Explaining John Inverarity's selections

John Inverarity is obviously an intelligent, well-read man. He has a magnificent record as a cricket player, captain and coach. He puts forward his opinions succinctly and with conviction.

But like every member of the human race, he has his prejudices. These have become increasingly apparent during his stint as head of the National Selection Panel.

In particular, I believe Inverarity has been heavily influenced by three things from his past:
(a) His own career as a first class cricketer;
(b) His enormously successful stint as captain of the Western Australian side;
(c) His career as a maths teacher and headmaster at various private schools in Adelaide and Perth.

(a) Inverarity the Player
Inverarity scored a pile of runs during his over 20-year first class career, but only averaged 35. He counter balanced this by taking some useful wickets at an average of 30 – but at a strike rate of less than one wicket a game – and by being an excellent team man and captain.

As a result, Inverarity seems to have developed a fondness for batsmen who average in the mid to late 30s at first class level, just like he did.

I refer here to Bailey, Doolan, Marsh and Quiney.

The old “you need to average at least 40 in the Shield to get in the test side” attitude does not seem to apply under Inverarity.

He also loves players who can bat a bit and bowl a bit – again, just like he did.

I refer you to Henriques, Maxwell, Smith, Watson, Faulkner and Agar.

What other reason could there be for the Test selection of players like Henriques, whose first class record is so mediocre?

If Hughes and Khawaja could bowl a bit surely they would have had a longer run in the team; if Bailey bowled he probably would be in South Africa right now.

(b) Inverarity the Captain
During the 1970s Inverarity was captain of West Australia, one of the most successful teams in Sheffield Shield history.

It was so successful in fact, that at times you get the impression Inverarity is trying to recreate it at national level.

It could be the reason why he has gone for the following players over the years:

– Gritty, but extremely intelligent and well-read openers with interests outside cricket, like Ric Charlesworth (Ed Cowan).

– Highly talented, mercurial batsmen with beautiful techniques who seem to have an equal ability to win matches with their genius and then lose them with rash, self-destructive and idiotic decisions, like Kim Hughes (Shaun Marsh, Shane Watson).

– Nuggety, gritty, dour middle order batsmen who are good blokes, fighters and team-men, like Rob Langer (Rob Quiney, George Bailey).

– Bits and pieces all rounders, like Inverarity’s long serving lieutenant Ian Brayshaw (Moises Henriques, Glenn Maxwell).

– Wicketkeepers who got their chance as wicketkeeper mostly because of their batting, like Rod Marsh (Wade, Haddin).

– Spinners who don’t really spin the ball that much but are gutsy players and very useful with the bat, like Tony Mann and Bruce Yardley (Maxwell, Ashton Agar), as opposed to specialist spinners who are bad with the bat (like Lyon, who has been dropped twice under Inverarity).

– Pumped up aggressive fast bowlers like Dennis Lillee (Mitchell Johnson, Ryan Harris).

– Beanpole swing bowlers who are lousy batsmen, like Terry Alderman (Jackson Bird).

Fanciful? Maybe. But why else drop Lyon? Why else push for Henriques? I think the theory holds.

(c) Inverarity the Teacher
Inverarity taught maths, and has shown a weakness for complex mathematical formulas during his time as selector.

“Informed player management” was one – it seemed to go along the lines of “take X number of fast bowlers x rotation = amount greater than three fast bowlers playing together consistently”. The result was a mess

“All-rounder policy” was another, particularly on the 2013 India tour, when somehow we wound up with a Test team that included Moises Henriques and/or Glenn Maxwell – the thinking seemed to be “five batsmen + batsman-keeper + one or two all rounders + three or four specialist bowlers was greater than six batsman + one keeper + four specialist bowlers.”

This formula didn’t work either.

Inverarity seems to have learnt his lesson after the last Ashes, when he picked six batsmen, a keeper and four specialists, the good old fashioned way.

But I bet it was still there in the back of his mind.

How else do you explain the selection of James Faulkner in the squad as 12th man and the constant discussions about promoting him to seven, thus weakening our already weak batting order?

A formula – “five specialist batsmen + one keeper in great batting form + all rounder + four bowlers is greater than six specialist batsmen + one keeper + four bowlers.”

Henriques is in the Test squad for South Africa you can b sure we haven’t heard the last of wacky selection formulas from old maths teacher Inverarity – you watch.

I don’t mean this to be a hatchet job. I like Inverarity.

He was a good player and a superb captain; I think if he’d captained Australia in the 78-79 Ashes we might have even won the series; as a selector he’s much better than Andrew Hilditch.

But I do think the above factors are worth discussing.

Because I feel they go some way to explaining some of the many selection mysteries of his time in the chair – in particular his passion for bits and pieces cricketers like Henriques and Faulkner despite the consistent lack of success of such players at Test level over the years (O’Donnell, Laughlin, Carlson), his preference for batsmen who average in the late 30’s over ones who average in the 40’s, and his distaste for players like Lyon and Hughes.

We are always analysing the psyches of players. Why not selectors?