In the past year, Australia has gone from being able to strangle the opposition’s scoring at the end of an innings, to being having one of the most expensive bowling attacks in the world. Now, this article doesn’t attempt to show why, but it certainly makes for alarming reading.
One of the most (for me at least) interesting tidbit is about bowlers like Rana Naved-ul-Hasan and Chaminda Vaas. The former is horrifically expensive during the first 40 overs of the game, but in the last 10 overs he is transformed into a miser. Vaas, on the other hand, is almost unplayable with the new ball, but turns into a regular pie-chucker in the last 10.
No doubt the teams have this type of statistics up the wazoo, but it makes me wonder why anyone is bowling Brett Lee in the last 10 overs, when his economy rate skyrockets. Of course, that’s not going to be an issue in this world cup. Unfortunately.
On a side note, I wonder what that does to all of the sponsors plans for the tournament. No doubt companies like 3 Mobile and Weet-Bix would have large campaigns centered around Lee for their advertising during the cup. Time for a few new ideas I think.