by Tim Wigmore
This divergence is already clearly apparent in spin bowling: almost no spinners since the advent of T20 have maintained consistent performances in all three formats. Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan, the two greatest spin bowlers in the history of the game, are arguably joined by only left-arm spinners Daniel Vettori and Shakib Al Hasan in being able to excel in all three formats.
Pace bowlers are increasingly finding cross-format success almost as elusive. For batsmen there has remained more of a crossover, helped by their physiological advantage which enables them to train more. But as pressures are placed on power hitting and 360-degree scoring, many will be forced to choose between the defence-orientated red-ball game and attack-focused white-ball formats.
Teams will be bowled out more but also make more runs
Many T20 teams still use their resources poorly: in general, they systematically overvalue wickets, meaning that they leave hitting power untapped because they are too cautious for too much of their innings. The T20 World Cup semi-final in 2016, when India cruised to 192 for 2 off their 20 overs and were then defeated by the West Indies, is a classic of this genre.
T20 sides are still often governed by thinking from 50-over cricket about keeping wickets in hand – even though this matters far less in T20, whether a side is batting first or chasing. An enlightening statistic by the ESPNcricinfo writer Kartikeya Date showed that, when T20 teams lost in run chases, they were bowled out just 37% of the time – half as much as in ODI cricket – and lost fewer than eight wickets 32% of the time, compared with 10% in ODIs. This exposed the deep failings in much T20 strategy.
As T20 sides become shrewder, the slow increase in the number of runs per innings in recent years is likely to continue. Paradoxically, proof of smart thinking may be losing more wickets – unlike in other formats of cricket, the volume of run scoring and the frequency of wickets being lost could rise in sync.
Rather than build an innings in the conventional way, more teams are likely to use expendable players at the top of the order, like Sunil Narine, to target the fielding restrictions. Teams will move to more bespoke batting orders, embracing thinking in terms of positions rather than set positions, following on from the examples of CSK and latterly Islamabad United. The general improvements in the standards of bowlers’ batting will augment this shift by giving sides more flexibility.
For instance, teams could have essentially separate batting orders in the Powerplay and afterwards: two or three low-value players who would be deployed to target the fielding restrictions, followed by players to control the middle of the innings and then those to target the end of the innings. If a team lost a wicket to be, say, 40 for 2 after four overs, they could send out a player in the team largely in for their bowling to continue attacking; even, say, 12 off six balls while the fielding restrictions remained might be viewed as a good result. Top order batsmen, who would value their wicket highly during the fielding restrictions and so be likely to begin slowly, could then be saved until after the Powerplay.
This could all help create a paradigm shift in the expectations placed on individual players. So, rather than top order batsmen aiming to bat for half or more of the innings and sides aiming for at least one member of their top three to score a half-century, teams could be set up looking for, say, any six of the top nine batsmen to score 35 from 20 balls.
There will be a rationalisation of T20 leagues
The future may well involve more T20 teams, with other national, regional or even intrastate tournaments popping up. But the economics of the sport – so far, most teams and leagues have lost money – points to a rationalisation in the ambitions of leagues, and the hierarchy between leagues solidifying. So while the IPL is likely to expand, in both its number of teams and length, from 2023, or possibly even sooner, other leagues will have to spend less, aiming for less glitzy overseas players and perhaps occupying less time, if they are to be commercially viable. The future of T20 leagues may be simultaneously of more leagues but distinct tiers between the leagues, as in, say, football. And the IPL is only likely to become more dominant.
‘Most signs point towards the IPL strengthening its position as the Premier League or NBA of cricket,’ said Jon Long, the former head of strategy for the ICC. ‘There will be a handful of leagues that will remain broadly similar to their current structures – perhaps incrementally increasing the number of teams and matches – while several other competitions will have gone through changes in terms of ownership, structure, duration and player eligibility criteria. It will remain challenging for leagues outside the three to four major markets to become financially sustainable but entrepreneurs and investors will continue to experiment with competitions.’ But some leagues which are popular today may not be able to survive in their current guise.
Greater use of data
It is likely that at the heart of greater strategising will be greater use of data. While cricket has already made strides in integrating more sophisticated data analysis into decision-making, the sport has only scratched the surface of its potential.
‘We haven’t anywhere near reached peak data,’ said Trent Woodhill, a coach in the IPL and other leagues. ‘We have the data. We just don’t have enough people being able to drive it and buying into it. You’re still going to get push-back. Cricket is still a game played by experienced players with allegedly good instincts. We’re still a long way behind American sports.’
A key growth area will be fielding where a combination of fielder tracking and advanced fielding metrics will not only enable analysts to prescribe a more accurate value to fielders, but will also help enhance coaching by identifying very specific fielder strengths and weaknesses.
‘I think you’ll see a bigger and bigger focus on fielding performance,’ explained England lead analyst Nathan Leamon. ‘I think fielding is the area of the game with the biggest headroom to improve. If you compare our skills in certain areas with other sports, there’s definitely evidence that we’re not close to the limits of how well you can field.’
The arrival of reliable fielding maps will greatly enhance analysis of all facets of the game. It will become possible to identify the batsmen who are best at finding gaps in the field, bowlers who are most effective at bowling to their field and the captain who utilises his fielders most efficiently, among many other things.
More football-style sackings
Before the 2017 season, Daniel Vettori was unveiled as Middlesex coach. The club stressed his IPL experience with Bangalore; they made no reference, and didn’t seem to notice, that his actual win-loss record in the IPL and elsewhere was mediocre. It embodied the lack of care paid to many coaching appointments, with jobs awarded largely on the basis of who looked the part and networks.
At Middlesex, Vettori won a derisory seven games out of 27. By the end of 2018, he had lost both his Bangalore and Middlesex jobs. It was a window into how, slowly, as the actual business of winning becomes more important to T20 teams, so coaches are becoming more accountable. This is begetting more job insecurity. The future of T20 coaching is likely to see more football-style sackings, including in mid-season.
The T20 World Cup will expand
The ICC often declare that T20 is the globalisation vehicle, but the number of countries permitted to play in the main stage of the men’s World Cup remains pitiful compared to sports that cricket likes to consider itself bigger than. But the decision in 2018 to open up T20 international status to all men’s and women’s international sides, bringing cricket in line with other sports, hinted at a desire to grow the sport less tepidly.
One of the next steps will be to increase the size of the T20 World Cup. From 2020, this comprises 12 sides in the main stage, with a further four playing a preliminary round (effectively another qualifier) immediately before, an increase from ten sides in the main stage in previous tournaments.
In the years to come this number is likely to grow. Sanjog Gupta, the executive vice-president of Star TV Network – and, as such
, a crucial member of the cricket ecosystem – said that he supports a more inclusive format.
‘I do see room for the T20 World Cup to be a big platform for new nations to come in and new nations and new viewers to be inducted in cricket and for it to become the tournament that’s the real first handshake for viewers around the world,’ Gupta said.
He suggested two potential models for expansion. The first option would include 14 teams: ‘You could potentially look at two groups of seven, which gives you 42 games followed by an extended play-offs.’
The second option would include 15 teams, followed by a subsequent stage. ‘You could potentially look at three groups of five each, with two from each group qualifying and playing in the Super Six. That gives you a good mix of new teams, more regions but also great games at the Super Six and league stage.’
Recent progress made by the US men’s team, who are now ranked among the world top 20 in ODI cricket, is likely to crystallise the desire to grow the T20 World Cup.
Greater emphasis on home advantage
T20 is an inherently volatile game that can be won or lost on the finest of margins. It is this fragility that means teams should seek to control every possible variable because they could easily end up being the difference between victory and defeat.
Teams play half their league matches at home. This offers the opportunity for teams to either adjust their conditions to suit their squad, which is more likely in leagues with less player turnover, like the T20 Blast in England, BBL in Australia and competitions in South Africa and New Zealand. Another option, more likely in leagues with greater player turnover such as the IPL, PSL and CPL, is to adjust their squad to suit conditions. If teams can dominate at home and win, say, 70% of their home fixtures, they will typically only require a handful of wins away to progress to the play-off stages.
So far there is only the faintest hint of home advantage in T20: 53% of matches are won by the home team, a lower advantage than in basketball, football or ODI cricket, where home teams win 59% of games.
Yet sides such as Chennai Super Kings in Chepauk, Rajasthan Royals in Jaipur and Perth Scorchers at the WACA have given a glimpse of what is possible. Perth won 69% of all their matches at the WACA, but their home form then dipped markedly when they moved to a new ground.
As T20 continues to mature it will become more results-orientated. Shrewd team managers will come to prioritise devising a strategy to dominate at home.
Formats will get shorter at amateur level
Time pressures have not only squeezed the professional game to produce shorter and shorter formats but these challenges are even more acute at amateur level. Playing cricket at club level across 50 overs a side takes an entire day out of someone’s weekend. In England in particular, participation numbers in amateur cricket are falling.
In response to this participation crisis it is likely that more midweek evening games will be played after work. In Asia and the Caribbean these matches will be played under lights as part of vibrant local leagues. These matches will take less time than traditional weekend fixtures and mirror the professional game’s prioritisation of T20.
Agents will continue to become more important
Agents have been among the first winners of the first age of T20. With T20 leagues from Afghanistan to Australia and Canada to the Caribbean, agents are more prevalent, and influential, than ever before. As of 2019, there were 40 in England alone, about double the number five years ago; worldwide, the number has risen to 110 registered agents. The shifting terrain has created a new need for agents – and so a new source of cash, with players using agents to get into T20 leagues while teams use agents to identify who is available and fulfils the league’s eligibility requirements.
Agents act like career planners. When considering offers from T20 franchises, agents routinely look at ground dimensions – smaller grounds are better for boundary hitters and worse for spinners, for instance – as well as the players and coaches they’d work with. And, rather like in football, agents are becoming a way of players voicing their discontent, and trying to assume a more prominent role in their teams. James Welch, a former Durham academy player who has run the agency Quantum Sport since 2007, once emailed Yorkshire’s director of cricket with David Willey’s lofty strike rate in the Powerplay to try to convince him to use Willey higher up the order. ‘Players want to see that you’re adding value.’
Yet as cricket’s wealth has snowballed, so the war for talent between agents has intensified. ‘Player poaching is a serious issue,’ said Talha Aisham from the agency Saya Corporation. ‘As this profession is getting popular, a lot of people are coming to it without any background and training.’
After the Afghan Premier League draft in 2018, one insider reported, several young Afghan players who had just earned contracts were messaged by a former team official, saying that they needed to give 10% of their money to the official to finalise their contracts. This was a complete lie, but a window into the opportunities for gluttony and malfeasance opened up by T20 leagues.
In some T20 leagues insiders whisper that captains or coaches seem to push specific players whom their agent also represents. The potential for conflict of interest, with agents representing coaches and players alike, is obvious.
There is broad agreement in the sport that there should be greater regulation. As of 2019, agents were unregulated everywhere except England, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. If regulations do not become more common – the ICC supports more member states introducing regulatory systems but a blanket global agent registration system is considered unlikely – then stories about the malign influence of agents promise to become more common in the sport’s new landscape.
Batsmen retiring out
In a CPL match in 2017, just 12 days after hitting an innings of 121 not out, Andre Russell – one of the most destructive T20 players of all time – was unused by Jamaica. Chasing 157 to win against Barbados, Jamaica ended up on 154 for 3, somehow contriving to lose by two runs despite having seven wickets in hand. Yet Russell did not bat at all – the T20 equivalent of having Lionel Messi on the bench but not being able to bring him on.
It was a perfect case study of how teams could benefit from retiring out struggling batsmen, rather than allowing them to continue to consume deliveries at the crease and prevent other players from getting to bat.
Retiring a batsman out has negative connotations attached to it partly because cricket is obsessed by the concept of ‘fair play’. Many believe the battle at the crease is part of the game, rather than something that can be tactically ended.
It is not, however, against the laws of the game to retire a batsman out. And, on occasion, it could be prudent for a team to do so, to ensure they didn’t leave one of their best batting resources unused. Similarly, fielding teams may employ ‘tactical drops’, making little effort to get to a high ball simply to keep a weaker batsman at the crease, and leave as few balls as possible for a player like Russell to impact the game.
Innovation in this area came from an unlikely source. In September 2018, Belize became the first team in professional T20 cricket to retire a batsman out when they withdrew Howell Gillett who was 8 not out off 23 balls in a match against Panama.
Match-ups will become more sophisticated
One of the buzzwords of the first era of T20 has been match-ups: that is opposition teams targeting certain types of batsmen with certain types of bowlers.
‘It happens every game,’ said England’s captain Eoin Morgan. ‘The one where it has worked best was the World Cup Final in 2016 where we opened the bowling with Joe Root to Chris Gayle. We had an under-par score on the board, we needed early wickets and the ball wasn’t going to swing because it didn’t swing the first innings so we decided to take a bit of a left-field call and again it was calculated but it came off.’
As data analysis of T20 improves, the level of detail in these match-ups will grow. For example, not all right-arm pace bowlers are the same. I
ndeed, two right-arm bowlers such as Lasith Malinga – with a low, slingy release – and Jason Holder – with an unusually high release point – could scarcely be more different. The same applies to batsmen: traditional anchor Michael Klinger is a right-handed batsmen but to group him as the same kind of player as, say, Jos Buttler would be inaccurate.
Advanced analysis is beginning to reflect this. CricViz have built a model that groups players using detailed shot type, footwork, scoring zone and ball-tracking data, separating players into sub-categories and then identifying strengths and weaknesses within these. As a result, Klinger might have a positive match-up against Malinga but a negative match-up against Holder, despite them both being right-arm quicks.
More set plays
Field settings generally are dictated to by the ball that a bowler is wanting to bowl. If he is looking to bowl a wide yorker, for example, then third man will be back; if he is looking to bowl a slower ball then third man and fine leg will be up. These settings are typically managed by the captain and bowler and are now a fundamental part of basic T20 tactics.
Yet, as the game and as planning around the game develops, it is possible that these field settings will become more predetermined. Fielding teams may employ something akin to set piece routines in football. A code signal from the coach or captain might be all it takes for the field to snap into a certain shape and the bowler respond with the relevant delivery. This might become particularly pertinent if more stringent over-rate penalties are applied through the use of ball clocks, counting down the time permitted in between deliveries.
As analytics of field settings – perhaps the most underappreciated aspect of the sport – grows, the detail that goes into these set plays will rapidly evolve. Teams will be able to identify subtle differences in shot location of different batsmen against different deliveries and they will manage their set plays accordingly.
Hybrid spin bowlers
