County Championship Form 2020-22
In today’s article I will be looking at the form of County Championship players.
Batting
All batters with 1000+ runs.
This first graph is runs scored vs Average. Pujara and Shan Masood both had incredible 2022 seasons. It will be interesting to see if they can keep that form going into the next season.
Then we have Malan, Foakes and Pope. Malan’s CC form saw him get reselected for England but it feels like that boat has sailed after his Ashes performance.
Pope keeps being the most successful English player in the County Championship, and Foakes form will keep Surrey fans happy.
Other people will note Crawley’s place on this graph, how much longer can he stay in England’s side with these stats.
Some under 24 players who have had good form
Jordan Cox: 1820 at 39.57, 13 50+ scores
Jack Haynes: 1587 at 41.76, 10 50+ scores
Jamie Smith: 1309 at 38.50, 7 50+ scores (4 tons)
Here is the same graph without Pujara to make it easier to see other players
Another effective way of looking at batters is Balls per dismissal vs scoring rate. Especially since England recently seem interested in aggressive batters.
Here Pujara’s incredibly endurance is shown as he faced over 180 balls per dismissal. 60 overs or nearly 4 hours of batting per dismissal. Masood’s incredible season was built more on quick scoring.
3 of England’s young stars stick out; Brook, Pope and Duckett at around 70 or quicker with Jacks not too far behind. Meanwhile Sibley, Hain, Lees and Compton will be hoping their consistency is something England won’t mind. Though with the Dukes ball expected to produce more movement this season, might their slower scoring rates hinder their seasons?
Tom Haines has been slowly pushing his case with a ton for the Lions the latest step. However considering Hove has been the best batting pitch during this period you feel he needs to move either closer to the Pope section or the Foakes section to really cement himself as an option.
Once again the graph without Pujara, Kiran Carlson is a talented quick scoring batter just below Vilas, but he needs to face more balls to start pushing his name out there.
Bowling
All bowlers with 40+ Wickets
First we have Harmer and Cook leading the way, Cook having the 2nd lowest average of any bowler as well. Craig Overton may have struggled internationally but for Somerset he is still fantastic. His average rivals Cook and he picks up more wickets per match. Though Cook is likely affected slightly by having Harmer and his 40 overs a match.
However the true standout is Robinson, injuries and England have affected his availability, but he has the best average. Not only that but despite accusations of being unfit, only 1 pacer averages more overs per match than his 34.
Outside of this group it’s hard to see the next standout bowler for England bar Norwell who has the 5th best average at 17.71. However aged 31 you feel time is running out for him.
Strike Rate vs Economy Rate is a perfect way of showing different bowler’s abilities. Robinsons’s SR should really stick out having managed it while bowling at Hove, where Pace has averaged 36.32, compared to 21.45 at Ageas, 25.65 at Chelmsford and 27.53 at Taunton where the next 3 best bowlers by average reside.
Potts is another bowler who will be hoping to properly break into the England side and is just below Neser on this graphic. However will England be worried by his last 2 test performances, 234/6 (57), an ER of over 4.
Under 24 bowlers with decent form
Tom Price: 48 wickets at 22.73
Nathan Gilchrist: 63 wickets at 24.83
Joey Evison: 22 wickets at 29.95
All-Rounders
All players with 30 wickets and 750 runs
Barker has been a superb bowling all-rounder for Hampshire however at 36 any real chance of representing England is long gone.
Liam Patterson white is a decent player who has gained England Lions attention though he didn’t perform fantastically in Sri Lanka.
Anuj Dal is an interesting case, he averages over 50 in the last 3 seasons and with 20 overs per match is a decent bowling option. If he can keep up his batting maybe at 5/6 and if his bowling average keeps dropping as it has done recently the 26 year old could push for an England spot. However any drop to his 2020-21 levels of 31.5/35.7 would probably see him pushed away. County fans will remember the case of Ryan Higgins who in 2019 produced a superb season and has since struggled to get close to that with the bat.
The only under 24 players with 500 runs and 20 wickets with a positive batting average to bowling average difference are:
George Hill: 29.29/21.57, Bowls medium pace
Felix Organ: 24.98/24.36, only averages 8 overs a match
Wicket-Keepers
Rating Wicketkeepers is difficult and without Catch percentage data imperfect. However Byes/Innings is a useful metric and for those doubtful since 1990 for CC WK’s with 100 matches, Chris Read and Jack Russell rank 5th and 2nd best on this metric. And Matthew Prior ranks 3rd worst who according to Cricviz had one of the lowest catching success rates vs spin since 2010 in tests.
Foakes once again stands out and if the rumours of England not playing him come true, then he can consider himself very unlucky.
Ollie Robinson has set himself up as a talented batter and does well on this metric. However he needs to start pushing his average into the 40’s as England prefer their wicket keepers to perform with bat more than ball.
Chris Cooke is a very underrated player who clearly keeps very well and has managed a 50+ average in the last two seasons.
I hope you find this article useful in looking players with form and those without.