Gearing-up for ‘The Hundred – Southern Hemisphere Success
Existing readers will have seen announcements about appointing Coaches for The Hundred at eight city locations: Manchester, Leeds, Nottingham, Birmingham, Cardiff, Southampton plus two in London (Lord’s and the Oval). Early days for naming squads. Anyone thought of: ‘Ladies at Lord’s’?
A more serious question is how Overseas cricketers are divided fairly, between each squad.
Existing Coaches will want to select top-ranked Overseas players who can either: (a) score faster than 1.5 runs per ball; (b) score at least four 50’s; (c) bowl unplayable ‘dot-balls to stop run chases in their tracks; (d) take quick wickets; or (e) at least two of these. Previous ‘quick and dirty’ analysis of Super League (’19) data revealed that most players struggle to hit a strike rate of one-run-per-ball.
Top five batters – came from the southern hemisphere
Strike rates per ball are calculated in proportion to runs scored per hundred balls. Top five Overseas batters with personal-best fastest strike rates were:
(1) New Zealand’s Rachel Priest;
(2) South Africa’s Lizelle Lee;
(3) Australia’s Tahlia McGrath;
(4) Australia’s Alyssa Healy
and (5)Australia’s Amanda-Jade Wellington.
Top five batting averages were
(A) India’s Jemimah Rodrigues (57)
(B) India’s Deepti Sharma (53);
(C) South Africa’s Mignon du Preez (47);
(D) West Indies’ Stafanie Taylor (42);
(E) New Zealand’s Rachel Priest (39).
Fastest ball striker – also came from the southern hemisphere
Rachel Priest keeping wicket (Photo: Julian Thompson)
During the tournament, Rachel Priest was the fastest striker, power-hitting 44 from 16 balls including five ‘sixes’ (at 2.7 runs per ball) in Storm v Stars. Priest hit 43 ‘fours’ and 15 ‘sixes’ – more ‘sixes’ than any other Overseas player. Two years ago, she scored more runs than any other player – the same year as Storm last won the Super League.
Fastest Century in Super League
Jemimah Rodrigues made Super League history from passing 100 runs from 58 deliveries, at a personal best strike rate of 1.9 runs-per-ball. Rodrigues century included 17 ‘fours’ and one ‘six,’ remaining undefeated on 112 runs. Overall, Rodrigues scored 402 runs from ten innings – the most runs for an Overseas batter; with fourth-best ranking for average strike rate (average 1.5 runs-per-ball). Her top batting average ranking (as mentioned above) was boosted by three ‘not outs.’
Fastest Fifty in Super League
Fastest Fifty by Lizelle Lee (Photo: Julian Thompson)
Lizelle Lee scored the fastest fifty including thirteen ‘fours’ and three ‘sixes’ in an opening partnership of 127 for Stars v Thunder. Lee made 75 from 28 balls at a personal best strike rate (2.6 runs-per-ball). In the same match, third fastest scorer Tahlia McGrath (2.1< runs-per-ball) scored 41 runs from 19 deliveries. Great start until thwarted by Thunder’s thunderstruck batting collapse.
Bowling dot balls
As mentioned above, unplayable ‘dot-balls’ can stop run chases in their tracks. Top three Super League bowlers from Overseas who delivered the most dot balls were (1) South Africa’s Marizanne Kapp (97 medium-pace dots for Stars); followed by (2) Australia’s Amanda-Jade Wellington (95 leg-break dots for Vipers) and (3) India’s Deepti Sharma (78 off-break dots for Storm).
Bowling averages – southern hemisphere success
Similar analysis revealed that four bowlers bagged ten or more wickets each. Firstly, Amanda-Jade Wellington took 14 wickets (best 3-22 for Vipers); with 95 dots. Secondly, South Africa’s Dane van Niekerk took 12 wickets (best 3-20 for Stars); with 71 dots. Third place for taking 10 wickets was New Zealand’s Leigh Kasperek (best 4-16 off-spin for Diamonds) with 67 dots. Separately, Marizanne Kapp (for Stars) and West Indies’ Hayley Matthews (for Lightning) should both be mentioned for bowling rare maidens (six-dot-balls-in-one-over).
Summary/conclusion
During the last year of the KIA Super League Overseas players have made a fantastic contribution to women’s cricket, particularly gifted players from the southern hemisphere. Analysis has shown that straight-forward averages can be misleading. High batting strike-rates and bowlers’ ability to bowl dot balls need careful consideration, as predictive success factors in The Hundred game.
Footnote: At time of writing, data analysis agrees with espncricinfo.com
