Batsmen might have become too dominant — ICC boss

Batsman might have become too dominant, especially in the final 10 overs, International Cricket Council (ICC) chief executive David Richardson told a press conference before the second World Cup quarter final in Melbourne.

Between fielding restrictions and larger bats the, balance between batsman and bowler "may have shifted a bit too much", the ICC boss says.

In his sights are recent developments introduced to razz up the game, including reduced boundaries, the use of two new white balls an innings and, more, larger and heavier modern bats and fielding restrictions (even outside the T-20-ish "power plays", no more than four are allowed outside the circle).

From Mr Richardson's comments, it seems almost certain the governing body will review the club-like bats used by some players, such as Australia's David Warner and the West Indies' Chris Gayle turned up at the tournament with club-like 45mm edges (evoking memories of Lance Cairns' famed " Excalibur"). Currently, the ICC only regulates height and width.

Boundaries were pushed back during the cup, though of course at some grounds, like Eden Park, there's only so much practical scope for avoiding Mr Richardson's complaint that "some batsmen are mis-hitting balls and it is just carrying over the rope and going for a six instead of being caught at the boundary, that is what some cricket people believe has become unfair."

But although he appears to favour a swing back toward bowlers, the ICC boss also hinted that tweaks would be minor. And bear in mind his comments were made before Australia's fast bowling crew proved so dominant in their semi-final against India and of course in the final against the Black Caps.

Is there a risk one day internationals will return to being boring? Does the ICC have a strategy for ODIs?

"Well let's hope so," he says at the Melbourne press conference. 

"The strategy of ICC has been to keep the three formats going: test cricket, the traditional; ODI and T20 — pure entertainment. We believe there's a time and place for all three. It's a challenge to keep them all going. The danger is that one of them will cannibalise the other."

"It's quite funny for us because each member country is different.

"In India and South Africa in particular ODI cricket, at international level anyway, was still  the primary format. In Australia, it was going through a bit of a lull, people were getting a bit bored, and therefore it actually forced us to look at the way ODI cricket was being played and we talked about the boring bit in the middle where teams were just getting ones and twos. I think the change in rules have helped that tremendously.

"I also think the 20/20 format has helped ODI and the test cricket become a much more attacking game.

"If we changed back to the old fielding restrictions, I think people would still bat with much more attacking flair. And because that's happening, the bowlers and captains have to be more attacking. You can't just contain and hope to keep the total down by being defensive. You have to take wickets. And so it's led to a far more attacking game.

"So I think our strategy going forward is to make sure that momentum is maintained."

He adds, "If we do change the playing conditions, we'll be using all the data that we have."

And oh what rivers of data.

Former Australian captain Adam Gilchrist, who appeared with Mr Richardson, called statistics the "secret sauce" of the modern game.

Cricket has always been a stats-crazy game, of course.

What's different now, says Jenni Lewis from World Cup stats sponsor SAP, is that teams can access data in real time.

SAP's Hana platform spits out information on the weather, the pitch and players' recent form against the opposition, and much more.

"Teams have never been able to use that data before because they couldn't process it fast enough," says Ms Lewis.  

Ms Lewis is a cricket nut, but her company's also onboard to push the fact that its same platform that's picked highlights and trends through the World Cup can be used by by SAP's Business Intelligence solutions and, down the track, to keep tabs on thousands of objects as we see the rise of the internet of things.

ckeall@nbr.co.nz

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POSTSCRIPT: Cracking down on courtsiders — the littel fish lead to the bigger fish

There was controversy over police cracking down on so-called "courtsiders" during the World Cup, or people who exploit the 15-second broadcast TV delay to send ball-by-ball information by cellphone in a bid to gain advantage in ball-by-ball betting.

Comment Eric Crampton said it was a waste of NZ Police time (read Why does the ICC care about 'courtsiding'?)

NBR put the question to ICC boss David Richardson. Don't police have better things to do than trying to spot courtsiders?

"I think they should keep the focus on it," the ICC chief executive said ahead of the second quarter final.

"We have to keep up the fight. 

"There’s no real benefit to us from chucking coutsiders or pitchsiders out. If they want to defraud the people who are betting with them, or defraud the bookies, that’s not really our focus."

What is?

"One, we want to disrupt their operations as possible – whether that’s to stop them from interacting with players or having access to umpires or to just stop their interactions at the ground.

"Two, courtsiders who get evicted are often quite a handy source of information for us. We find out who they’re talking to," Mr Richardson says.

"In many of our countries, betting is illegal. So if they’re talking to people in India and there’s illegal betting going on, we hand that information over to the police or the police here pass it on to the police there. It’s more about information gathering than anything."

SAP Global Sponsorships Technology Lead Jenni Lewis says cricket and tennis are the two biggest sports for ball-by-ball betting in the world. So while SAP might make its motherlode of performance stats available to teams in real-time, punters don't get immediate full access.

"It's a social responsibility for us to work with the governing body so definitely we have started to do that," she says.