Fielding for Munaf Patel & India

[lethal_raina]

How important is ground fielding in Test Cricket? The standard answer of course, is that it is extremely important. I want to suggest here that the obsession among ardent observers of Cricket (and especially India's cricket) about ground fielding has less to do with any actual facts, and much to do with feeling a certain inferiority. It has less to do with Cricket, than to do with wanting to feel up to date, so to speak. It's a bit like the increasing prejudice against supposedly mild mannered cricketers. It's the reason why, if you took a poll among serious cricket fans in India, I would wager that most would think Sourav Ganguly was a more successful captain than Rahul Dravid (please read this statement carefully, I am not saying "better" or "superior", but "more successful" - i.e, got more favorable results). People want someone who will get overtly angry and demonstrate how upset he is everytime he gets hit for four or is denied a wicket upon making an appeal. Similarly, people want to see a fielder who will throw himself around. This is sadly a misunderstanding about fielding, in much the same way that people will argue that drainage facilities at Galle or Colombo, are not as good as those at grounds in London or Manchester. These are arguments made by people who wish to be modern. In an even more interesting comparison - compare the drainage services in London and Bombay, or New York and Bombay. Except, these modern people fail to appreciate the comparison between the actual rainfalls in London or New York, and Bombay, or Galle and Colombo, and London or Manchester. These same people who want to emulate the services in London or New York, completely ignore the fact that the conditions are very different. A simple comparison would be thus - Bombay, which gets typically tropical monsoon rainfall, gets 85 inches in the City, and about 95 inches in the suburbs annually. London by contrast, gets about 23 inches annually. Galle gets about 88 inches per year. Clearly, draining a cricket ground in Galle and draining Lord's are completely different prospects, with completely different costs, and run by people with different means. The "we should be like London or Shanghai or Timbuktu" argument is therefore ridiculous. Fielding is similarly complicated unfortunately. It has nothing to do with diving or running really fast or making sliding stops. Sliding stops are the most overrated phenomenon in cricket. In terms of it's impact on a game, the number of sliding stops made by your average fielder in a 50 over game, does not even compensate the number of rank bad balls your average spin bowler will deliver in a 10 over spell. The short ball outside off stump delivered by the off spinner, or the one bowled by the off spinner that drifts down the leg side, rarely gets as much abuse as a fielder who is unwilling to make a sliding stop to prevent half a run, or a fielder who might have a weak arm. We even make up stories about team morale being affected by apparently sluggish fielding. Sluggish fielding itself is a modern invention. What about team morale being affected by the spin bowler being unable to string six good deliveries and then 6 good overs in a spell and build some pressure? You will rarely find any of these cricket fanatics getting upset about that. But which hurts a team more? Rubbish bowling, or polite fielding? Because being unable to bowl the ball where you want to bowl it is unworthy of international cricket. Batsmen in International Cricket should have to be able to hit good balls to make runs. Generations of batsmen who have played against India, have never had to do that. Limited and ordinary players like Paranavitana make runs regularly against India. Not because we have less aggressive fielding, but because our bowlers don't possess control. The unpopularity of Munaf Patel is easily explained by this silly obsession. An obsession about racing about the field after balls hit by batsmen to terrible deliveries and then applauding loudly when then odd four is limited to three - this guy really cares about his team, except that he was bowling at the other end and can't string together six decent deliveries. An obsession about diving which always ignores the fact that fielding is about anticipation - about reading the batsman. The great cover fielder almost always instinctively focuses on his left when he sees a ball pitching short, while he holds his ground if the ball is full. The truly great fielder doesn't have to dive. That's why it's often been argued that Ponting was the better fielder compared to Jonty - because he has superb anticipation. He's a cricketer, not a goalkeeper. Jonty was brilliant and specialized at coverpoint and midwicket (for Pak Symcox) but I think there have been fielders in the cricketing world with superior anticipation (if slightly lesser mobility) than Jonty's. Ponting would be one and Mark Waugh would be another. Observers in Australia and South Africa think A B deVilliers has better anticipation than Jonty had as well. But Jonty was the poster boy of the perfect storm of cable television and fielding displays. Diving and sliding became the stuff of promotional videos. Cool, if ultimately only marginally relevant in a game. Being able to take singles is a far more significant skill in ODI cricket than diving about and turning two into one. The field is too big for that. It's one of the reasons, why I don't think Yuvraj Singh or Mohammad Kaif were particularly great fielders even though they dived and slid a lot, and why I think that in the long run, VVS and Dravid have been more valuable fielders for the Indian Test team. Because they possess the ability to anticipate. Every time India go through a day in the field where they don't take wickets and drop a catch or two, people jump on the "we're such a bad fielding side" band wagon. Do I need to remind you that this is the Number One Test team in the World? And as much as I think that the ICC's Rating methodology has problems, I think it is hard to argue that India have not competed against the best opposition in the world better than anybody else in the last 8-10 years. It is hard to argue that India's supposedly ageing team did not beat England in England the last time they were there, and most people would agree that England had a better fielding side (KP, Collingwood, Bell, Cook, Broad, Anderson - all superior fielders to their counterparts in the Indian side). It shouldn't even be a point of debate as to whether Munaf Patel should be left out of the Test team on account of his fielding. He shouldn't be left out. He has more class and ability as a bowler in his little finger than a lot of people who have played for India recently as fast bowlers. Unless someone who is genuinely quick comes along, or unless a genuine swing bowler comes along (like Sreesanth), i don't think Munaf Patel's place should ever be in doubt. It is my one gripe with the Indian Selectors. Not every talented bowler they will find is going to be a model individual. Some bowlers need taking care of, and deserve it because they have something special to offer. In Munaf's case it is especially true, simply on account of his background. They may have a perfectly valid reason to dislike Munaf Patel, but that shouldn't really matter. I would wager, that if a measure was found for the number of runs saved during fielding, and another was found for the number of runs conceded because bad balls were bowled, that Munaf Patel would out perform any Indian bowler with the possible exception of Zaheer Khan, Harbhajan Singh (yes Pragyan Ojha included!). Test Matches are won based on things not easily visible on the multiple cameras and graphics of the modern cable broadcast. They are won by honest, careful batting and accurate bowling. They are won through control and restraint not by a brilliant stop at deep fine leg - the problem there is that the ball was bowled down leg, not that the fielder conceded two where he should have conceded one. The difference between conceding 0 and 1 is not the same as the difference between conceding 1 and 2. Of course in the perfect world every batsman would be Tendulkar, every fielder Ponting and every bowler Warne or Wasim. But then, this perfect world would not be human. Everytime we blame fielding for India's performance in a Test Match, we miss the real point. These are good fielders - good enough to make them the World Number One Test team. Good enough to win Test Matches in every Test playing nation in the world. When we find a batsman who can field like Mark Waugh or Ricky Ponting, as well as bat like them, we should pick him by all means. But until then, lets not beat up on our players up using tired, trivial props like fielding. They are not bad fielders.

[Guest BossBhai]

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[The Outsider]

Ground fielding is not an important aspect of test cricket. The margins of results are so big that the 8-10 odd runs saved over an innings by sliding stops are vastly overrated. It does make a big difference in ODIs and T20s though. However, catching in test is absolutely crucial, specially close in catching. Dropping a good opposition batsman can mean a difference of 100 runs in the final scheme of things, at times even more. Crucial dropped catches have turned around the fortunes of many test matches. I would pick a Sehwag, Tendulkar, Dravid, or Laxman as better test match fielders any day over Yuvraj and Kaif, both of whom were very ordinary close in catchers. That is not to say that you need to be an absolute dud in the field. Your inner ring of fielders must at least be safe, if not brilliant to stop batsmen from rotating the strike too easily. As for the boundary riders, they are essentially showpieces in test matches. Doesn't really matter if the batsman is able to pinch 3 runs from someone on occasions where they could have been restricted to 2 as long as they are catching everything.

[Mr. Wicket]

Extending Outy's point a bit, I consider Kaif one of the worst close in fielders we've had in the last couple of decades and someone whose nervous energy has cost us more catches than he's taken there. As a bat-pad, it's important to be still and keep low - Kaif was a very good inner ring type fielder who could move quickly around gully/point/cover, but was never good at keeping still and low and anticipating the ball from a spinner. I recollect him missing (not dropping) a number of catches that a better bat-pad like Chopra or Dravid would have held onto easily.

[Guest BossBhai]

-- Removed on request of the user --

[thevortex]

Good point, lethal_raina. I agree. As far as I am concerned, at the highest level of the game we have two primary skills (batting and bowling) and a secondary skill (fielding).

[UmarAkmal]

Catching is more important than fielding in tests.