Cricket statistics
Cricket is a sport that generates a large number of statistics.
Statistics are recorded for each player during a match, and aggregated over a career. At the professional level, statistics for Test cricket, one-day internationals, and first-class cricket are recorded separately. However, since Test matches are a form of first-class cricket, a player's first-class statistics will include his Test match statistics - but not vice versa.
General statistics
- Matches (Mat): Number of matches played.
- Catches (Ct): Number of catches taken.
- Stumpings (St): Number of stumpings made (as a wicket-keeper).
Batting statistics
- Innings (I): The number of innings in which the batsman actually batted.
- Not Outs (NO): The number of times the batsman was not out at the conclusion of an innings.
- Runs (R): The number of runs scored.
- Highest Score (HS): The highest score ever made by the batsman.
- Batting Average (Ave): The total number of runs by the total number of innings in which the batsman was out. Ave = Runs/[I - NO]
- Centuries (100): The number of innings in which the batsman scored one hundred runs or more.
- Half-centuries (50): The number of innings in which the batsman scored fifty to ninety-nine runs (centuries do not count as half-centuries as well).
- Balls Faced (BF): The total number of balls received, including no balls but not including wides.
- Strike Rate (SR): The number of runs scored per 100 balls faced. (SR = [100 * Runs]/BF)
Bowling statistics
- Overs (O): The number of overs bowled.
- Balls (B): The number of balls bowled. Overs is more traditional, but balls is a more useful statistic because the number of balls per over has varied historically.
- Maiden Overs (M): The number of maiden overs (overs in which the bowler conceded zero runs) bowled.
- Runs (R): The number of runs conceded.
- Wickets (W): The number of wickets taken.
- No balls (Nb): The number of no balls bowled.
- Wides (Wd): The number of wides bowled.
- Bowling Average (Ave): The average number of runs conceded per wicket. (Ave = Runs/W)
- Economy Rate (Econ): The average number of runs conceded per over. (Econ = 6 * Runs/Balls)
- Best Bowling (BB): The bowler's best bowling performance in an innings, defined as firstly the greatest number of wickets, secondly the fewest runs conceded for that number of wickets.
- Five-wickets in an innings (5w): The number of innings in which the bowler took at least five wickets.
- Ten-wickets in a match (10w): The number of matches in which the bowler took at least ten wickets; recorded for Tests and first-class matches only.
- Strike Rate (SR): The average number of balls bowled per wicket taken. (SR = Balls/W)
Analysis of cricket statistics
Although cricket statistics have been recorded since the late 1800s, they have mostly been regarded by fans in a traditional manner of simply comparing the numbers between players. This contrasts with baseball, which generates a similar profusion of statistical records. Baseball statistics have been studied in greater detail, leading to the field of sabermetrics, which has produced several new statistics expressly designed to give better indications of the relative strengths and values of players.
This sort of detailed analysis has not yet been generally applied to cricket statistics, although some statisticians are beginning to look at cricket with an eye to providing a similar depth of analysis. Professional cricket coaches are using computer records of ball-by-ball play to obtain more detailed statistical analysis of player performances than ever before. However, these analyses have seen little spread into the public knowledge of the fan community.
One example of a proposed new cricket statistic is a figure to better indicate a batsman's value than his batting average. Since the average is somewhat inflated by the presence of any not out innings, some have argued that a more indicative statistic would be the number of runs scored per innings, regardless of whether the batsman was out or not. Although arguably achieving the goal of measuring a batsman's worth more accurately, this proposed statistic has mostly been ignored by cricket fans.
Dynamic and graphical statistics
The advent of saturation television coverage of professional cricket has provided an impetus to develop new and interesting forms of presenting statistical data to viewers. Television networks have thus invented several new ways of presenting statistics.
These include displaying two-dimensional plots of shot directions and distances on an overhead view of a cricket field, and graphs of run scoring and wicket taking numbers plotted against time or balls bowled over a career or within a match. These graphics can be changed dynamically by computer as statistics evolve during a game.
