In cricket, form is only ever temporary

Roar Pro

By Mr Sports, 8 Jan 2010 Mr Sports is a Roar Pro

Tagged:: Cricket, Phil Hughes, Shane Watson, Test cricket

Related coverage

Cricket news

Australia's batsman Phillip Hughes, left, plays a shot as South Africa's fielder Jacques Kallis, right, follows play during the third day of the second test match at Kingsmead stadium in Durban, South Africa, Sunday March 8, 2009. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)

Yesterday on this website, there were a number of lively threads debating the makeup of the Australian cricket team. As is always the case, the opinions were starkly divergent, with Michael Clarke either ‘soft’ and undeserving, or the lynchpin of Australia’s future, depending on who you choose to believe.

Whilst I have no intention of joining the fray in that debate (sorry Marcus North, your time is up), I would like to make an observation about what the current debate demonstrates about cricket generally.

That is that more than any other team sport that I am familiar with cricket, and in particular batting, is a game about form.

When a batsman is in form, it is obvious from ball one.

Shane Watson looks commanding even leaving the ball outside the off stump at the moment. A batsman in form immediately demonstrates a long stride forward or a crisp move backwards. The ball sings off the middle of the bat with every stroke.

A batsman out of form, though, is just as obvious. The movements are tentative; the bat is suddenly all edge. Viewers can sense it immediately and any astute fielding captain (not that there are many of those at the moment) will, as well.

There is very little middle ground between in form and out of form for a test match batsman (indeed, it is the ability to grind out runs when out of form that marks the great from the good).

For a bowler, the process is slower but just as clear.

It make take an over or two but any seasoned cricket fan can tell early in a stint whether or not a bowler is in form with the ball (of course, sometimes it can happen more quickly than that – Steve Harmison’s first ball in Ashes 2007 leaps to mind).

For a bowler out of form, the ball seems to always land a little short, or a little full.

The batsman gets a lucky edge and the pressure is released.

No other sport is so brutal in revealing the current state of an individual’s game. Sure we notice when a rugby league or Aussie rules player is playing exceptionally well, but how to tell why the 30 tackle a game player is now only making 22?

Or, for a better example: why is Willie Mason not considered any good any more? He’s still frighteningly big and fast, and in theory, all he needs to do is hit the ball up and get the occasional offload.

In 2004 he was a dominant force and a key member of a Premiership team doing just that. So what is different about the Roosters edition Willie Mason compared to the Bulldogs edition?

Presumably he was ‘in form’ in his Bulldogs days and has not rediscovered that form since. But the point is that I’ve been watching rugby league the whole time and I can’t tell what the difference between what he does now and what he did then.

Form is simply that much harder to describe and define in other team sports.

In fact, cricket is the only sport where we regularly talk about a player’s form at all. During the Eels run to the Grand Final this year the talk about Jarryd Hayne was ‘this bloke is great’ not ‘this bloke is in great form.’

A team might be in or out of form but individual players are rarely discussed in that way.

The answer to this, as I see it, is that cricket isn’t really a team sport at all. It is an individual sport masquerading as a team sport.

Certainly the disposition and attitude of the fielders helps a bowler but in the end all cricket flows from a one on one matchup. When Jarryd Hayne drops off next season, it will be the forwards ‘not setting the platform’ or the halves ‘not creating opportunities.’

In other words, the performance of one is tied to the performance of all.

In cricket, when Phil Hughes chases three balls a metre outside off stump it is patently obvious to everyone that he is out of form. When a cricketer is out of form, there is nothing anyone can do except give advice.

Shane Watson couldn’t simply take up the slack for Hughes.

Of course, the flip side is that when a player is in form it is writ large across the landscape of a match or series. Shane Watson is having one of the great domestic test seasons in recent memory.

However the danger is that when a player is dominating in this fashion, the cricketing public, the mainstream media and the selectors might take this as a permanent re-defining of a player’s ability, rather than just the best expression of that ability.

So with that in mind, the larger point is that nothing is ever absolute in cricket.

The folks on this website who were yesterday hailing Shane Watson as the anchor for the Australian team for the next five years, and dismissing Phillip Hughes and Marcus North should remember the old adage that in cricket form is temporary.

Enjoy sports? Enjoy a bargain? All Sports Online has your favourite sporting brands at up to 70% off. Online only, premium quality sporting goods and merchandise at discounted prices. Get a deal now.

The Crowd Says (11) | Page 1 of Comments

vinay verma said | January 8th 2010 @ 7:23am | Report comment

Good piece,Mr Sport..a few observations..Cricket may appear individualistic at times but it is inherently a team game. When it becomes individual is when teams have a problem.We talk of partnerships. When batsman is obviously struggling his partner should take most of the strike. In the recent Ashes series Johnson was on the rampage and in came Bell,nervous as anyone’s nellie. Strauss nursed him through the first half hour and Bell then played a defining knock. I have seen this in batting pairs like Lawry and Simpson,Greendige and Haynes and recently with Hayden and Langer. There were days when Langer would take most of the strike and outscore Hayden. This is the team ethic.

Bowlers,too,hunt in pairs. For a long time paul Riefel was the foil to McGrath,especially in the West Indies when Australia regained the Worrell trophy. Fielders too play an important part,as you have also mentioned.

Form is a funny beast. Greg Chappell,Mark Taylor and Mark Waugh had wretched runs but came out the other side. This is when you have to bat “ugly” and recently Hussey has been just that. Tendulkar in his last visit to the SCG was in a form slump. He chose not to play the cover drive. In fact he did not play the cover drive till he had passed the hundred. Not his most fluent innings but one for the team.

Reply
- Brian said | January 8th 2010 @ 12:42pm | Report comment
  
  If it was an indiviual game with auto-wickie like in the backyard Paksitan would have won.
  Having said that thank you for very good article. Soccer has a goalkeeper and Rugby a kicker but generally only in cricket is most of the time spent playing individually. With batsman the real problem is picking out bad form from bad players. Sehwag is one player I can think of that spent over a year in his career in such bad form you wouldn’t pick him for a shield team yet he’s clearly talented. Its hard to imagine a football star in any code playing so badly as to be so uselss as Sehwag was that year or even as bad as Johnson was for a few whole ahses test matches
  
  Reply
Brett McKay said | January 8th 2010 @ 9:29am | Report comment

yeah, good stuff Sports, a really good summation. I’m not sure when the old adage that “form is temporary, class is permanent” was first first uttered – Vinay will know, it may have been him that said it first – but it’s as true as it ever was. I was not and am still not in the Mike Hussey Must Go camp, because even when his form has been down, and his feet movement not as crisp as it has been, you could still see that he was hitting the ball pretty well. His shot instincts were still there, even if his feet weren’t quite. While most artciles in the last few days have talked about Hussey’s “career-saving” 123* in Sydney, I knew it wasn’t far away. The man is a class act.

I like your comparison of cricket and the footballs on how to see form. You could probably even extend your views onto any of the individual sports too, or team sports which are based on individual contests (like cricket is). So the form of tennis and squash players, golfers, baseball pitchers and batters, snooker and billiards players is probably easier to judge than footballers as you’ve said, but also basketballers, netballers, hockey players, etc.

Reply
Gibbo said | January 8th 2010 @ 12:30pm | Report comment

Interesting read and i agree – cricket is an individual game. Lets be honest, you’d only join a team and put up with fielding so you can get a turn batting or bowling. Take AFL as an example – you can enjoy a social kick, but you dont join a team to kick and mark and run. You join a team so you can play matches and try and win. Cricket is very different and are almost required to join a team to test your batting or bowling in the proper environment. From there, if you’re any good, you play in higher standard competitions and can even find yourself opening for your country!

Reply
vinay verma said | January 8th 2010 @ 12:53pm | Report comment

Gibbo,Brian,to look at Cricket as an “individual” based game is to miss the whole point of Cricket. Granted at the schoolboy level kids only want to bowl and bat. I have coached juniors and it is usually the parents who complain that their kid hasn’t had a bowl or a bat. After a whole season of coaching the kids are actually enjoying their fielding. This is their chance to make up for failure or missing out on batting or bowling. As you move up the competition spectrum teamwork is of the utmost importance. Fielders backing up overthrows..this can be the difference between winning and losing a close game..this is where the value of a Symonds is hard to ignore. Colin Bland,paul sheahan and Ross Edwards were as valued for their fielding as batting.
Genuinely appreciating the success of a teammate when you yourself have failed. These are the higher values cricket teaches you. Why would Siddle or Onions hang on with their mate for a draw if Cricket was such an individual game? Siddle bowled well without reward but he would be chuffed,as would his teammates at the guts and patience he displayed. This was a victory for the whole team. Hussey got MOM but there 10 others who all contributed. And finally if Cricket was an individual sport man of the match payments would remain with the player..no,they are put in a common pool.

Reply
- Brett McKay said | January 8th 2010 @ 1:02pm | Report comment
  
  exactly why I referred to “team sports which are based on individual contests” Vinay, because that’s the way to describe cricket. It’s very much a team game, as you say, but at it’s heart is the eternal contest of bat against ball, and that’s where I think Gibbo and Brian are coming from…
  
  Reply
  - vinay verma said | January 8th 2010 @ 1:59pm | Report comment
    
    Here’s where we start disagreeing Brett. It would be an invidual contest if there were only two protagonists. Batting and bowling do not exist in a vacuum. If every batsman was out only bowled or LBW your dictum would be apt. But we have caught,stumped,runout which require at least one or two other people. And they have to be positioned by the captain. Even the 12th man has a role.
    To call it primarily a contest between bat and ball is selling the game short. I would like to call it a contest between teams determined to impose their collective will. We talk of Austalia’s ruthlessness and will to win. These are “collective” phrases. Sorry,Brett,but I have a philosophical difference on this. I see Cricket as bigger than your”individual” contests. I enjoy good fielding and wicket keeping as much as the cover drive or the yorker. Field placings and changing bowlers. Lifting the tempo as the match dictates.
    
    Reply
    - Brett McKay said | January 8th 2010 @ 2:09pm | Report comment
      
      a ha, at last Vinay!! But, let me quickly hose this down by reminding you that I said “..at it’s heart is the eternal contest of bat against ball…” and why I included it with “team sports which are based on individual contests”.
      
      Everything you say here is quite right, and cricket is of course a team sport. I guess when I say that at the heart of cricket is the battle between bat and ball, that’s where I’m singling out the individual element. From the moment the bowler commences his run-up, to the point where the batsman completes his shot (or misses, obviously), it’s one-on-one. After that point though, the team game kicks back in…
      
      Reply
      - vinay verma said | January 8th 2010 @ 2:18pm | Report comment
        
        You batsmen have a warped view of the world. You would condemn a bowler to a newly paved “road’ and make him bowl with one hand tied behind their back. And deny him a drinks break. And you wouldn’t be out till all three stumps were knocked out of the ground.And then you would have the gall to ask for a review! I say take your helmet off when you talk to me. Your shout next time,Brett.
        
        Reply
        
        Brett McKay said | January 8th 2010 @ 2:21pm | Report comment
        
        the ball would need to pitch in line before knocking all three stumps out, by he way
ohtani's jacket said | January 8th 2010 @ 2:09pm | Report comment

I think it’s fairly obvious when a footballer of any sort is out of form. The difference with cricket is that being out of form is largely based on technique and can be analysed ball after ball, whereas in a football code it’s more a matter of a player not being involved as much as we’re accustomed to. The football codes have a workrate element to them that cricket doesn’t really have unless you’re considering bowling spells or stints at the crease.

Reply