sussexpob wrote:bigfluffylemon wrote:Good chase by England. The bowling is a bit of a worry, but I do wonder if their poor stats over the last four years are at least in part due to the fact that all their home games are played on stupidly flat decks prepared on purpose to aid England's strength in batting...
Doesnt show in the stats, BFL. Englands bowlers are more expensive away than at home (5.92 away, 5.8s at home) since 2016. I complained about this in the winter, and have pretty strongly concluded there is no argument, other than one that England's bowlers are just pretty shocking. If you were to attach them onto other batting line ups, they wouldnt be successful. They are constantly bailed out by a team that makes 360 with 5 overs and 6 wickets to spare, like the last match./quote]
Interesting stat - thanks. So that's not the answer. Hard not to agree that our bowling is weak.
One quite striking record that I think shows the weakness of our bowling, but also does lend some credence to the theory that England's bowling stats are so rubbish because teams go after them hard when chasing big totals is the frankly ridiculous discrepancy in our record when setting a target vs chasing.
When chasing, England have a W/L record of 5.6 since September 2015, more than double the next best (India with 2.2). We have comfortably the highest average chasing, the highest run rate. We have not lost at home chasing in that time and have only lost 5 times away, on 4 of those 5 occasions by less than 35 runs, twice by less than 15. We're as close to unbeatable as it realistically gets chasing. Yet in that time, we have only conceded more than 280 on 10 occasions bowling first out of 35 completed games - a little over 25%. Our bowling average is 33 in these situations and RPO conceded 5.6 - comfortably middle of the pack - some way worse than India or South Africa with 29, but on par with Australia, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and better than Sri Lanka or West Indies.
When setting a target, it's a different story. W/L record of 1.7 - still not bad, but third of the major teams behind India and Sri Lanka. We have the fastest scoring rate still, but only 4th best batting average, behind Pakistan, India and South Africa. When defending a target, our bowling average is nearly the worst of any major team, and our RPO is conceded is 5.9 - the worst by anybody, including associates. When defending a target, we have conceded more than 280 on 12 occasions out of 36 completed games, but we've only lost 9 of those matches - we won 3, and we have set a target of more than 280 on 25 occasions out of 36, winning 22 of those 25. Yet when we've set less than 280, we've defended it precisely twice, and lost on the other 9 occasions.
http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine ... ;type=teamhttp://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine ... ;type=teamConclusion: England really do only have a plan A - go hard batting or go home. It works quite often, but on some occasions our batsmen go out too hard, fail to set a good target, and there is no plan B. When chasing, our batsmen know exactly how hard they can go on the pitch, don't go too hard and fall in a heap, as we have the batting strength to chase down anything.
In other words, as I think we already know - to beat England, win the toss and ask us to bat, then we've probably got no better than a 50:50 shot of beating a top side (India, South Africa or New Zealand). So pray that we win the toss and chase in both the semi and the final, and we'll win.
I do think it does show that part of the reason our bowling stats are so poor is that teams go harder against us when chasing because they have to - we set bigger targets than other sides when Plan A comes off, and usually the opposition does fall in a heap in those circumstances. But both chasing and defending, our bowling is definitely weak among the major teams.