Intent v Attrition

During the recent Border-Gavaskar series, Cheteshwar Pujara and Rishabh Pant approached the same goal in two completely different ways. This led to a lot of debate, and opinion mongering. Hence, this article. I’m attempting to create two teams — Attrition XI and Aggression XI. The former focuses on batsmen that put a price on their wicket, while the latter looks at those who dominate and score at a brisk pace. In case of bowlers, the Attrition XI selects players who take wickets while limiting the scoring at the same time; Aggression XI has players that take their wickets quickly.

The data being used is from a specific time period. Players contend for specialised positions in the lineup and are selected separately for each position. The division of positions is as follows-

1. Openers (1,2)
2. Number 3
3. Middle order (4,5)
4. Lower middle order (6,7)
5. Spinner (8)
6. Pacers (9–11)

Selection metrics

For every batting position group, we consider only the innings played by a player in those positions. For instance, innings played by Steve Smith at number 3 are not counted when we select him for middle order positions (4,5). We also have a qualification criteria of at least thirty innings batted/bowled. For positions 6 and 7 we look only at batting data but with an additional caveat — selecting one wicketkeeper and one all-rounder for these positions. Simple enough?

Looking at the data from 2015 to 2020 we get the following two sides —

Not bad!

There were some interesting insights that came out of it —

Cheteshwar Pujara vs Kane Williamson — This was the biggest elephant in the room. Che missed out on a place in Attrition XI by a whisker! His balls per dismissal value was 110.42 whereas for Williamson it was 110.58 (story of his life, right?). No one has played more balls than Pujara (8171) at number three in last five years. Williamson has played 7188 balls in only 3 fewer innings than Pujara. It can be argued that the only reason Pujara missed out was because Williamson remained not out nine times compared to Pujara’s three.

Why no ABD? How can there be an intent XI that doesn’t feature AB de Villiers? He had some tough competition. We also tend to forget that AB is a much more versatile player than the one we see in IPL. Perhaps his cause was hurt by knocks such as his remarkable 297 ball 43 in Delhi against India four years ago when South Africa were fighting tooth and nail for a draw.

I was surprised to see Azhar Ali at number one in openers list — but there is daylight between him(bpd value of 109) and even Sir Alastair Cook! (92). To be fair, most of his batting was done in the UAE. I didn’t expect to see Ross Taylor either. But his strike rate of 65.1 was way better than everyone else including Kohli’s 60.14. Ashwin was interesting because he made it to both teams but in different capacities. In Attrition XI he is there for his batting as an all-rounder (there were 7 people above him in bpd values but none of them bowled). In Intent XI he was a clear winner amongst spinners with a strike rate of 50.3 (that is better than Jimmy Anderson!).

All other picks were pretty much understandable.

If you still got beef, tell me in comments!

Data links-

1. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wKIcQJGZNPLDz7ubagjZbu9Hjk-M4Ee_uPuylydI86I/edit?usp=sharing
2. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-OXfybHv1-Me97MLXKOSy1Zo2oh-WuPCSPg2AtrT4gc/edit?usp=sharing

P.S: I’ll be doing this exercise for other time periods as well. Keep watching this space for more.