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There’s no problem picking five bowlers when one hits 87 and another hits 63.
There were some pretty expensive bowling figures knocking about after India finished their innings. Perhaps the nicest was Stuart Clark’s 0-92. Now we’ve nothing against Clark, but he shouldn’t be averaging under 20 with the ball. And now he doesn’t. And probably never will again.
A duck for Mike Hussey would help the part of our brain that gets ENRAGED about aberrant statistics to settle down again. We’ve barely slept in the last two years, worrying about it all.
Funny how English players have averages that make people go: ‘He’s better than that implies’ and Australian players have averages that make them go: ‘Now that’s misleading. He’s not quite that good.’
“I lean on statistics like a drunken man leans on a lamppost, only for support, not illumination.”
Not sure who said this, but I like it a lot..
We know that Clark’s a handy seam bowler, and that Hussey’s a useful batsman.
But they are by no means the best players in the world!
And hopefully Mr Cricket will have a Jimmy Adams fall from grace.
It was Navjot Sidhu, according to the internet. A man whose contribution to catchy cricket phraseology is entirely undermined by that whole ‘killing a man’ thing.
Another Sidhuism about statistics is: ‘Statistics are like miniskirts. They reveal more than they hide,’ which is weirdly contradictory to his other one.
I once heard of a man whose first name is Statistics.
its always nice to face the ‘real’ world…
if one wants to look how cold the statistics can be…one look no further than look back at perth test…
the contribution of sehwag and bowling of ishant…
That would be the fella..
I bet he’s wearing miniskirts now, and being looked after by a big fella called Bubba.
Miriam,
Can you imagine how horrible your parents would have to be to call you that. Geeky mathemeticians, shouldn’t be allowed to procreate, for this reason alone.
Think about, would you want to meet the offspring of “The Bearded Wonder”?
lampost quote:
David Brent also said it. But apparently Andrew Lang used it too.
No, I’ve no idea who Andrew Lang is. Some DWM apparently.
DWM?
That was quite, quite deliberate on your part Scientician, you bounder.
DWM = dead white male. It shocks me that you don’t know that TLA.
Re the lamppost quote – maybe he was talking about the man called Statistics.
Suave: Geeks rule.
It’s good that someone mentions the manslaughter thing with Sidhu. That it is not widely known is outrageous. It’s not even mentioned on his Cricinfo player profile.
I agree with Miriam on geeks. I don’t think I’d want to be named Statistics though.
Well statistics is not everything…I do agree with it…But Hussey has proved what he is capable of…May be this is a draught period for him…But even then I don’t think he can be called Mr.Cricket…
Perhaps we could call him Mr Statistics. Or Statistics Hussey.
I somehow believe Clarke’s average will continue to remain quite high… I feel instead of Johnson, Clarke should be given the new ball. He will prove to be more successful and dangerous.
He’s good though…rather useful at the moment for Australia till Tait shapes up better or someone else comes along.
That kind of thing has been said about all other teams too…but I guess the real reason for it is other teams have one or two bowlers of credit playing at a time while Australia exerts pr essure from all 11 sides all the time.
Therefore stats tend to look good in addition to what the player has done to deserve it. Maybe David can take up this theme and develop it? 🙂
You’d think that any self-respecting Mr Cricket would bowl every once in a while.
Ha ha.. I’ve been waiting for these two events for a while now too. Reality checks on Hussey’s and Clark’s averages. They’re good but not that good. It’s reassuring to know that I’m not the only one who’s disconcerted by lopsided statistics.