Over Rates: Is there an answer ?

[Midwinter]

Occasional mention on the radio yesterday about the inability of the test teams to bowl the 90 overs in a six hour day,regardless of delays. When play could be extended for an extra hour the over rate was dragged out to fill the time available

In shield cricket this is a matter of course and at one point teams had to bowl 100 overs in day.

It is a deliberate tatic to reduce the number of balls bowled to limit the scoring, (this goes way back to Hutton and the 51 overs in a day).

In ODI's the penalties for not bowling the overs are severe wuth the captains being suspended for repeated occurrences.

So why is the slow (and low over) rate tolerated in tests ?

I think the answer is simply to suspend the captain of the teams that don't bowl the overs.

But will this happen ?

 

[Uppercut]

To be honest, unless it's obviously part of a tactic to slow the scoring, i don't really care. It's only when Paul Collingwood delays repeatedly and ridiculously while waiting for rain to cost NZ an ODI that it annoys me. And i don't think captains should be forced to give a part-time spinner too many overs just because they're supposed to speed up the over rate.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

How about we kill every cricketer who slows down the efficiency of perfect test cricket.

NO RUN-UPS
OLD BALL
NO APPEALS
FINAL DESTINATION

 

[fredfertang]

On the subject of over rates there are some interesting stats available for the Ashes Series of 1938 – a days play then was 5 hours 55 mins playing time - 11.30 to 6.30 with 45 mins for lunch and 20 for tea.

1st Test

Day 1 of 4 125 overs
Day 2 124 overs
Day 3 129 overs
Day 4 124 overs

An extra 15 mins was played on Day 3 for some reason (due to tea being taken on the pitch in 5 mins!) and 10 minutes less on Day 4

2nd Test

Day 1 of 4 115 overs
Day 2 111 overs
Day 3 47 overs
Day 4 107 overs

2 hours 40 mins only playing time on Day 3

3rd Test was completely abandoned due to rain

4th Test

Day 1 of 4 111 overs
Day 2 103 overs ( bad light 37 mins lost)
Day 3 65 overs ( 13 mins lost – and finished at 4.15)

5th Test - to be played to a finish

Day 1 131 overs
Day 2 113 overs (58 mins lost rain/bad light)
Day 3 122 overs
Day 4 57 overs (finished at 3.37)

Quick bowlers bowled around 28% of the overs, spinners 52% and medium pacers 20% - the Australians relied on the spinners O’Reilly and Fleetwood-Smith a great deal and their only quickish bowler, McCormick, didn’t play in the timeless fourth test. England on the other hand had Ken Farnes throughout and Wellard/Bowes or Hammond opening with him.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

How long were runups?

 

[Craig]

Give them a hefty finincial penalty and if they don't work it out, ban them.

 

[fredfertang]

How long were runups?

If you go to www.movietone.com you can find a few clips of the various bowlers although you need a bit of patience

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

If you go to www.movietone.com you can find a few clips of the various bowlers although you need a bit of patience

Awesome, cheers.

 

[pasag]

Look, it's an issue, but seriously it's starting to really grind my gears how it's being banged on about on radio constantly, by some posters who bring it up in every post and from certain television commentators. Bloody hell, it's all you hear about during this series and I'm kind of wishing for another massive Aus-Ind controversy so people start talking about something else

/rant

 

[silentstriker]

Penalty should not be financial. They don't care about losing a match fee if its going to save Tests.

Penalty should be runs. If the opposition is scoring at 4 runs an over, and you are six overs behind, the opposition should have 24 runs added to their tally as extras. That'll stop it mighty quick, if during the course of the game, you're giving away 50-60 runs.

 

[silentstriker]

How long were runups?

These days though, even with two spinners, you rarely see more than 15 overs/hour. SO I don't think that's it. Captains these days want to change a field after every ball, and bowlers have a 40 minute ritual before every ball.

 

[pasag]

^ Meh.

For the record I'm not saying it's not a problem, I even started a thread about it and called it a blight on the game:

http://forum.cricketweb.net/showthread.php?t=25417

However, mention it and move on, don't need to hear about it every two seconds especially when half the time it's just people repeating what's been said by the commentators. I bet you if the commentators never brought it up, most of the people going on about it constantly wouldn't even notice.

 

[silentstriker]

^ Meh.

For the record I'm not saying it's not a problem, I even started a thread about it and called it a blight on the game:

http://forum.cricketweb.net/showthread.php?t=25417

However, mention it and move on, don't need to hear about it every two seconds especially when half the time it's just people repeating what's been said by the commentators. I bet you if the commentators never brought it up, most of the people going on about it constantly wouldn't even notice.

Not saying its a huge problem, but I do think if you want to do something about it, run penalty is what you should do.

I think there is a limit though. 12 overs is just way too little. I'm fine with 14-15.

 

[G.I.Joe]

These days though, even with two spinners, you rarely see more than 15 overs/hour. SO I don't think that's it. Captains these days want to change a field after every ball, and bowlers have a 40 minute ritual before every ball.

Would help to have fewer of the Watson type bowlers who believe in glaring and mouthing off at the batsman after every delivery. A common theme in the videos of the old tests was the bowler briskly walking back to his mark once the ball was collected by the keeper.

 

[silentstriker]

Would help to have fewer of the Watson type bowlers who believe in glaring and mouthing off at the batsman after every delivery. A common theme in the videos of the old tests was the bowler briskly walking back to his mark once the ball was collected by the keeper.

Overrates are slow by people who don't mouth either. I don't think that's really it.

 

[G.I.Joe]

Overrates are slow by people who don't mouth either. I don't think that's really it.

Then there's pretty much little else other than extended field placements to account for the difference between 20 and 13 overs an hour.

 

[Prince EWS]

Look, it's an issue, but seriously it's starting to really grind my gears how it's being banged on about on radio constantly, by some posters who bring it up in every post and from certain television commentators. Bloody hell, it's all you hear about during this series and I'm kind of wishing for another massive Aus-Ind controversy so people start talking about something else

/rant

Couldn't agree more.

 

[Richard]

Well I don't know how much it's been overdone on Aussie\India radio\TV, but it hasn't where I've been looking. Over-rates have been poor, by all teams, against all teams, for almost all bowlers with the occasional exception of the Sri Lankans who have always taken a tactic of rushing through the overs sometimes, for many years now. It's something that does need sorting-out IMO. I agree with this post most:

Penalty should not be financial. They don't care about losing a match fee if its going to save Tests.

Penalty should be runs. If the opposition is scoring at 4 runs an over, and you are six overs behind, the opposition should have 24 runs added to their tally as extras. That'll stop it mighty quick, if during the course of the game, you're giving away 50-60 runs.

I'm not entirely sure about the formula, I think the penalty needs to be constant (for example, maybe 12 runs for every over per hour where 15 are not completed, barring extenuating circumstances - eg, if a team bowls 12.3 overs in an hour the batting side gets 36 penalty runs) but the penalty has to be in runs terms. Not a fan of banning players for anything other than Code Of Conduct breaches TBH.

 

[Neil Pickup]

Don't see why we can't just start earlier and extend sessions to make people get 90 in the day. If the fielding team are stuck with a 3 hour last session because they couldn't be bothered to get on with it, then it's their loss.

 

[GIMH]

I would suggest having both batsmen on strike at the same time. For example, tomorrow morning Australia could have Lee and Clark bowling a ball from opposite ends at the same time - it would lead to some really impressive catches, as fielders caught a ball in each hand. It would also lead to more attacking team selection, as four bowlers would never be enough.