired when they were thirsty.
Teams with limited tactical options, like South Africa, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, stuck fairly closely to their plan ‘A’ because ‘B’ and ‘C’ are only there for emergencies, although there was still time for some scenario-planning. Given that South Africa will only ever have a maximum of six bowling options in any starting XI, what would happen if one of the frontline five was injured after just an over or two?
That would leave sixth bowler Aiden Markram as a sitting duck with the opposition knowing that he would have to bowl eight or nine overs. Unless…a few overs could be burgled from someone else. Cue – Heinrich Klassen, who used to be a semi-respectable part-time off spinner. He even has six wickets in domestic List ‘A’ cricket. But no, there’s plenty of that around. Instead he delivered three overs of medium pace so filthy they bordered on pornographic. They might just work. It’s unlikely anyone outside the Netherlands would have faced similar after the age of 13.
There is more analysis and more columns of statistics before this tournament than ever before, just one of many results of T20 cricket’s take over. People make a living from it now and many others supplement their day jobs. Grab any numerical gem you fancy and you can turn it into a prediction, a theory or even a thesis.
Between the last World Cup and this one, more teams have been bowled out in ODIs than in any other four-year cycle between tournaments. Actually, the last two years have seen more innings fail to reach the end of 50 overs than any others – 37.5% in 2022 and 43.94% in 2023. Put that into your stat salad and toss.
Experience? Five of the ten squads have an average age over 30 – India, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa with defending champions England marginally the oldest. Four squads average over 60 caps – India, Australia, New Zealand and England with South Africa in fifth place on 55 caps. Wait, that’s the same five teams. Coincidence? Add it to the salad.
In the last 10 overs South Africa has scored at an average of 7.9 in the last three years, higher than any other team. India, Australia and Pakistan average between 7.25 and 7.54 while England ‘only’ average 6.94. But England already have 50 more runs than the others by the start of the last 10.
Another huge talking point is about the 50-over format itself and whether it will survive the four years until it’s next big global gathering in South Africa, in 2027. In case you haven’t been paying attention, it has already started dying. Between the 1999 WC and the 2003 version, a total of 433 ODIs were played around the world. The total peaked at an all-time high between the ’03 and ’07 tournaments at 458 before averaging out at around 380 in the next three four-year cycles. Between the 2019 event and this one, however, there were just 194 ODIs.
Other than in England, bilateral ODIs have become financially unsustainable. And it hasn’t gone unnoticed by broadcasters and sponsors that England have taken to selecting ‘B’ teams in 50-over cricket. The top players are playing it less and less. It is only a matter of time before it disappears. It has been suggested that the format is kept only for World Cups which is like telling marathon runners they can only do 10km training runs before the big race.
This World Cup will make a record profit for the ICC which will be distributed to its members, both greedy and grateful. On that basis alone it will survive until it reaches South Africa but stand by for some pruning to 40 overs per side. After that, the T20 take-over will be complete. There will be precious few administrators nostalgic about the golden years of 50-over cricket, just as there are none today who wistfully recall 60-over cricket with which the World Cup began.
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There are 23 South Africa-born players in the ten squads and 18 India-born players, but if you include the South Africans amongst the coaching staff then you’ve got over 30. Jonathan Trott is head coach of Afghanistan, Allan Donald coaches Bangladesh’s fast bowlers, Ryan Cook is in charge of the Netherlands, Mickey Arthur is Pakistan’s Director of Cricket and Andy Flower, a consultant with Australia, was born in Cape Town. I know, there are others…
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Finally, a couple of months ago I wrote a column about Thomas Kaber, the former SA Under-19 left arm wrist spinner now languishing in the second division with the Garden Route Badgers in South Western Districts. I suggested that unassuming, modest players like him can slip through the myriad of T20 scouting networks which now exist around the world, despite impressive playing records. Last week he was bought at the SA20 Player Auction by no less than… the Mumbai Indians! His first high-profile T20 gig. Go Thomas - first of many.
