15 March, 2007

On chasing low totals in cricket

Yesterday, when I was re-reading C Northcote Parkinson’s excellent book, Parkinson’s Law: The Pursuit of Progress, while researching my column for Mint, it struck me that the central insight of the book applies beautifully to cricket. The insight is this:

Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

Now, when teams chase low totals in one-day matches, the way they chase the target changes entirely from the norm. A team that would normally chase 250 easily approaches 180 differently. The tempo of their batting adjusts itself to the low target, and while they might normally look to reach the 180 mark by the 40th over, the task expands itself “to fill the time available for its completion.”

And if that new tempo is an unnatural one for the side, it might just backfire on them, and they might lose. This is why it now strikes me that India might have been lucky to get dismissed for 183 in the 1983 World Cup final. Had we made 250, we might have lost.

Do note that this doesn’t mean that teams should deliberately make low scores. That’s pushing it!