The need for spinners and wicketkeepers to score runs?

Question

One of the conundrums facing selectors is balancing their side. To avoid having too long a tail, they usually require their lower middle order (numbers 7 and 8) to be handy with the bat.

Often pressure is put on the spinner and/or the wicketkeeper to be multi-functional. They need to be able to score runs, as well as be proficient at their own specialist role.

Hence in England we saw Ashley Giles picked for years, as he was a better batsman than his contemporaries, and we have gone through a succession of 'keepers in our search to find someone who can also bat.

So, my question is this: If you were a selector, would you pick a spinner and a wicketkeeper based on their ability to perform their specialist role regardless of whether they could bat, or would you pick someone of slightly lesser ability, arguing that what you lose in the spin or keeping department, is made up for by the runs they score?

Answer 1

(Short Summary at bottom)

It's not a matter of whether they're specialists, it's whether their primary skill (spin bowling and wicket keeping) is up to standard. I agree with the comment about Prior as I think his wicket keeping is good enough to get him into the team alone but when you consider his 40+ test average that's a massive bonus. If you have a choice between picking Monty Panesar or Giles then you have to go with Panesar because his primary skill (bowling) is better than Giles'. But if you can pick between Shane Warne (a bowler who can bat and get runs down the order) and Panesar (a specialist bowler) you'd pick Warne for his bowling, the batting is a bonus. Right now though I think England need to have a team of selectors to pick the selectors, since the current ones don't seem to have a clue what they're doing.

To answer your question, you have to pick based on the skills you're looking for, if you want a bowler then pick a guy based on his bowling. Same with the Keeper.

Answer 2

Ashley Giles was always getting selected for England because he was the best bowler and because Phil Tuffnell was useless at fielding.

To answer your question though, if i was a selector, I wouldn't care if my spinners couldn't bat, as long as they bowl well. I wouldn't care if the wicketkeeper wasn't a brilliant batter, so long as he could bat, because I wouldn't want him taking up a spot where I could be using a specialist bowler.

Who says the spinner has to score runs, pace bowlers are capable of batting as well.

Answer 3

In a most ideal situation nothing more will be expected from the wicket-keeper or the spinner other than their best performance in their assigned role but due to the high unpredictability the selectors try to even out the odds and try to accommodate as many all rounders as possible. Kinda they try to diversify the portfolio!

Answer 4

My Nickname i dont know has already done a great answer, so i will briefly put what i think

Bowlers primary job is to take wickets! If there are 2 spinners and 1 spinner (lets say Monty) is a better bowler and more in form than the other bowler BUT the other bowler (lets say Giles) will score more runs in the lower order, and the 2nd spinner (Giles) gets picked then i believe that is a spineless selection. The bowlers job is to take wickets not help the batsmen score runs!! If the batsmen arent scoring runs then it shouldnt be the tails job to save them.

Of course people like Monty can be converted (with the right amount of commitment and desire) into good tail-enders!! So i would always pick the better spinner ahead of the better lower order player.

So to sum up! Its the bowlers job to take wickets!!! and the batsmen's to score runs! Lastly i think Giles was selected not only cos he was the best batsmen but because he was our best spinner too!! Robert Croft was a better lower-order batsmen than Giles but Giles was still picked ahead of him.

On the wicket-keeping issue! It looks like Adam Gilchrist and Kumar Sangakarra (and going back further Alec Stewart) have changed Wicket-Keeping!!

In My opinion now, keepers have to average over 32 in test cricket and be a handy glovemen too! 20 years ago 25 average was acceptable!! BUT not now!! Wicket-keepers have to be able to bat too! and help the middle order batsmen. The best way to find a wicket-keeper who does this is to convert a batsmen into a wicket-keeping batsmen! (like Matt Prior)

Oh yeah GET PRIOR IN!

Answer 5

Well I am answering this after some very lenghty and very impressive answers.

I assume we are looking at the current situation in English cricket and would answer accordingly.

No I do not think it is important that a spinner should be picked on his ability to score runs. Why should a spin bowler be more capable of scoring runs than a quickie and indeed the majority of quality all rounders in the past have been fast bowlers. Looking back at all the really top quality spinners in the last few decades very few of them have been even average batsmen.

However when you get to a wicket keeper you have a completely different argument.

It is essential that these days a keeper can bat at 7 or above in order to play 4 specialist bowlers. However if you are in the situation that you have bowlers of excellent batting skills then there is no reason as to why the keeper cannot bat lower. Hence we find ourselves in the position England are in today.

Broad was dropped even though he has been the most consistent batsman in the side. Collingwood came back in for a reason only know to the selectors and Ambrose continues to keep wicket even though he is totally out of his depth.

I fear who bats at first drop is a bigger question??

Answer 6

I would definitely pick a wicket keeper who can bat, at the moment that would have to be Matt Prior, he is a class batsman at county level & is capable of batting at 6 for England if they need the extra bowler. Of course if he were to drop a catch, then the batsman went on to get a ton, you'd kick yourself, but I believe the posities of picking Prior outway the negatives. I think differently about the spinner slot though, I couln't agree with picking a second rate spinner that could bat, because a top spinner is a potential match winner. (a wicket keeper isn't!)

Answer 7

Good question. First things first, the specialist spinner in the side is not always expected to perform as a batsman too. Plenty of non-Indian subcontinental teams rely on their pace attack so much that any spinner wanting to get into the team will have to have batting and fielding credentials. It is believed that if a team plays 3 fast men, they should ideally be specialists as pacers so they can lend maximum variety to the attack, without regards to their batting ability. However, plenty of fast bowlers are handy batsmen and being generally strong and well-built, fast bowlers have always had the advantage when it came to lower order slogging in the last overs of an ODI (or to reach a desired score in time to declare a third innings in a Test with enough time to bowl the other team out).

If you look at teams around the world, the only team that has a specialist spinner-batsmen is New Zealand, however, Daniel Vettori would easily keep his place in the team as a bowler and captain alone. Most other teams have one or more fast bowlers (currently or in the recent past) who are handy lower order batsmen: Brett Lee and Andy Bichel for Australia; Stuart Broad and Steve Harmison (even Matthew Hoggard is a useful night-watchman and defensive batter) for England; Irfan Pathan, Ajit Agarkar and Zaheer Khan for India; Abdul Razzaq and Azhar Mahmood for Pakistan; Chaminda Vaas, Farveez Maharoof and to some extent Nuwan Zoysa for Sri Lanka; Mashrafe Mortaza for Bangladesh; Shaun Pollock, Andrew Hall and Albie Morkel for South Africa; Vasbert Drakes and Mervyn Dillon of the West Indies, Jacob Oram, Tim Southee and James Franklin of NZ and Heath Streak, Andy Blignaut and Elton Chigumbura for Zimbabwe. Thus it can be inferred that if a team has useful lower order batsmen who are fast bowlers, a spinner will be picked in the team for balance, or to exploit a spinner-friendly track, regardless of batting ability. As a selector, therefore, I would not pick a spinner depending on their batting ability, but purely on spin bowling prowess, but only if the pitches were anticipated to be spinner-friendly (or if they were too good to be not picked, e.g. Warne, Muralitharan, Vettori or Kumble).

As for wicketkeepers, I think the fans and self-styled experts are too finicky about specialist/part-timer status of keepers picked. Tons of people say that, instead of a keepers' merry-go-round based on batting ability, specialist keepers should be picked instead. However, when a specialist keeper is picked, they will bemoan his lack of run-scoring and happily re-instate a keeper who clearly lacks technique or experience, with disastrous consequences, as happened with Rahul Dravid (who had never kept for state, county or club level teams before being given the gloves for India).

Believing that keeping ability is something you are born with, ie. you either can or cannot keep, you cannot learn it, one must realise that in any country there will be too many "specialist" keepers with enough batting ability to succeed at domestic or club level, but not in a Test match. The national team of a country is the highest level at which any player may play; and if there are hundreds of specialist keepers (with similar skill) currently plying their trade in that country, the one chosen to represent the country must be the best amongst them, and if batting or leadership skills need to be considered to make the final decision, so be it. International cricket is meant to separate the Gilchrists, Bouchers and McCullums of this world from other keepers with decent keeping technique, but who fall short with the bat or as motivational characters.

Therefore, as a selector, I would know that there may be a few dozen keepers in the country who are good enough, and that if I announced that the one chosen was the one with the best keeping technique, many names would come forward. If, however, batting and captaincy were to be considered, this would separate the likes of Gilchrist, Boucher, Dhoni from "the rest". Therefore, it is important to remember that playing at the highest level requires not only that you belong to a pool of good keepers, but to be the best amongst them in all ways, and that this may include batting and other abilities as well. I would definitely choose a keeper based on a mixture of batting and keeping skills and not keeping skills alone.

Edit: Plus, I certainly wouldn't pick a keeper who is also an experienced captain, but lacks batting prowess, like NZ did in the 90s with Lee Germon. Thus, I would say that batting ability is a definite requirement for a keeper, even if their keeping and leadership roles are valued.