Test batting post 2013 is toughest since 1990s

[Trichromatic]

Overall figures

Decade	Teams	Mat	Won	Lost	Tied	Draw	W/L	Ave	RPO	Inns	HS	LS
1870s	2	3	3	3	0	0	1.000	18.71	2.47	12	261	104
1880s	3	29	25	25	0	4	1.000	19.38	2.30	105	551	42
1900s	3	41	31	31	0	10	1.000	25.08	2.82	155	577	36
1890s	3	32	26	26	0	6	1.000	25.25	2.63	118	586	30
1910s	3	29	25	25	0	4	1.000	27.55	3.01	104	589	58
1950s	7	164	113	113	0	51	1.000	28.60	2.30	591	790	26
1990s	9	347	223	223	0	124	1.000	31.64	2.86	1244	952	46
1960s	7	186	97	97	1	88	1.000	32.27	2.49	690	656	78
1980s	7	266	143	143	1	122	1.000	32.64	2.86	935	708	53
1930s	6	89	53	53	0	36	1.000	32.69	2.71	314	903	36
1970s	7	198	114	114	0	84	1.000	32.80	2.69	729	687	42
1920s	4	51	35	35	0	16	1.000	33.42	2.66	180	636	30
2010s	10	350	275	275	0	75	1.000	33.53	3.22	1302	759	45
2000s	11	464	350	350	0	114	1.000	34.17	3.20	1686	765	47
1940s	6	45	23	23	0	22	1.000	35.77	2.62	160	674	42

 

 

Phase 1: Test batting till 1910s was underdeveloped and cricket was too much in favor of batsmen. So, 1870s to 1910s have lowest averages, but batting was consistently improving.

 

Phase 2: Batting improved a lot in Bradman era (1920s-1940s) and this was batsmen dominated phase.

 

Phase 3: 1950s. Pace bowling started developing from trundlers to faster bowlers and batsmen struggled to manage them. Averages dropped quite significantly with improved quality of bowling on uncovered pitches.

 

Phase 4: 1960s. Covered pitches came into picture and bowlers had no clue to what to do. Batsmen made merry and it was much better decade of batsmen than previous one.

 

Phase  5: 1970s-1980s. Balanced time for batsmen and bowlers. Batting averages went up and pacers found their way to get wickets. 

 

Phase 6: 1990s. Toughest era for batting with all teams having good bowlers and batsmen struggling. Batting averages dropped significantly. Averaging 50 became almost impossible.

 

Phase 7: 2003-2013. Era of FTBs. Many great bowlers retired. Pitch quality improved a lot and we got flat pitches all over the world. Minnows entered the scene with lot of matches. Top 6 team averaged 37 with bat. Great ones averaged above 55 and there were million batsmen averaging 50+. Steyn was only great fast bowler emerging during this phase. Massive FTBs and minnow bashing era.

 

Phase 8: Post 2013. Teams becoming desperate for home advantage and started preparing spicy pitches everywhere. Bangladesh improved at home and Zimbabwe rarely got matches, so that minnow factor dimnished. So many new pacers and spinners emerging again. Overall batting average since 2013 - 33.10. The way it's decreasing with year, it is easily toughest phase in 1990s.

 

 

Year	Teams	Mat	Won	Lost	Tied	Draw	W/L	Ave	RPO	Inns	HS	LS
year 2014	10	41	33	33	0	8	1.000	35.96	3.27	156	730	94
year 2016	10	47	40	40	0	7	1.000	33.47	3.24	171	759	83
year 2015	9	43	34	34	0	9	1.000	32.81	3.32	160	628	60
year 2013	10	44	33	33	0	11	1.000	32.17	3.13	164	638	45
year 2017	10	47	40	40	0	7	1.000	32.06	3.20	174	687	68
year 2018	4	4	4	4	0	0	1.000	25.96	2.98	15	649	130

 

 

 

 

[Cricketics]

Batting against Starc and Hazlewood is extremely tough, as tough as batting against anyone back in the days.

 

 

Those who appreciate past players because they faced top players need to realize its no piece of cake to score in South Aftica, Australia and England in today’s era and the same can be said for scoring in India against top spinners like Ashwin and Jadeja.

 

 

Anyone overseas player who score in India against Ashwin and Jadeja deserve huge respect equally. 

 

 

People have knack for glorifying the past to put down the performance of current players. Smith and Kohli have done brilliant in this era so far. In particular Smith who has amassed truck loads of runs everywhere in Test. Champion batsman.

 

 

 

 

 

[kira]

This era in test cricket is similar to the 80s and 90s. We have great set of fast bowlers like starc, hazelwood, rabada, morkel, southe boult, shami, bhuvi, anderson (great in cloudy conditions but since he mostly plays in cloudy conditions so he's mostly great), Broad(same as anderson) etc along with many new upcoming youngsters. Pace bowling stock today is as rich as the 80s and 90s.

 

We also have some very good spinners in ashwin, jadeja, maharaj, lyon. Sure, the stock of spinners isn't as good as the warne-murali era but it is still great set of spinners. 

 

Anyone who scores runs in this era of test cricket will surely be rated as high as the greats of 80s and 90s.

[Trichromatic]

I think days of high 50s averages are over now with retirement of Kallis and Sanga. 2000s had SRT, Dravid, Kallis, Sanga, Ponting, averaging close to 60 at peak. All great batsmen were averaging close to 50 unlike 1990s. 

 

Best will average around 50-51 for most part of career. Smith is only exception here. 

 

I remember reading a newspaper article titled "Is 55 new 50?". While earlier peak average of 50 was considered ATG stufff, suddenly 55 became new peak for ATGs and 50 was common for others. Guess, it's going back to 50 now. 

[SUMO]

3 hours ago, Trichromatic said:

I think days of high 50s averages are over now with retirement of Kallis and Sanga. 2000s had SRT, Dravid, Kallis, Sanga, Ponting, averaging close to 60 at peak. All great batsmen were averaging close to 50 unlike 1990s. 

 

Best will average around 50-51 for most part of career. Smith is only exception here. 

 

I remember reading a newspaper article titled "Is 55 new 50?". While earlier peak average of 50 was considered ATG stufff, suddenly 55 became new peak for ATGs and 50 was common for others. Guess, it's going back to 50 now. 

Abd and amla has also fallen below 50.

Only fab 4 has in them to finish career with 50+ 

Interestingly among Post 2001 debutants, no one ( except hussey ) has finished with avg 50+ 

Cook, kp, clark, graeme smith, sehwag smarweera etc have all failed to do so.

Dont think warner puji rahane taylor faf azhar angelo chandi etc have it in them.

[The Dark Horse]

May be it has something to do with the impatience of batsmen.

[Gollum]

Will be interesting to see if the mushrooming of T20 leagues has anything to do with all this, will be a nice research study for some budding statistician.

 

In any case last 4-5 years have been exciting for all test lovers, more so for us because India is doing well.

 

Hope Lanka improves and WI doesn't stall on the progress it made in the last 3 odd years. 

 

This is how cricket was meant to be played, balance between bat and ball where 100s are cherished as much as 4fers and 500+ isn't the norm. ODI cricket unfortunately has taken a nose dive, it is living on borrowed time and unless the balance is restored, it will be relegated to the history books, T20 is what current T50 provides but much more fan friendly because of time and entertainment. 

Edited January 29, 2018 by Gollum

[Trichromatic]

1 hour ago, Gollum said:

Will be interesting to see if the mushrooming of T20 leagues has anything to do with all this, will be a nice research study for some budding statistician.

 

In any case last 4-5 years have been exciting for all test lovers, more so for us because India is doing well.

 

Hope Lanka improves and WI doesn't stall on the progress it made in the last 3 odd years. 

 

This is how cricket was meant to be played, balance between bat and ball where 100s are cherished as much as 4fers and 500+ isn't the norm. ODI cricket unfortunately has taken a nose dive, it is living on borrowed time and unless the balance is restored, it will be relegated to the history books, T20 is what current T50 provides but much more fan friendly because of time and entertainment. 

This doesn't require too much research to see that Indian cricket is played on more bowler friendly pitches, recent SA series was one of the toughest for batsmen, our previous England tour was full of spicy tracks whereas matches were played on flat pitches in 2000s with 500-600 scored for fun. 

 

Even Bangladesh is preparing turners to take home advantage. They couldn't do it ealier. SL used to be flat for everyone in lot of matches, now they have both pace and spin assitance. WI has been spinner/pacer friendly for many matches.

 

NZ, Aus, UAE are flat. NZ produced green tracks last time Pakistan toured them.

 

It's obvious all that all teams are trying to maximise the home advantage and unless teams are sure that they can beat opposition on flat pitches, they are giving difficult tracks to visitors.

[Gollum]

@Trichromatic I was talking in terms of bad test technique because of too many meaningless T20s. Also no off season and hardly any warm ups, optically for me at least modern era batsmen look low quality compared to earlier years.