Cricket’s obsession with numbers has lasted as long as the sport itself. In fact, worried by the possibility of Test cricket losing its ‘spirit’, legendary cricket writer Jack Fingleton came up with what he termed a ‘revolutionary’ solution in 1946. The Australian suggested that cricket should scrap or ignore records and statistics, at least for a trial period.
While admirable in its intention, the idea never gained any traction. Numbers have always retained a special place in the game. In fact, with the advent of technology and the greater emphasis on performance analytics, data and statistics have gained even more importance in the sport. Not to forget, video and biomechanics analyses. In today’s times, cricket is understood and viewed in a completely different light from how it was in the past.
At the turn of the 21st century, two individuals from different backgrounds used modern technology to help cricket in India. Sports Mechanics’ S. Ramakrishnan (Ramky) was hired as a performance analyst by the Indian cricket team after impressing John Wright at a conference in 2003.“Usually, the sporting community is slow to respond to technology. When I joined the Indian team, some players wondered what I was doing sitting with a laptop all day. But they saw the value addition with time,” Ramky told The Hindu . With time, the performance analyst ensured that the analysis went from being “predictive to descriptive.”
The Indian team’s first brush with data analytics was during the famous 2003 tour to Australia. Video footage of the opposing team was sought, digitised over a period, and then presented at the team meetings. This played a crucial part in the drawn series, which included the famous win in Adelaide, India’s first on Australian soil in over two decades.
Ramky then established Sports Mechanics in 2006, whose services have been used by Indian Premier League teams and the International Cricket Council.
In the early 2000s, another enthusiastic man named Joy Bhattacharya oversaw the launch of Super Selector. It was a game that gained immense popularity among the cricket following public due to its revolutionary use of data that allowed fans to form fantasy teams. Bhattacharya was later appointed the CEO of Kolkata Knight Riders and worked with Sports Mechanics to devise the auction strategy for his franchise. Later, the multinational giant SAP partnered KKR and helped them identify lesser known players. Suryakumar Yadav is a prime example of it, signed by the franchise in 2014.
However, both Bhattacharya and Ramky are not convinced that cricket has embraced technology fully. “Coaches are wary of depending on machines,” says the former KKR CEO. Fast bowling coach and Delhi Daredevils mentor T.A. Sekar agrees that data has a major role to play but he’s not sure it always provides the best solutions. “Sometimes a bowler may not be comfortable bowling to a particular field, even if the data tells you that it will be the best field setting to exploit a batsman’s weakness. Here, a captain and coach need to be flexible,” he adds. Ramky acknowledges that data can’t dictate plans completely on the field. Nevertheless, he believes that it provides a strong underpinning to planning and strategy. “Experience and gut feeling shouldn’t be replaced but performance analysis can complement the two,” affirms Ramky.
