In this series of the anatomy of an average T20 player, we investigate the following question: what does an “average” T20 player like? This is an important question, because it helps us establish a baseline using which we can compare player performances, and judge whether a player has performed “above average” or “below average”.
We start with the bowlers first, since it is easier to characterize average bowlers. We use the bowling statistics in the 4 seasons of the Indian Premier League, and average the statistics for all the bowlers to obtain the following 3 numbers: the league average economy rate, league average strike rate and league average bowling average.
So what do we get? On an average, a T20 bowler gives away 1.27 runs for every delivery he bowls (this includes all the extras, byes and leg byes included). This gives us 7.61 as the league average economy rate. The average T20 bowler takes a wicket every 22.70 balls, and for every wicket that he takes, he gives away 28.78 runs.
To give a more familiar picture of an average T20 player, we looked at the statistics of the past 4 seasons of IPL to see which bowlers come closest to these average numbers. And one player whose statistics are remarkably close to these averages are those of Ashok Dinda. In 25 IPL games (103.1 overs total) He has a 28.03 average, 7.33 economy rate and 22.9 strike rate. Dinda has played 5 ODIs with India as well, and some believe he should be groomed as a future fast bowler of India. However, in the shortest format of the game, he is just a very average bowler.
In the next article in this series, we will look at an average T20 batsman, and figure out which batsman most closely fits that description.