Return of the Armchair All-Rounder: Match Analysis, BD vs Aus ODI #2

[RazabQ]

I'm back! Having watched every ball of this ODI and most of Bangladesh's games I wanted to give my two anas and look at why we got clobbered yesterday.

BD Innings:
People have talked to death about IK's horrible ball-hogging. The irony is that this is nothing new. IK has always struggled to play angles and rotate strike. If there's width he'll thrash and he seems to have shelved the compulsive hooking/pulling of his. Other than that his game is/has always been built on circumspection in the face of good bowling (his ODI strike rate of 64% is close to his List A one of 70%). And he doesn't get noticed as much because he's in the slip stream of his partner (http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/eng...;view=fow_list) And that last part bears repeating. Good bowling. Not Sreesanth bowling all over the place on a shirt-front - which has been IK's most/only explosive performance to date.

What the Aussie pacers, and Lee in particular did well yesterday was bowl wicket to wicket, giving no room and they bowled FAST. For good measure they also varied their lengths wonderfully. Imrul looked what he was - outclassed. And when he did get balls in his preferred areas he kept finding the fielder.

About Fatty McFatty aka TIK, well he's a pinch-hitter ainnit? Watto pulled off the kind of blinder our slip fielders dream off and that was that.

Nafees did the best he could till he gave it away by the lack of taking a big stride out to meet Steve's ordinary tweakers. His body language was better, he was positive in his footwork, and once he got past his initial slashing-at-balls-outside-off phase, shot selection in general was decent. I've always liked him and he maybe playing himself back into the #3 or even opening slot.

Rok's out for nothing was a blessing in disguise. In present form and mindset he does NOT belong in a club side, let alone the Tigers. Such a high back-lift and yet he's consistently late on his strokes. Playing from his crease with no intent to meet the ball. Poor bat-speed. Lack of a follow-through. He's just negativeness personified! Surely Alok or Shubagoto gets a game in his place on the final ODI?

Shak got out to the best ball bowled by a spinner over both innings. Drifted away, dipped and ripped through the gate to take bails. Happens and no need to castigate the batter there. Would Shak have batted more positively today? Guess we'll never know.

Mushy & Riyadh played the kind of innings that is their "natural game". They had the impending collapse as grounds for "playing themselves in" and then attempting to "accelerate". They don't have a power-game and so the best one can hope from these two is that they scamper the singles and twos and hits the odd cheeky boundary or two. Mushy basically played himself back to form. Initially he was finding the fielders with regularity, as he has been wont to of late. But, he didn't get out and eventually was able to find the gaps. He was also lucky to come in and face just the spinners - he is shaky against pacers early. But one needs that little luck.

Two minor quibbles about this partnership - Mushy should have requested a runner. We missed out on some twos because of his cramps. Second - the bat seems to turn in their hand whenever they try to come down the wicket and hit down. Combination of footwork not being good enough so that they are _beside_ the ball when making contact and not having more control of their top-hand. These are coachable aspects.

Some macro points: All batters also need to get better at taking pace of their strokes to long-on and long-off. Which leades me to point #2. Overall our batters continued to show their lack of fitness by not regularly running the first one hard and thereby creating the opportunity for the 2nd run.

In contrast, the Aussie fielding and athleticism was wonderful to watch. Old man Hussey sprinting to stop a near boundary and firing a throw in. Lee running like a mad man all over their place; these guys are well past 30! And their bowling was sooo consistent. Even their weak links such as Xavi bowled wicket to wicket lines. Very few long-hops. Lots of variations of pace. Consistently on around off and mid stump. These guys are playing with a chip on their shoulder after getting bounced from the World Cup. They've done their homework for these pitches and fielding is backing up some outstanding execution of bowling plans.

Our total was 40-50 short of what that pitch and opponent's class demanded but given our batting capabilities and the Aussie excellence I really can't expect more if a Tamim or Shak (our only two explosive players) don't fire.

Aussie Innings:
Obviously Shane Watson is the story here. But for a twist, I will begin by focusing first on the one bowler who did not suffer as much carnage - Shak. What did he do that he didn't get a double digit bowling economy (in fact it was 5 RPO off 7 overs including during PowerPlays).

1. Avoiding bowling at Watto at his rampage. Possibly but he bowled in the PP with a new ball and was still not tonked as much as the other bowlers. So that's a red herring. Even if he hid himself later, that does not take away from what he did in the 7 overs.
2. He didn't bowl too many down leg side. It's a pity this series doesn't offer hawk-eye charts but Shak really bowled only 3-4 deliveries on leg side and a couple of them because the batter had moved onside to create room for himself. His lines were very good.
3. Varied his pace. This was big. Ala Vettori, he really mixed up his pace and did not just fire darts (Razzak) or throw up loopy ones (Shubho).
4. Varied his length but erred on the fuller side. That's typical Shak anyway - in fact in the recent past he was guilty of bowling too full - but he bowled the ball just slightly fuller then good length and that combined with the variation of pace prevented Watto from being able to consistently tee up and execute on his slog sweeps and straightish horizontal bat forehands.
5. When he got hold of a batsman not named Watto he kept him on strike by bowling to his field. Witness the maiden against Punter. Every ball different, every ball matching what the batsman was trying to do and fielders in the right place.
6. The Aussies went with their typical strategy of playing out the opponents' one class bowlers (see stats of Vettori and Murali compared to the rest of their team-mates against the 'Roos). But given that Shak did get tonked on when he erred, this one's a red-herring as well.

Now compare that to rest of the spinners:

• Bowling length deliveries. Lots.
• Bowling on leg stump. Loads!
• Bowling long hops. More than any international bowler should.

Full credit to Shane for treating them disdainfully and having the power and intent to dispatch them but this tripe shouldn't have been bowled in the first place! Shak kinda hinted at it - that when the ball was new and not stopping ("holding" was the term he used), we did not bowl at the right areas. Which would have been a fuller length, on off (or on the 4th stump if Watto was moving offside) so that the skidders would have a chance to cramp him for room. And all of these bowled at more or less the same pace. Again don't have hawk-eye to double-check but there was no great variation from Shubho or Razzak until their final over or two. By then Watto was in the zone and even when they bowled a decent one, he was smoking them.

However it wasn't the spinners I hold the most culpable. It's the pacers. In any attack, your "fast bowlers" set the tone. If they are accurate, hostile, parsimonious and penetrative, the spinners can thrive. Our man Shafiul - who seems to wilt whenever there is a biffer of the mode of a Shewag or Shane at the receiving end, started bowling wide and giving Watto room to free his arm, then over compensated by bowling leggish and then over compensated by bowling full. Pathetic. You see such stuff in school cricket! His partner Rubel could not land two balls on the same spot. When your captain does/can not have the faith that you will intimidate the opponents enforcers, then what hope can the spinners have. One of the big reasons for the Banglawash of the Kiwis was that the pacers were consistently taking care of Macca and Rider - the Kiwi biffers. In these days of powerful bats and baseball infused slugging, without early domination of hitters, spinners will have a tough time.

As for fielding - we didn't dive often quickly enough a few times and displayed horrible lack of anticipation on the two dropped catches. Razzak had the opportunity to do those neat tricks where you palm the ball up and then come back inside the rope to complete the catch. Something like this: . But who am I kidding. Razzak could advertise for Geritrol with his fielding "abilities". Otherwise actually the fielding was ok. Not much fielding to do when the ball is in the galleries! As or Rok's drop - isn't he supposed to be in our R.A.B? Perhaps his poor batting is impacting his typically competent fielding.

Final verdict: an Okay essay with the bat given the quality of the bowling and fielding we faced and an acceptable one with the limited attacking batsmanship we have. And then defending we did not set the right tone and let an outstanding player utilize our lack of quality to quickly put us under the kind of cosh from which we, as a cricketing nation, have never been able to recover (Macca's 28 ball 80 in the 3rd ODI in 2007, England's 391 for 4 in 2005, etc.)

On a different note,
A word about our soon to be former head coach, Jamie:
We always argue about his negativity (quite possibly true) and his inability to get the team to take advantage of PowerPlays but is it really his fault? Kudos to Holden (http://www.banglacricket.com/alochon...0&postcount=13) for unearthing this:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/wc2007/c...ry/291947.html

So Jamie converted Watson into the boundary hitting machine he is today, and that too for the PP overs. Clearly the fact that we have no one in our side who can do it is more one of skillacq and skillapp issue and not teaching/coaching; Jamies protestations indicate as much too. Add to that we don't have hulks of a batsmen. Our tallest batters, Junaid & Riyadh are of the "min-min" typee and reluctant to use their god-given power.

Oh well c'est la vie. Hoping the upwards trajectory continues in ODI #3.

[Boomerang]

I guess Imrul and Rokibul have got heavy bats. While they start to swing the bat on the half way stage they get strain on the muscle that let them to block the ball. I can remember my old school days when i was always given a heavy bat by my friends( actually i was never a strong boy) and i could just barely hit any ball.

[RazabQ]

I've held Rok's bat when he came to InterSports. Not THAT heavy but anyway, interesting insight.

[Night_wolf]

rokibul when out of this team have the fighting sprite of an ox...how can we get rid of him?...when given chance he has proven time after time...remember before the eng series,before the wc and also before this series..its really to throw a guy out when he is proving himself in giving opportunities...i say next time we dont give him any opportunities..horrible as it sounds this is the only way to get rid of this guy otherwise he'll again score something before the next series and come back into the team and again fail when it matters..

by the way nice read

[ahnaf]

Lol.. Nice to know watto's reaction about his change... The truth is it we dont have that kind of bighitter or even someone who could turn to be a bighitter..

[mij]

We need batting coach, who can make us batter batsman. This coach is just not good enough.

[Banglatiger84]

Talking of athleticism, who else winced when the commentator said something like "Mushfiqur is really struggling here, he seems to have cramps", just after getting his 50.
I know it was hot out there but still...

[Night_wolf]

Originally Posted by mij
We need batting coach, who can make us batter batsman. This coach is just not good enough.

then who is good enough for us?..cant we just acknowledge that we are not good enough?

[BANFAN]

Originally Posted by Night_wolf
then who is good enough for us?..cant we just acknowledge that we are not good enough?

Can't you acknowledge the coach isn;t good enough?

If a class does bad, you dont change the class, rathar you change the teacher, who is proven incapable by the result of his class.

And you dont mind blaming about 30 pool players who are all wrong IYO and your one man is all correct?

[Zeeshan]

Razabda very good quality, but only tip please hypperlink the dab of code in the middle.

Otherwise top-notch analysis.

[Zeeshan]

About Fatty McFatty aka TIK, well he's a pinch-hitter ainnit?

lol

[Sohel]

Exceptional analysis as expected Razab, and thank you for it. Agree with every single one of your observations. I sincerely hope more quality analysis find themselves caught in the slipstream you're offering here.

[cricket_dorshok]

very good analysis.

[AsifTheManRahman]

Razab bhai, how about turning this into a column?

[Zunaid]

Originally Posted by AsifTheManRahman
Razab bhai, how about turning this into a column?

I had asked him when he wrote the first one umpteen years ago. The bum got promoted and claims he does not have time.

[lamisa]

great analysis. i hope rok doesn't play the next odi.such a waste.

[RazabQ]

Z bhai - put this in the queue. Needs the language a little more formalized. You know "can't" becomes "cannot", Rok becomes Rokibul etc. Plus I may have overused "so".

All, glad to know I haven't lost it

[RazabQ]

I do promise to do one for ODI #3.

[Akib]

Great analysis! Much better than the mass of "Drop Player X" or "FIRE EVERYONE" threads that pop up after losses.

I think one of the biggest problems with out cricket (other than lack of domestic structure) is fitness. And I don't mean just being a tad overweight like Tamim. Compare our guys to other cricketers from other nations... Do ours even look like athletes... What do we feed them? They need to hit the gym!

[Night_wolf]

Originally Posted by BANFAN
Can't you acknowledge the coach isn;t good enough?

If a class does bad, you dont change the class, rathar you change the teacher, who is proven incapable by the result of his class.

And you dont mind blaming about 30 pool players who are all wrong IYO and your one man is all correct?

i acknowledge that siddons negative mindset was bad for us..but batting wise he is not a bad coach..blaming him doesn't justify him..as Holden Pointed out that Watson was largely benefited by siddons,its our own gullibility that we were not able to get something out of him...and enough with the blames..its our own fault that we are in this position in international cricket...10 years have passed and we are still in the dark ages in the domestic cricket..all of our players learn to play quality cricket in the international stage and that isn't a good place to start ur basics

[RazabQ]

@Akib: physique != fitness. I agree our players tend not to be buff, musclebound figures but Riyadh, Mushi, Junaid are actually quite chiseled. Part is our genes and part is our protein-light diets heavy on carbs. However that is NOT connected to being out of breath after 30 min at the crease. Do you know the Aussies practice in 3 layers of clothing in the Northern Territories (warmest, most humid part) so that they are acclimatised for the weather? How do our players "bleep" ratings compare with theirs? With a younger and lighter weight squad we should be running circles around their fitness - not the other way round! They have Hussey and we have Fatty McFatty. 'Nuff 'sed.

[Avik]

enlightening analysis. objective. bhalo lagse pore.

[Robi]

Originally Posted by BANFAN
Can't you acknowledge the coach isn;t good enough?

If a class does bad, you dont change the class, rathar you change the teacher, who is proven incapable by the result of his class.

And you dont mind blaming about 30 pool players who are all wrong IYO and your one man is all correct?

Well i cant say about who is blaming whom or what,but to explain ur anology banfan,in a class of 30 students not all come first.only one does,but the teacher gives the same teaching to all the thirty students.

why all the thirty dont do well? coz all of them dont put the same effort..

in the same way.our team has sakib and tamim...coz they work that hard.before siddons.we had only Mr Ash..talent but no consistancy..

Tamim and shak, are the product of siddons.and what i see there has been some improvements.maybe not as expected.

we can argue about that for all day long.and i dont wish to waste my time on that.the only reason i felt like replying to ur comment,coz it seemed u had a blind eye against siddons..and i personally dont like,to discredit someones hardwork,no matter how small it is,even if it doesnt bring any result.as long as someones trying.


for now siddons is leaving.if he has done some good.those result will remain.if he hasnt,who ever new coach will come i hope he improves the team further.

i wish you all the best.have a great day.

[Robi]

RazabQ good analysis.
it must be hard for you to prepare such analysis,really appreciate..

(just if you could make a few more after a series )

[Asif68]

Originally Posted by BANFAN
Can't you acknowledge the coach isn;t good enough?

If a class does bad, you dont change the class, rathar you change the teacher, who is proven incapable by the result of his class.

And you dont mind blaming about 30 pool players who are all wrong IYO and your one man is all correct?

Yes but when the class fails time and time again you should just suspend them all. The coach and players both are to blame, now coach is gone if the players fail again which they will then who will we blame? Siddons sucks but I feel bad for him for having to coach a team as bad as ours