• Welcome to the Cricket Web forums, one of the biggest forums in the world dedicated to cricket.

    You are currently viewing our boards as a guest which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community you will have access to post topics, respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join the Cricket Web community today!

    If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us.

Which statistics did you value most in cricket as a kid? And which ones now?

mr_mister

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
It's late at night and I don't feel like explaining this properly, but as a kid in the late 90s all I cared about was a Batsman's high score and a Bowler's best figures. I was so annoyed when Steve Waugh got out for 199 against the WI in '99 as I wanted his score of 200 to be broken. I felt he deserved a higher 'high score' to justify his quality as a batsman. This also tricked me into thinking Mark Taylor was the best player around due to the 334* on his resume. I still have every Ashes player from the 98/99 series memorised off by heart. I considered Stewart to be slighty better than Athers based on his high score being 5 runs more.


Eventually I started caring heaps about overall runs and wickets, matches and catches. Watching Taylor beat Borders record for catches, then Mark Waugh beat that soon after, it was cool. Quantity over quality type stuff.



Now I'm all about averages, like so many people here. For so long a batting average meant nothing to me, now I view it as the one true measure of a batsman's skill. I think reading about Bradman(I used to scoff at his 56 matches and 7000 runs when I was 10) and realising what an average of 100 actually meant dawned on me around age 13 or so.


Despite strikerates meaning a lot, I've never cared about them beyond the novelty of seeing how high someone's batting strikerate can get in an individual innings.



I assume most people's statistical preference followed a similar path?
 
Last edited:

indiaholic

International Captain
Career milestones I suppose.. I used to care about Tendulkar crossing Bradman's and Gavaskar's runs tally and the centuries record. I was happy that Kapil Dev held the record for most number of wickets etc.. Now I am deeply skeptical of all statistics. Almost all of it is used to justify biases.
 

vcs

Request Your Custom Title Now!
I also used to care a lot about batsmen's top scores as a kid. And number of ODI centuries. I remember Desmond Haynes used to be far ahead of everyone else with 17 and it seemed to take Sachin forever to get his first one after a lot of 80s. Also I distinctly remember being annoyed when he struggled to convert 160-plus scores in the '90s into double centuries. Must have happened at least 5-6 times before he finally got a double.

Also I remember Azhar holding the record for fastest ODI century for a while (61 balls). Seemed like Mount Everest at the time.
 
Last edited:

Howe_zat

Audio File
I love digging through records but career average tracking has rarely floated my boat.

I find medium to long term Test stats can be quite helpful but ODI stats mostly useless.

Have never been very interested in bowling speeds but I think I would be if they were more reliably measured.
 

Day Man

School Boy/Girl Cricketer
Batting and bowling averages.
# of centuries.
Fastest 50s and 100s and most wickets in an innings/Test.
Highest chases in ODIs and getting to 300.

Did not really care about strike rates and longevity. The 90s were such simpler times.
 

Blain

U19 Captain
Always been averages for me. It annoys me now on Cricinfo live scoring they only have strike rate and career runs? Seriously.. Stupid. The Big Bash does the same, must be to hide all the **** averages.
 

91Jmay

International Coach
Always been averages for me. It annoys me now on Cricinfo live scoring they only have strike rate and career runs? Seriously.. Stupid. The Big Bash does the same, must be to hide all the **** averages.
Averages in T20 aren't that vital though to be fair. I have always liked Batting index for T20.
 

NUFAN

Y no Afghanistan flag
Ok ill do it.. Bradman played 52 Tests.

As a kid I was all about averages. I remember dad saying early on that if you average 40 with the bat you are very good and 50 great. Wise words.

Nowadays its all about the moneyball ratings and the stats that show a bat has made twin 50s and taken a hat-trick in their career. If I have a kid they will be messed up.
 

doesitmatter

U19 Cricketer
As a kid i used to blindly follow players batting and bowling averages but not contemplating the nuances behind it.. for example things like home or away averages if away against which country the player struggled, what kind of bowling he struggled against etc? Now the same thing but with the nuances i described above but in the same token lost the fun of watching with too many things cooking in the brain..Long lost kid days..Early morning, sipping hot tea, Tendulkar batting in Australia, Benaud commentary, just earning to see that solid backfoot defence or a backfoot punch against Brad Williams,Brett Lee or McGrath without any care of anybody's record......
 

91Jmay

International Coach
Ok ill do it.. Bradman played 52 Tests.

As a kid I was all about averages. I remember dad saying early on that if you average 40 with the bat you are very good and 50 great. Wise words.

Nowadays its all about the moneyball ratings and the stats that show a bat has made twin 50s and taken a hat-trick in their career. If I have a kid they will be messed up.
Yeah i remember my Dad saying exactly the same thing about batting averages, to be fair it still largely holds true + 3 to 5 runs.
 

Starfighter

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Same as the OP. It was all about high score and best innings bowling, except for Don Bradman, who was (and is) always the best.
Sanath Jayasuriya's HS of 340 made him amazing despite despite his average of 40.07 being nothing special, while Joel Garner's best of 'only' 6/59 meant he was clearly mediocre at best.
Now I care about in context figures, so home and away averages, the quality of the opposition and so on.
 

Bijed

International Regular
When I was growing up and cricket was on Channel 4, I used to pay very close attention to the speeds bowlers reached and kept a log of the fastest speeds I'd seen. I also used to spend all my time looking through the averages in my dad's Playfair annuals, mostly the bowling averages. Things like individual scores didn't really interest me, to be honest, though extremes such as Lara's 400* did register as being noteworthy.

These days I don't place that much bearing to stats with regards to forming an opinion on players, except in the more extreme cases. Still find them interesting, though, and have a greater interest in stats other than just averages.
 

Prince EWS

Global Moderator
I've honestly never really cared about aggregates or records much at all. I'm an averages man and always have been, with an interest in batting strikes rates and bowling economy rates in limited overs cricket (but only limited overs cricket).

If I've changed at all, it's that I used to care more about overall career averages where I'm now more likely to want to take a player's peaks and troughs into full context over a long career. I also care a lot more about longevity now, which I measure more in years played rather than matches.
 

Athlai

Not Terrible
I've honestly never really cared about aggregates or records much at all. I'm an averages man and always have been, with an interest in batting strikes rates and bowling economy rates in limited overs cricket (but only limited overs cricket).

If I've changed at all, it's that I used to care more about overall career averages where I'm now more likely to want to take a player's peaks and troughs into full context over a long career. I also care a lot more about longevity now, which I measure more in years played rather than matches.
This but I care less about longevity than Cribblet.
 

morgieb

Request Your Custom Title Now!
Like lots I have always tended to favour the old average, but these days I tend to look at the context of said averages more etc.
 

Top