Cricket and Weather

Cricket and how to deal withe time being lost to the weather.

INTRODUCTION

The match at the Ageas bowl between England and Pakistan has been hammered by a combination of bad weather and excessive caution on the part of the umpires, and not a single one out of nine Bob Willis Trophy matches has escaped unscathed either. This post looks at the various matches and looks at reducing the toll poor weather takes of cricket.

THE TEST MATCH

The situation at the Ageas bowl is that the equivalent of over two whole days have been lost to the weather, and the teams are currently in their hotel sheltering from what is apparently quite heavy rain. In the play that has been possible Pakistan have amassed 236 in their first innings, with Mohammad Rizwan playing a fine innings, and Stuart Broad continuing his excellent summer with the ball. England in response are 7-1, with Burns out for a duck, and a little lucky to have lasted as long as he did, since his second ball was edged just short of the slip fielder before his fourth was caught in that region. Probably the only chance of a positive result in that game is if the teams broker a deal whereby England declare, Pakistan forfeit their second innings and England have a go at a target of 230, while Pakistan try to take 10 wickets.

THE BOB WILLIS TROPHY

Leeds has seen 79 overs in a day and a half, and Yorkshire are 288-4 against Derbyshire.
Birmingham has seen more play than most places, and Warwickshire were dismissed for 121 in the first innings, while Somerset are 134-5 off 45.2 overs in response.
At Hove there have been 61 overs of play and Sussex are 155-6 against Essex.
At Northampton Worcestershire made 219 in their first innings and Northamptonshire are 60-3 in response.
At Trent Bridge there have been 71.2 overs and Nottinghamshire are 268-2 against Lancashire.
The St Lawrence Ground at Canterbury has seen 46 overs so far, and Middlesex are 94-4 against Kent.
At the Arundel Castle Ground which Hampshire are using as a home venue since the Ageas Bowl is required for other purposes they have already given up on play for today, which means that two days have seen exactly 40 overs, off which Surrey have reached 130-8.
In the game I am currently listening to at Sophia Gardens, Cardiff, Glamorgan are 68-4 off 40 overs against Gloucestershire.
Finally, at Grace Road there have been 72.2 overs thus far and Glamorgan are 224-4.

REDUCING LOSSES TO THE WEATHER

Firstly, abolish stoppages for the light altogether – play all matches using pink balls, so that the floodlights can be allowed to take complete control if necessary. Rain is harder to deal with, but I have an idea to float. It should be possible to construct a strong, lightweight but entirely waterproof canopy which could be attached to the tops of the floodlight pylons, enabling matches to be continued even if it is raining. It is just possible that an almighty miscue could send a ball pretty much vertically upwards (there was a shot that Ian Botham played off Terry Alderman at Old Trafford in 1981 that might have done this – Mike Whitney made a gallant effort to get underneath it to take the catch but could not quite do so) and cause it to hit the canopy, but I am sure that that could be dealt with.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…

Bob Willis Trophy Round 2 Final Day

A look at the Bob Willis Trophy as round two draws to a close.

INTRODUCTION

We are into the penultimate possible session of play in round two of the Bob Willis Trophy. five of the matches are now finished, four still in progress. Only one match looks set to end in a draw.

THE FINISHED MATCHES

Several finished yesterday (see that my previous post), including the match between Kent and Sussex which Kent won for the loss of just one wicket. Hampshire completed their win over Middlesex today, making hard work if it as they lost seven wickets while chasing down 158. This match took place at one of the less well known of county venues – the Brunton Memorial Ground at Radlett. The two bowlers who troubled Hants were at opposite ends of the experience spectrum – Tim Murtagh with over two decades of top level cricket behind him took three, a haul matched by Thilan Wallalawita, a left arm spinner, who is playing his first season of first class cricket. Even more noteworthy in terms of difference in experience were two of the Kent heroes in their game against Sussex. Darren Stevens took five wickets in the Sussex second innings, at the age of 44, while Jordan Cox scored 238 not out for Kent at the age of 19. Cox is also a recognized wicket keeper, although Oliver Graham Robinson, also on England’s radar, had the gloves for Kent in this match.

THE MATCHES IN PROGRESS

The game between Worcestershire and Glamorgan is the one that is likely to end in draw – Worcs batted on in their second innings until their lead stood at 357, and there were less than two full sessions to play, a decision which seems unduly cautious.

Notts have been set 188 to win by Yorkshire and have responded to the challenge by collapsing to 80-6, putting Yorkshire in control. Gloucestershire have set Warwickshire 239 to win and the latter are 30-3 thus far. Finally, Surrey are facing a target of 337 and are currently 118-6, with all six of the wickets falling to off spinner Simon Harmer, who also took six in the first Surrey innings. Playing the ‘Casabianca’ role for Surrey is wicket keeper Jamie Smith, currently 33 not out. Incidentally, while his bowling achievement in this game has been immense, even if Harmer gets all the remaining wickets it will not be an Essex record – Walter Mead took 17 in a match against the 1893 Australians. It will be a record for Essex v Surrey at Chelmsford, beating leg spinner Peter Smith’s 13 wicket haul in 1950 (the same Peter Smith who three years earlier belted 163 from no11 against Derbyshire). Harmer will not get his all-ten – he has just taken a catch off the bowling of Aaron Beard to account for Jamie Smith and put Essex on the brink of victory (shades of the NZ v AUS game when Richard Hadlee took 9-52 in the first innings and the one he did not get was Geoff Lawson who was caught off the bowling of Vaughan Brown by Richard Hadlee).

The Bob Willis Trophy has already produced a clutch of magnificent matches, several towering individual performances and generally a huge amount to savour.

Nottinghamshire are now 97-9 against Yorkshire, and Glamorgan are doing their bit to breathe life back into their game against Worcestershire – they have slumped to 5-3 chasing a purely nominal 358. Update on the Notts v Yorkshire match – Notts are all out for 97, medium pacer Jordan Thompson 3-6, off spinner Jack Shutt 2-14. Yorks have won by 90 runs after conceding a first innings lead of 91. Both are local products – Shutt hails from Barnsley, while Thompson is from Rawdon, Leeds (which many years ago gave the world Brian Close).

Gus Atkinson has gone to the bowling of Harmer who now has 7-56 in the innings and 13 in the match. Surrey are 145-8, and the end seems nigh in that one as well.

After showing some fight Warwickshire have just lost their fourth wicket at 50, and now 52-4 needing a further 187 to win.

Surrey have just lost their ninth wicket, and Beard has his second. Essex have just taken the final wicket to win by 169 runs, and the final wicket went appropriately to Harmer, given him 14 for the match, a new Essex v Surrey record. It is also Essex’s tenth straight win in four day games at Chelmsford.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…

IMG_2752 (2) — Tomotoes just starting to develop a hint of their eventual red colour.

Cricket Back With A Vengeance

Some thoughts on the Bob Willis Trophy, a sensational ODI and the start of a test match. Some mathematics, an important petition and some photographs.

INTRODUCTION

This post looks back briefly at the first round of Bob Willis Trophy fixtures, for longer at yesterday’s incredible ODI and casts an eye over what is happening in Manchester.

BOB WILLIS TROPHY – EIGHT
DEFINITE RESULTS, ONE DRAW

In addition to the three teams who recorded wins before I reached the end of yesterday’s post, five other teams ultimately achieved victories in the first round of the Bob Willis Trophy. The odd game out was the game between Northamptonshire and Warwickshire, where Northamptonshire having escaped from a very difficult situation declined to make a game of it, and declared at 507-6 in their second innings after which the teams shook hands on a draw. Essex beat Kent by two wickets, Middlesex beat Surrey by 190 runs, bowling them out for 123 in the final innings. Worcestershire beat Gloucestershire by eight wickets. Leicestershire were set to score 150 off 17 overs by Lancashire and did it with eight balls to spare. Derbyshire were set 365 in the fourth innings by Nottinghamshire, and 299-7 it looked like they were either going to be bowled out or just hold out for a draw. However, the eighth wicket pair not only pulled off the great escape, they snatched the win off the last possible ball of the game. These outcomes bear all the hallmarks of a thoroughly absorbing set of county matches, but their conclusions were all overshadowed by…

AN ODI TO REMEMBER

It is often the case that limited overs games do not remain in the memory for any longer than they take to play, but often does not equal always, and most general rules have exceptions. Yesterday’s game between England and Ireland was precisely such a game. England batted first, Roy and Bairstow both failed, while Vince added to his considerable oeuvre of elegant miniatures, once more failing to produce a full scale masterwork. At 44-3 England looked to be in deep trouble, but Tom Banton produced his first ODI 50 at a vital time, skipper Morgan scored a majestic hundred and the lower order produced some useful runs. England eventually tallied 328, which looked enough for them to defend. An early wicket did not augur well for Ireland either, but then Paul Stirling and Andrew Balbirnie produced the best batting of the day to get Ireland within range. Both fell before it was quite a done deal, leaving the veteran Kevin O’Brien and the 20 year old Harry Tector together for the closing stages. It ultimately came down to eight needed off the final over, which Saqib Mahmood accepted responsibility for bowling. Tector hit a four, Mahmood bowled a no-ball and suddenly it was three needed off four balls. The first of those balls was a dot, but Tector then scored two off the third to last delivery to level the scores and took a single of the penultimate ball of the game to take the victory and ten points in the ODI Super League for Ireland. Although it went right down to the wire Ireland looked in control for most of their batting innings and any result other than the actual one would have been a travesty of cricketing justice. Well played Ireland – or if you prefer: D’imir go maith, Éire!

Plenty more will be seen of this Irish side, especially Harry Tector and Curtis Campher, the latter named of whom had a fine debut series. Most of the England side too will feature again, but Moeen Ali and James Vince are both in serious jeopardy – Moeen cannot buy a run at present and his bowling is not sufficient to command a place in its own right while Vince is a player of fine shots who never seems to play a major innings, and although he bowled three overs yesterday he is not a serious bowler, while Banton’s runs yesterday came although he was batting out of position – he normally bats at or very close to the top of the order.

THE TEST MATCH AT MANCHESTER

Another England team is in action between today and Sunday in Manchester, playing the first match of a three match test series against Pakistan. England are unchanged from the third test against the West Indies as Stokes is still not fully fit to bowl, England do not believe that three seamers plus Bess can take 20 wickets between them and the England management retains its absurd faith in Buttler as a test cricketer. Pakistan won the toss and have chosen to bat. They are 121-2 of 41.1 with the players currently off the field for bad light. Archer and Woakes have a wicket a piece, Broad and Anderson have none and Bess has bowled five overs to date. Babar Azam had reached a 50 and left handed opener Shan Masood is not far away from that mark, with Abid Ali and Azhar Ali the two to go, the latter for a duck. Pakistan have taken a minor gamble with their own batting, putting the young leg spinner Shadab Khan at no6, which most would reckon is a place or even two higher than his batting skills currently merit. If Pakistan can get to 300 in this innings that could well be enough for England to struggle – their recent history when faced with anything approaching a substantial total is not exactly encouraging.

SOLUTION AND NEW PROBLEM

Yesterday I posed this problem adapted from brilliant:

My change is that where they gave a list of options for what was closest the the probability that someone testing positive actually has the disease I simply ask: To the nearest whole number what is the percentage chance that someone who has tested positive for the disease actually has it? Answer in my next post (my own explanation, plus a particularly impressive published solution).

The way I worked this one out was: if we imagine a sample of 1,000 people, 50 will have the disease and 950 won’t. Of the 50 who do have the disease 47 will have tested positive while three test negative (94% accuracy on positives). Of the 950 who do not have the disease 96% will have tested negative and 4% won’t. That 4% of 950 is 38, so the probability of a someone who has tested positive actually having the disease is 47/ (47+38) = 47/85. This comes to 55.29% to two decimal places, or to the nearest whole percentage 55% and that is the answer. Below is a jpg of a brilliantly economical published solution from Inesh Chattopadhyay:

Today’s question is incredibly easy, and I also offer a bonus challenge:

No multi-choice here (this is much too easy for that), but a bonus challenge: part 1) if there was a third square of the same size but divided into 49 smaller squares shaded in similar fashion which would have the largest shaded area, and part 2)what is the general rule relating the number of squares into which the big square is divided and the proportion of it that ends up shaded?

A PETITION AND SOME PHOTOGRAPHS

Jo Corbyn, chair of NAS Norwich, has a petition on change.org calling on the government to stop cutting people’s life-saving social care. Below is a jpg of the petition, formatted as a link so that you can sign and share it – please do so:

My usual sign off…

IMG_2562 (2) — This was by far my best butterfly pic of the day…

IMG_2562 (3) — …so I devoted some attention…

The Bob Willis Trophy and England v Ireland

A whistle stop tour of the Bob Willis Trophy as the first round of matches draws to a close, a look at the ODI between England and Ireland, some mathematics and photographs.

INTRODUCTION

The first round of Bob Willis Trophy Matches is into its final afternoon, and the third and last match of the ODI series between England and Ireland is underway.

THE BOB WILLIS TROPHY

Late yesterday afternoon Sussex became the first team to win a Bob Willis Trophy match when they bowled Hampshire out for 150 in the final innings to win a low scoring match by 94 runs. Oliver Edward Robinson, the right arm medium fast bowler, was Sussex’s star player, following 3-36 in the first Hampshire innings with 5-29 in their second. Jack Carson, a 19 year old off spinner had 3-37 in that final innings as well, following 2-15 first time round. Felix Organ, an off spinning all rounder (mentioned in this post in my all-time XIs series), and Mason Crane, a leg spinner, each took three wickets in each Sussex innings. Somerset joined Sussex in the winners enclosure this morning, bowling Glamorgan out in the final innings for 160 to win by a colossal 289 runs. The Overton twins got among the wickets in both innings, while Jack Brooks, better known as a bowler, had some fun with the bat for Somerset with 72 in the first innings. Tom Abell, a young batter looking to stake a claim to an England place, made 119 in Somerset’s second innings. I will pay Glamorgan the courtesy of making no reference to their efforts in this match. Yorkshire have just become the third team to record a victory in the competition, having been delayed by rain this morning, but getting the better of Durham by six wickets. All of Yorkshire’s seamers got among the wickets, and Dawid Malan and Harry Brook scored runs in the final innings. Northamptonshire look to have turned the tables on Warwickshire after a disastrous start. Northants were rolled for 142 in their first innings, and Warwickshire scored 369-8 from 120 overs in response before their first innings had to be closed. Northamptonshire are 453-6 in their second innings and all but safe from defeat. Surrey and Middlesex is interestingly poised at The Oval. Middlesex declared their second innings at 248-6, setting Surrey 314 to win in 71 overs, and Surrey lost three wickets early in their second innings and are currently 76-3 in the 27th. Daniel Moriarty, a left arm spinner on first class debut took five wickets out of the six Middlesex lost in their second innings. Ryan Patel and Jamie Smith are currently batting well. Smith, Surrey’s keeper in the absence of Ben Foakes, scored 80 in the first innings, while Patel has some long innings to his credit in the past (he also bowls medium pace and holds the record for taking five first class wickets earlier in his career than any other bowler in terms of balls bowled to get there). Martin Andersson (no, this is not a typo, his surname is spelt the Nordic way with a double s, as opposed to veteran England seamer James Anderson, although he was born in Reading, Berkshire) bowled a crucial spell in the Surrey first innings, and also scored 50 in Middlesex’s second innings. Lancashire managed 322 in the first innings against Leciestershire, who responded with 409-8, while Lancashire are now 181-6 in their second innings. Callum Parkinson, twin brother of Matt who when not injured is part of the England ODI setup, has bagged five wickets in this match, two in the first Lancashire innings and three more in the second. Gloucs and Worcs looks like going the way of the latter. Gloucestershire made 267 in their first innings and are now 244-9 in their second, with Worcestershire having scored 428-5 in their first innings. Josh Tongue has bowled well for Worcestershire in both innings. Notts and Derbyshire is going Notts’ way but only just – they have set Derbyshire 365 to win and the latter are currently 212-5. Joey Evison, a young all rounder, has made two scores of over 30 for Notts and picked up four wickets, while Haseeb Hameed formerly of Lancashire is showing signs of resurrecting his batting having scored 68 and 52 in this match. Finally, the ‘Dartford Crossing Derby’ between Kent and Essex looks likely to go Essex’s way, although they have just lost another wicket, making it 148-5 and 54 needed to win. Kent made 387 first up, Essex 298 in response, but then Kent folded for 112 in their second innings. Jamie Porter took four wickets in the first Kent innings, while Heino Kuhn scored 140. Matt Milnes took four wickets for Kent in his turn, while Marcus O’Riordan, an off spinner, took three. Simon Harmer in turn took four wickets with his own spin, while Essex’s opening bowlers took five between them, three for Sam Cook and two for Porter. Hamidullah Qadri has a wicket with his own off spin in the Essex second innings.

ENGLAND V IRELAND

England have lost three early wickets, but are now fighting back, having just got 100 up. Morgan the skipper is doing most of the scoring at present, while Tom Banton is playing the support role. Roy and Bairstow were both out in single figures, and Vince yet again looked impressive for a short period before getting out, this time with 16 to his name. As a senior top order batter Vince must be running out of chances – he has produced seemingly numberless elegant miniatures but no full fledged masterpiece as yet.

SOLUTION AND NEW TEASER

I set this one in my last post:

These were the possible answers:

a) $log 5/ log 3 \approx 0.68 3 b) log 9/ log 5 \approx 0.732 c) log 4/ log 5 \approx 1.161 d) log 5/ log 9 \approx 1.365 e) log 3/ log 5 \approx 1.465$

Below is a screenshot of Vinayak Srivastava’s published solution – click on it for more:

This one was today’s daily challenge on brilliant, although I am making it a little tougher than they did (the four daggers is a ludicrous overstatement of the difficulty of this one):

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off:

PS Kent have turned things around against Essex and now have them 172-8 needing to score 30 with only two wickets left. Tom Banton is starting to blossom in the ODI, having now reached 50, his first such ODI score.

The Start Of The Bob Willis Trophy

A first post on the Bob Willis Trophy, a bit of mathematics and some photographs.

INTRODUCTION

This post looks at the start of the competition that has been devised to replace the county championship in this pandemic hit season, play in which got underway at 11AM this morning. The second ODI between England and Ireland gets underway at the Ageas Bowl shortly.

HONOURING A LEGEND

Bob Willis, the former fast bowler who was only the second England bowler to take as many as 300 test wickets, following in the footsteps of Fred Trueman, died on December 4th 2019. When it became apparent a normal county championship would be impossible to stage it was only natural that his name should be attached to the replacement competition. Willis’ finest hour came at Headingley in 1981. He he taken no wickets in either innings, when with Australia 56-1 in their second innings needing only a further 74 for victory he was given one last chance to save his test career. Just under an hour later Australia were 75-8 and Willis had taken six wickets in as many overs (the other, the adhesive Border, had fallen to Chris Old). Dennis Lillee and Ray Bright launched a counter attack that yielded 35 runs in four overs before Lillee mistimed a drive and Gatting ran in, dived and held the catch. Alderman was dropped twice of Botham, but the first ball of Willis’ 16th over of the innings and tenth off the reel uprooted Bright’s middle stump to give England victory by 18 runs, with Willis having figures of 8-43. Willis would play on another three years, captaining the side for a period.

AN EXPERIMENT BORN OF NECESSITY

The 18 First Class counties have been split into three regions, South, Central and North. Each region will be play five rounds of matches, so that each side plays each other side in their region twice. At the end of this the two teams with the most points will play a final at Lord’s, which will be contested over five days instead of the regular four for a county fixture. Certain other changes have been made to the normal format of county games: the number of points for a draw has been increased from five to eight so that teams who suffer a lot of adverse weather will not too badly affected, a new ball will only be available at 90 overs rather than 80, the first innings for each county cannot last beyond 120 overs, and the minimum lead to be able to enforce the follow-on will be 200 rather than 150 runs. One beneficial side effect of these arrangements should be that spinners come into the game more than at present (Surrey and Middlesex, whose game I have listened to some of, are each playing two spinners, in Surrey’s case first class debutant Daniel Moriarty and England hopeful Amar Virdi, who would be the most obvious replacement for Dom Bess in the off spinner;s role). England is somewhat overburdened with bowlers who move the ball around a bit at medium pace or fractionally above and short of both genuine pace and spin. Surrey and Warwickshire were going to be experimenting with letting in spectators, but that has been prevented by the fact that Covid-19 cases are spiking upward making caution once more the order of the day.

A MEASURE OF MATHEMATICS

I have solutions to provide to the two problems I posed in my previous post, and I also have a new problem to set. My first was this one:

This was a bit of trick question. The answer is the both final shapes have the same number of faces (14 as it happens). Here is a published solution from Mahdi Raza:

The second problem I posed was this one:

The fact that the result is not allowed to be negative at any stage means that only five square numbers need be considered as possible plays for Mei – 1, 4, 9, 16 and 25. 25 + 9 = 34, which means that if either of these numbers is chosen Yuri is left with a square number and reaches 0 at the first attempt, which leaves 1, 4 and 16 as options.

Case 1: Mei plays 16. This reduces the number to 18. Yuri’s choices are now 1, 4, 9 or 16, of which 9 is instantly ruled out since it gives the game to Mei. However a choice of 16 by Yuri reduces the number to 2. Mei’s next move is forced 0 she subtracts 1, leaving 1 remaining and a win for Yuri as he also subtracts 1.

Case 2: Mei plays 4. This reduces the number to 30. All Yuri now has to do is play 25, reducing the number to 5, and whether Mei subtracts 1 or 4 she leaves a square number which Yuri thus reduces to 0 winning the game.

Case 3: Mei plays 1 which reduces the number to 33. If Yuri plays 25 that reduces the number to 8. Mei has a choice between 1 and 4, and 4 reduces the total to 4 an a win for Yuri, so she has to play 1. If Yuri now plays 4 then Mei plays 1 and Yuri has to do likewise, giving the game to Mei. Thus Yuri plays 1 reducing the number to 6, and Mei can then win the game by playing 4 and making the number 2 with Yuri to play. Thus Yuri cannot play 25 as his first response. If he plays 16 that reduces the number to 17, from which Mei cannot play 1 as that gives Yuri the game. If she plays four that reduces the number to 13, and Yuri’s forced moved of 1 reduces the number to 12, from which Mei cannot play one or nine as they immediately allow winning moves for Yuri. So she plays four, making the number now eight, and Yuri counters with a one which makes the number seven, and whether Mei plays one or four Yuri is in control because his own next move makes the number two. If she plays a nine instantly from 17 that reduces the number to eight and again Yuri is in control. Similarly 16 hands the game straight to Yuri. Thus whatever number Mei starts with Yuri has a winning response. THus, if both players play optimally Mei cannot win.

The new problem involves fractal geometry:

There are five answers for you to choose from:

a) $log 5/ log 3 \approx 0.68 3 b) log 9/ log 5 \approx 0.732 c) log 4/ log 5 \approx 1.161 d) log 5/ log 9 \approx 1.365 e) log 3/ log 5 \approx 1.465$

Solution in my next post.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off:

	Thomas on 49
	Shaun Bradford on 49
	Thomas on Reaching Back to WG Grace Twic…
	Elena Delle Selve on Reaching Back to WG Grace Twic…
	Thomas on Two Contrasting Routes to…

INTRODUCTION

THE TEST MATCH

THE BOB WILLIS TROPHY

REDUCING LOSSES TO THE WEATHER

PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

THE FINISHED MATCHES

THE MATCHES IN PROGRESS

PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

BOB WILLIS TROPHY – EIGHT DEFINITE RESULTS, ONE DRAW

AN ODI TO REMEMBER

THE TEST MATCH AT MANCHESTER

SOLUTION AND NEW PROBLEM

A PETITION AND SOME PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

THE BOB WILLIS TROPHY

ENGLAND V IRELAND

SOLUTION AND NEW TEASER

PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

HONOURING A LEGEND

AN EXPERIMENT BORN OF NECESSITY

A MEASURE OF MATHEMATICS

PHOTOGRAPHS

BOB WILLIS TROPHY – EIGHT
DEFINITE RESULTS, ONE DRAW