Farming the strike

Sanjit and Xavier felt that they had faced very few balls while batting last week. Both less than half of the balls in their partnerships, with Rajit and Matt respectively taking most of the strike. So Sanjit asked about the records in this category. Today we'll check out number of balls faced by individuals during a batting pair, and balls faced in a row.

Least balls faced in a pair
The first thing to note is that the Xavier/Matt and Sanjit/Rajit pairs went nowhere near setting any records. The Jeganathan brothers faced 12 (Sanjit) and 20 (Rajit) balls, but there have been 48 occasions where someone has faced less than 12 balls in a pair - 20 times by our batters and 28 by opponents.

There have been:
33 occurrences of a batter facing only 11 balls,
10 occurrences of a batter facing only 10 balls, and
4 occurrences of a batter facing only 9 balls...

Most of the very low numbers belong to opposition batters - none of the 9-ball efforts are by us, and only 3 of the 10-ball innings are by us. However, we do have the honour of holding the outright top place on this list.

About a year ago, during a game at Lyneham, Matt and Rian played an innings where Matt faced a massive 24 balls, leaving only 8 of them for Rian - exactly 2 in each over. Which was unfortunate, because Rian seemed in good form that day. Every one of those 8 balls he faced was hit to the back net: 4,5,5,5,4,4,7,4. He also got run out on one of the balls that Matt faced, for a total score of 33.

On that day, Matt faced the first ball, then kept much of the strike through: 4 extras, 5 dot balls, 5 wickets, and twice crossing on the final ball of the over. Also unfortunately, they were the last pair, and we lost that game by 5 runs.


Most balls faced in a pair
Because of the possibility of additional balls being bowled in an innings, the stats for most balls faced is not just a mirror image of the least-faced. One could argue that any balls that are re-bowled during an innings should not count against the striking batsman (as per the rules of regular cricket), but my stats counter doesn't differentiate such things at the moment. Something I'll have to remember to fix (or at least add an option for) next time I update it.

Come to think of it, under my current arrangements Mankads also count as a 'ball faced' (by whoever is actually on strike at the time), as do illegal Mankad attempts (which should be called "no-ball, dead-ball", and then rebowled).

Anyway.... according to my stats as they stand at the moment there have been:
41 occurrences of a batter facing 21 balls,
12 occurrences of a batter facing 22 balls,
6 occurrences of a batter facing 23 balls, and
1 occurrence of a batter facing 24 balls (Matt).

Well, that was not particularly exciting, but I hope you enjoyed by brief rant about balls that shouldn't count, and how my stats are not yet perfected.
Must. Fix.

Balls faced in one over
Last week, Sanjit faced the first ball of the Jeganathan pair before his brother kept the strike for the rest of the first over - 4 dot balls and 3 wides. Again, this was no record - there are plenty of examples of players facing an entire over.

In Popped Collars history, there have been 5 overs which were faced entirely by one batsman. And all of them were opposition batsmen. This is a bit surprising to me. Given the erratic quality of the opposition we have played over the years (especially at Weston), I would have thought we would have come across a bowler capable of bowling enough wides to keep someone on strike the whole time, or a bowler good enough to get nothing but play-and-miss and bowled. But no.

There have been five times where one of our batsmen has faced 7 in a row during one over, but either started on the second ball, or gave the strike away with one to come.

Consecutive balls faced
But now... let's look beyond that. Forget about individual overs - how long has one batter gone without giving his partner any of the strike. The simple answer is: 12 balls

Team	Batter	Number of Balls	Details
DILIGAFS	Dean	12	0 0 2/0 W W N W 0 0 C/7
Galas	Greg	11	C 1/N 0 L W L 0 0 3/2
Pidge's Coupe	Pidgeon	10	2/0 B W L L L 0 1/2
Four Skins	Henry	9	0 1/0 L L 0 L W 1
Popped Collars	Xavier	9	0 0 3/W L 0 W 0 2
C U Next Tuesday	Scott	9	L N 7/L L L 0 L 3
Popped Collars	Jake	9	0 C W W W 1/0 W 1
Phil's Floggers	Darcy	9	0 W N 0 0 T W 1/1

The last column in this table lists what happened during their time on strike, so you can see how they managed to keep it for that long. A slash ( / ) indicates a change of over.

Most of these long streaks were greatly helped by the bowlers giving away extras (W,L,N). Predictably, dot-balls (0) and batsmen being bowled (B) or caught (C) also appear often, as do batsmen scoring runs off the final ball of the over.

An interesting one is the "T" in the last entry. This was the non-striker being given out "Third Ball" when they were required to score - either for hesitating after taking off for a run, or in this case perhaps not even attempting a run.

Non-Popped Collars record
I do enjoy telling the story of the time - playing for another team - that I faced only 1 ball in a pair, while my partner took the other 31. We were of course doing it on purpose. If I remember correctly, the opposition also helped out a bit during the last over, once they realised what we were trying to do. Unfortunately, after sifting through my extensive archive of old matches, it seems I don't have that classic scorecard. Disappointing, but I'll continue telling that story anyway.