In the last week we have witnessed the aftermath of the Ashes 2013 with praise for Australia’s fast bowling attack and finger-pointing for the England team regarding their batting techniques, leadership … *insert or google your own here reason here*… coming under scrutiny.

On the one side we can all sing praises for a phenomenal series by Mitchell Johnson and on the other we share the disappointment of Andy Flower, Alistair Cook and co. However, it was only back in March that the shoe was on the other foot with the sacking of Mickey Arthur, such is the fickleness of success and defeat.

In this week’s blog we’ll look at the Ashes and the dangers of poorly attributing reasons for success and failure and then take these lessons to help you evaluate your own batting technique.

Lars Lefgren did some research that looked at how American football coaches make strategy changes after wins and losses. Here’s Lefgren’s summary of what he calls ‘outcome bias’:

“…coaches tend to change their strategy more frequently after losing a game compared to winning the game. This occurs even when comparing narrow losses or victories, where winning has no predictive power about future success.” p 27 From Lefgren et al, “Sticking with What (Barely) Worked: A Test of Outcome Bias”

Admittedly, we can’t say that England narrowly lost the Ashes this time round but as we read the current press (e.g. “Flower, KP and the England blame game”) people want some answers. But, the wisdom from Lefgren is not to stop searching for the reason but realise that, after a loss there is a tendency to ‘over-correct’ to the point that the ‘baby is thrown out with the bath water’. Conversely, the danger for Australia is to have decisions and team traits reinforced because they are winning when in fact they may have no benefit on future success. For example, the team was not changed throughout the five test series (‘don’t change a winning team’) yet clearly there were some Australian players that did not perform.

Another helpful sport science theory comes from Weiner. Weiner’s attribution theory provides a framework to recognise the reasons we give for winning and losing. In, short it suggests that we’re more likely to attribute success to things that we have done (internal), that are in our control and likely to happen again. In contrast, we’re more likely to attribute failure to external factors that are out of our control and unlikely to happen again. Put in Ashes speak: the Aussie cricket team are more likely to say the 5-0 win was due to their great preparation and execution of bowling plans, selection, Darren Lehman etc…, whereas the England cricket team will be more likely to attribute the 5-0 loss to factors outside of their control (e.g. losing the toss 4 times in a row, Trott’s stress-related illness etc…). The heart of this idea is that we give reasons for our success and failure that lighten the blow on our self-confidence. We tend to give reasons that keep our ego in tact!

In short, the lessons for evaluating the Eng vs Aus result:

• Just because you’ve won it doesn’t mean you irrationally keep on doing what you did at the time of a win (some might say this is why superstitions start up!).
• Drop your pride, particularly when you win — recognise that success has an element of fortune — some things that were done may be detrimental to future success.
• Don’t make knee-jerk changes in a team’s strategy and culture after losing. There’s a chance that hasty changes could harm actual strengths.

Ok, so as a batsman how can we apply these lessons when evaluating batting technique?

1. Set process goals rather than performance goals. For example, as an opener set the goal to make positive decision when going back or forward (use the depth of the crease) in the first 5 overs rather than to score 20 runs. Process goals will limit the risk of Lefgren’s ‘outcome bias’.

2. When you get out for a low score don’t completely change your batting set-up. Pick ONE thing to work on and THREE things to affirm and keep doing well.

3. When you make big runs recognise that there is no such thing as a ‘chanceless hundred’ — some parts of your batting technique could have brought your downfall if you weren’t lucky!

So, rather than jump on the Ashes 2013 blame-bandwagon, how about use the lessons learned to help assess your own batting technique in a rational manner!

from www.batexbattingtips.com