Raw pace is back. After years of limited overs cricket being controlled by spinners and changes of pace by the quicks, genuinely scary fast bowling is once more in command in this World Cup.
All of the top five wicket-takers in this tournament have been clocked at 150kmh or higher in the past month. Mitchell Starc (24 wickets) heads the pack followed by Lockie Ferguson (17), Jofra Archer (16), Mohammad Amir (16) and Mark Wood (13).
Meanwhile, the next five bowlers each have been clocked at between 145 and 150kmh in this tournament. Those bowlers are Trent Boult (146kmh), Chris Morris (147kmh), Pat Cummins (150kmh), Sheldon Cotterrell (145kmh) and Shaheen Shah Afridi (147kmh).
You have to scroll down to 11th on the wicket taker’s list before you encounter a bowler who doesn’t have hurrying pace as a weapon in their armoury. The man who is scything through batting line-ups like no one else, Australia’s Starc, also happens to be the fastest bowler in the tournament.
Data released just before Australia’s thumping win over New Zealand yesterday showed that 32per cent of Starc’s deliveries in this World Cup had been clocked at more than 145kmh.
That placed him comfortably ahead of Wood (23per cent), Ferguson (23per cent), Archer (22per cent) and Kagiso Rabada (12per cent). As Starc set about eviscerating New Zealand yesterday he spent a whole lot of time in that rarefied air above 150kmh.
The final two balls of Starc’s first over were measured at 152kmh and 154kmh. That is not just sharp or swift or speedy, that is downright terrifying pace. International batsmen have been quoted again and again as saying that once bowlers exceed 145kmh their speed becomes a major factor. Once they go above 150kmh it takes an uncommon mix of courage, composure, balance, technique and lightning reflexes for a batsman to prosper.
Right now Starc is bowling quicker even than he was in the 2015 World Cup. He took four deliveries to warm up with the new ball yesterday, clearly feeling his way into his spell. Then he engaged the superchargers. Over the remainder of his opening spell, Starc’s average speed was 149kmh.
That average was dragged down by a couple of off cutters he bowled that were measured in the low-140s – the same style of delivery he used to later dismiss Kane Williamson. Starc rolled his fingers across the seam on that ball, getting the 137kmh delivery to both stick in the pitch and deviate away from the Kiwi star.
Starc’s delivery to Williamson directly before that had clocked 151kmh. The Aussie used his underrated cricket smarts to recognise that pure pace alone was not enough to trouble New Zealand’s best batsman. But what that rushing speed did do was help set up Williamson for the slower cutter. Once he had disposed of the Kiwi gun he used his raw pace to dismiss Tom Latham, Ish Sodhi, Lockie Ferguson and Mitchell Santner.
The ball that trapped Sodhi LBW was, based on the data publicly available, the fastest of the World Cup at 154.3kmh. The fact it was also delivered from around the wicket, creating an extreme angle in at the right-handed Sodhi, made it near-unplayable.
(AP Photo/Rui Vieira)
Starc is producing a ton of such deliveries at the moment. He is irresistible. From just eight games so far he has taken four wickets or more in an innings four times. That is as many as Wood, Archer, Amir, Cummins, Ferguson and Boult combined.
Another way of looking at it is that it is roughly equivalent to a batsman scoring four tons in eight World Cup games. Only one batsman in history has ever scored four centuries in a World Cup – Sri Lankan champion Kumar Sangakkara in 2015. But, the reality is you don’t need to quote Starc’s stats to outline his dominance at present.
Sometimes in order to understand the full extent of a player’s command over a series or tournament you need to list their numbers to let it sink in. Right now all you need to do is watch Starc.
And not for long, a single over will suffice. The pace, power and precision he’ll display in that brief period will leave any cricket follower agog. We are witnessing something remarkable. Starc is tearing another World Cup to shreds.
Neel
Roar Guru
Probably not as quick as the bowlers from the 2003 World Cup but goodness gracious it’s something else watching a pacer spearing a yorker at 150km/h. Ferguson has been good to watch as well but Starc is just on another level as opposed to everyone else. Starc loves World Cups. World Cups seem to bring the best out of him.
Insult_2_Injury
Roar Rookie
Fast bowlers holding sway, with batsmen having to dig in a bit to thrive. What’s old is new again! Gotta love a tournament where all players and countries can be compared in the same circumstances.
Omnitrader
Roar Rookie
touchè Ronan. So a 4fer or 3fer would be equivalent do you think? I noticed 9 putting up 3WI stats for the world cup.
Lawrence
Roar Rookie
Reason AB is our greatest modern day batsman, facing 4 x WI fast bowlers at around 150 day in day out.
La grandeur d'Athéna
Roar Rookie
That is a tough comparison. I would say it depends on how we use them. Jassi is superb throughout and very hard to hit him out. But sometimes even superb may not be enough. We need something special. That is where Mitchell Starc comes in. I was listening to cricbuzz Australia New Zealand post match show other day where gautam was joking with zaheer and robin that Starc's slower delivery was at about 140 kilometres per hour!
sandpaper
Roar Rookie
wonder who is the best bumrah or starc ??
Ronan O'Connell
Expert
Yeah I agree, the pressure of tournament play changes so many things, as we've seen the past month with batting styles, bowler strategies, batting 1st v chasing etc.
Ronan O'Connell
Expert
"I always thought a 5fer was the equivalent of a hundred, not a 4 or more." Not in ODIs. Number of ODI bowlers to take 10 or more five-wicket hauls ...... 2 Number of ODI batsmen to make 10 or more centuries ................ 55
Spanner
Roar Rookie
"Fast bowlers win matches, kids" - this has always been the case and always will be ! The team with the best performing bowlers will take the prize and there will be no 300 plus scores in the finals - thank goodness for that !
JamesH
Roar Guru
The ICC gave an explicit direction to local curators to prepare sporting pitches for this tournament. They also employed an independent pitch advisor to work with the curators. My understanding is that in bilateral series the curators dance to the tune of host nation’s administering body instead. It’s hard not to conclude that the pitches would have been more batting-friendly if the ECB had got its way.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
It's not so much the ICC taking note, as the suggestion is that they have some control over the pitches in the World Cup, but really have none (other than the ability to give a pitch a poor report card after the match) for normal bilateral series. (And I've only ever heard such report cards given for test venues, don't know if they do it for ODI's in the same way). More likely, all the other nations boards should take note, if England come to visit to play a bilateral ODI series, put a bit in the pitch for the bowlers and you've got a good chance of winning!
JamesH
Roar Guru
Good observation. The pressure of tournament play might just make batsmen go into their shells slightly, which is all the best quicks need in order to cause problems. To the extent that it is the conditions, I hope the ICC takes note. The cricket in this tournament has been so much more entertaining than in most bilateral series. Part of that is due to the theatre of a World Cup, yes, but the gripping contest between bat and ball is a big factor too. Watching world class quicks trouble batsmen is far more interesting than seeing bowlers in damage control from ball one.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
It is cool to see the fast bowlers flourishing in this tournament. But then, maybe this is one of the things that comes out of tournament play. It's not only in the last 4 years since the WC that spinners have started dominating. It's been happening for a while. Pretty sure it was before the last world cup too, yet the top 7 wicket takers there were: Starc, Boult, Yadav, Shami, Morkel, Jerome Taylor, Wahab Riaz before getting to the first spinner at 8 with Vettori. Keep looking down the list, and there's only a sprinkling of spinners among them. So maybe it's just the nature of tournament play. There's something about it, whether it be the ICC having some control over pitches, or the fact that just about all pitches get used more than once, which results in having a bit more in pitches for the pace bowlers than in pitches often rolled out for bilateral series. Maybe also add to that the fact that I'm sure Australia aren't the only country where out premier white ball quicks miss lots of the ODI's played in between the big tournaments in managing their workloads as they generally play test cricket also. Pretty sure just about all the fast bowlers on these lists of top wicket takers are among their countries main test fast bowlers too, meaning that probably lots of ODI's in bilateral series are regularly played with the second-rate fast bowlers, who are more likely to get hammered.
DaveJ
Roar Rookie
Starc’s pace was pretty amazing against NZ, but I don’t think it’s quite right to say he eviscerated them. The match looked over when they were 5/118 and struggling to score against all bowlers. Starc only took one of the first five wickets, albeit the crucial one of Williamson. Then got Latham to a brilliant catch from Smith and mopped up the tail. But I guess the prospect of facing him at the death was one reason it looked all over at five down. Overall it was the slow scoring rate early on that put NZ behind the eight ball and led to some ragged shots. In some ways Starc did more to eviscerate the heart of England’s batting by taking the wickets of Root and Morgan, even though Behrendorff got the figures at the end thanks to the tail holding out against him. But too bad Starc only gets ten overs!
Dwanye
Roar Rookie
Hi tomothy. I fully agree, bowler never have had the ‘love’, Lol. Just that last NZ game leaning that way I think maybe. Sure carey’s 71 off 72 is awesome and lifted us too that total after a poor start. But Starc’s ‘Pfeiffer’, NZ could get close, his stats, awesome.
WarrenBungles
Guest
The Aussies are a cert. Put ya house on em ya mugs.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
Shami was definitely hitting 144-145 during the overs I saw him bowl last night.
Paul
Roar Guru
They looked a far better team on that surface Dan, certainly far more comfortable. I think you're right about batting first as well, but again, it's all about keeping wickets intact early. The pitches seem faster in the first innings, but equally seem to do a bit more too.
English twizz
Guest
No real rain forecast till the end of the world cup now just some showers
Dan In Devon
Guest
Could this warm weather be England’s saving? I expect the pitches will become dryer going forwards - but the key seems to be win the toss and in the second innings the wicket seems to get a little slower. Easier to play the big shots when the ball is coming onto the bat. I think having two left armers has given the Australian attack a bit more bite.