Scintilating Steketee

Both sets of fans would have been on the edges of their seats going into the last over of last nights Big Bash match between the Strikers and the Heat.

With 17 runs required and 6 wickets in hand, the match was seemingly in the balance.

Cricmetric found 19 previous instances (across BBL, IPL and CPL tournaments) where the last over of the match saw the batting team require between 15 and 19 runs with 5 or more wickets in hand. In those matches, the batting team won on 7 occasions, or 36% of the time.

So surely then, chances were that the Heat would get over the line?

Enter Mark Steketee.

Of 43 bowlers who have bowled at least 10 career overs in the closing stages of a BBL innings, Steketee has the second highest incidence of conceding 10+ runs per over (60%). For the full list of bowlers refer to the chart below. Interesting to note that the top 4 best bowlers (see the bottom of the chart) are all tweakers.

Steketee

So the match truly was in the balance heading into the last over.

Enter the new, improved Mark Steketee.

Steketee took 2 wickets but, most importantly, conceded just 6 runs thereby handing the Heat a 10 run victory – which looked a forlorn hope when the Strikers were cruising at 133/0 after 11 overs.

Cricmetric ranks Steketee’s heroics as the 2nd best last over bowling performance in a BBL match, bettered only by Shaun Tait on 27th December 2013. In that match, Sydney Thunder were 5 wickets down and required 10 runs to win going into the last over of the match against the Strikers. Mike Hussey was 84 not out and Tait’s previous three overs had gone for 34 runs. Tait dismissed Hussey and conceded just 3 runs to win the match for the Strikers by 7 runs.

Congratulations to Mark Steketee and to both teams for an entertaining match!