Michael Lewis’s best-seller, Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game , published in 2003, had as its premise how long held conventional wisdom wasn’t always the ticket to success. The protagonist was Billy Beane, manager of the Major League Baseball team Oakland A. With a budget less than most other teams’, he had to win the League.
Conventional wisdom would have told him to rely on pitchers with powerful arms. Instead, he chose ones who got a lot of ground outs (getting to the ball and throwing it before a batter reaches the base).
A parallel can be drawn to cricket here. For long, batting and bowling were considered the only arts which separated teams. But, over time, as the teams’ talent quotient converged, newer ways had to be discovered to stay ahead of the curve. So, the need for entrepreneurial skills became important even in sports. And this manifested itself in better fielding techniques and improved running between the wickets.
“If each guy saves me one run, it gives me 10 runs,” said Jonty Rhodes, the man, who, with his incredible stops and amazing catches, revolutionised fielding in the early 1990s, in an interview to Sportstar. “Margins in many games come down to that.”
For long, a talented bowler or batsman could get into the team on the basis of his major strength. But now, the ones lumbering along on the field are sure to be found out. These days, quality fielding is more a norm than an exception.
“The limited-over set-up has had an effect,” said Rhodes. “You used to have four or five really slow guys. Nowadays, with shots like the Dil Scoop and reverse sweep, you really can’t hide such fielders.”
What this has done is to increase the requirement for one to be an all-round fielder. Being a specialist in one position is no longer enough. As much as fielding at slip and cover are important, so are boundary-line catching and fielding.
“With T20 cricket and better bats, the batsmen take on the fielders,” said Rhodes. “So defending your boundary has become very important. Kieron Pollard fields in the ring in the initial overs and moves to the boundary later on.
“In my days the best fielders used to field at positions like the backward point. People like me and Herschelle Gibbs were good in the ring, but not as good at the boundary. Now you see them at mid-on, long-on, long-off, or wherever the ball goes. From David Warner and Suresh Raina to A.B. de Villiers, when he is not keeping...”
Another of the fielding innovations has been the relay throw, where the lack of a bullet-arm forces two players to team up and get the ball back. On the big grounds of Australia, it’s a much quicker way to return the ball from the boundary.
But, it was New Zealand, in the 2003 World Cup, who first used it as a deliberate ploy to get a batsman out. The first victim was none other than Brian Lara.
“That was our first fish,” said the then captain Stephen Fleming. “And it’s a pretty big fish to fry. It [relay throw] creates confusion. Today, it won us the match.”
Even in running between the wickets, it takes two to tango. In the early days of one-day cricket, taking quick singles and twos was just an afterthought for many top-order batsmen. Not until a Dean Jones or a Michael Bevan came along did one realise the importance of it.
Writing in ESPNCricinfo, former India opener Aakash Chopra had this to say about Jones’s running: “He would hold the bat high on the handle so as to use its length to the optimum, and while turning, he would stay low and stretch fully. While staying low helped him generate the necessary thrust to turn quickly and gain momentum again, stretching the arms and the body allowed him to run at least one step fewer.”
Not so long ago, a player was never termed bankable based only on his fielding, or running between the wickets. These days team selections hinge on them. That’s how much the game has evolved.
