Until the late 90s the only two batsmen who really seemed to work out One Day Cricket were Javed Miandad and Dean Jones. Others were good at it, but because they were naturally good at it. Jones and Miandad thought about cricket and they came up with a way to make maximum runs consistently and turn themselves into legends. Albeit, Dean Jones thought he was a legend before. Their style of batting was based on picking the gaps, taking calculated risks, and milking the middle overs. This is what all teams do now. So much so that it bores us now. In the mid 90s Michael Bevan invented what is known as a finisher, which (if using Bevan as a template) is a batsman who will keep his head, can work out mathematics on the run, knows where he can score 4s if needed, and will make the chase tighter than it needs to be, but will win way more than he loses. At about the same time Sanatha Jayasurya and Romesh Kaluwitharana changed opening the batting by ritual slaughtering of bowlers. These are the three main kinds of batsmen you have in One Day Cricket, the thrasher, the milker, and the finisher. Originally these types of players moved over to T20, and just played at a slightly more frenetic pace. That is because T20 is still pretty young. It would be foolish to say that teams have worked it out yet, but they are getting close.
Batsmen are working themselves into two distinct groups, the mentalists and the clever guys, for want of better terms. The mentalists are your Shahid Afridi, Yusuf Pathan, and Albie Morkel types. Players who can score at phenomenal strike rates and win games in the space of 5 overs. They generally don’t get themselves set, they just try and smash it from the start. Cricket has always had batsmen like these guys, but in T20 they are let fully off the leash and encouraged to hit harder than they ever have before.
Brad Hodge is the highest scoring Domestic T20 batsman in the world. His strike rate is 127. His basic form of attack is to get himself set, take few risks, score off every ball, put away the bad ball, and then accelerate. It isn’t rocket science, but it works. Quite often Hodge will be roughly 20 off 20, but he will end up as 70 off 50, or better. Shaun Marsh did the exact same thing in the first IPL to lead all scorers. Kallis is doing it this year.
A balanced side needs mostly clever guys, with a few mentalists. The mentalists can lose wickets for you very fast, and they don’t come off very often. The clever guys can often get out just as they are starting to up the ante, and often waste key balls in this period. A team of just clever guys will rarely put on amazing totals, and also might get bogged down at times. A team of mentalists could get bowled out under 100 too often. The ideal T20 batsman is someone like Ross Taylor, who averages over 30 with a strike rate of more than 150. He scores enough runs to be clever, and scores them quick enough to be a bit mental. Taylor can be the rock your innings is built around, or the warhead to ends the game.
And maybe that is where T20 batting will end up. You might need to accumulate, slow the game down, amp the game up, get a bit mental, and then finish it off. Then take a long bath.
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