IPL 2013: Home/Away Records and Lazy Punditry

A recurring narrative during this IPL season has been that of how home teams have won most matches. We have so far had 46 matches of which 33 have been won by the home team. Four teams - Bangalore (6-0), Hyderabad (4-0), Mumbai (4-0) and Rajasthan (5-0) are yet to lose at home.

It made me wonder if there has been such a pattern in the league in the previous seasons. Apart from Rajasthan in 2008 & Chennai in 2011, I cannot remember any side winning all their home games in a season. So I had a look at the results from all the IPL seasons held in India i.e. 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and as it turns out, the highest home win % is indeed from this season. The next highest was in 2010 when the home team won 55% of the matches. Here's a chart showing the numbers season by season.

Commentators have been discussing among themselves and asking players about why home teams have been winning so many matches. There have been the usual explanations of how teams prepare pitches at their home venue to suit their style of play.

Well, from what I have seen, the pitches at Wankhede and Sawai Mansingh Stadium aren't too different from those at Chinnaswamy, yet Bangalore lost at both those venues while they have won all their matches at home. In any case, the pitch factor would have been in effect in each of the previous seasons so why didn't we have more results going in favour of the home side until this year?

There is also the explanation that players get tired from all the traveling and living out of a suitcase during their road trips, but again that's been the case in all the previous seasons as well.

There have been some sub-narratives within the main one of home teams dominating matches. The first is that the Kolkata needed to exploit their home advantage in order to make the playoffs, and that their failure to do so has pushed them to the brink of elimination.

If the pundits had bothered to find out, Kolkata did not make the 2012 playoffs on the back of winning on doctored pitches at home. Infact, they had a 3-4 record at the Eden Gardens (Their game against Deccan was rained out). So the problem for Kolkata this season is not that they are 3-2 at home. The problem is that they are 0-5 away so far when they went 7-1 on the road in 2012.

They had a scoring rate of 7.53 runs an over in 2012, while they're scoring at 7.59 runs an over this season. However, they're giving away 7.66 runs an over this season as opposed to just 6.89 an over in 2012. There is no real explanation for it because their roster is virtually the same. While they are missing Shakib Al Hasan this season, he played less than half their games last season. They don't have the services of Wasim Akram this season, and while I think they were wrong in letting him go, I am talking from a position where I have no idea what Akram brought to the team.

The other sub-narrative is that of Chennai being unbeaten on the road while everyone else is struggling to win away. Mahendra Singh Dhoni was asked about it and he talked about how the squad was more of a family instead of a professional set up, and how the management knew its cricket through being involved with the sport for years. How the players weren't asked what went wrong after a loss, but were told what went wrong.

While all this is true for 2013, it has been true for previous seasons as well. Yet, Chennai have at various points in the past struggled away from home. They had a 2-5 away record in the 2010 and 2011 seasons. So why are they 4-0 this season while the rest of the league is a combined 9-33 in away games?

There are two very obvious reasons for it. The first one is that they are simply the best side in the league this season, a status they haven't had in the five seasons prior. Sure they're the only side to have made the last four in each of the previous seasons. But they haven't finished top of the table in any of them. They are better this season because of a number of reasons. They have a deeper and more quality batting lineup this season than any of the previous ones. Ravindra Jadeja is playing better than he ever has. Chris Morris has provided them a fast bowling option they have lacked in all but 2010 and 2011 when Doug Bollinger was at his best. Most importantly, they finally have Michael Hussey for the entire season. Why is he so critical? Well, he only has the highest average of all Chennai players. He averages 43.77 which is more than 7 runs higher than their next best batsman. Infact, they dropped him for one game this season & promptly lost to last-placed Pune.

The second reason for Chennai being unbeaten on the road is the opposition they've faced. Delhi, Kolkata, Pune and Punjab are the bottom four teams in the league. In Mohali, Delhi, Kolkata & Pune, they are a combined 7-11. Take out their losses to Chennai and they're still only 7-7. On the other hand, the four teams Chennai have yet to visit are a combined 19-0 at home.

None of this is meant to suggest that Chennai will lose all their remaining away games. Will they win all their remaining road games? Probably not. Will they all of a sudden be struggling because they're on the road? Definitely not. It would be foolish to think that the least flawed of the nine teams would turn into an average side just because the opposition is strong. All I'm trying to say is if the experts are willing to do something other than offer cliches and peddle sponsor names during their commentary stint, they can easily tell the viewers why Chennai have the kind of record they do.

Michael Hussey and the Myth of Padding Averages

Disclaimer: This post will be entirely stats-based so anyone who finds them repulsive is better off not reading it.

Just how good is Michael Hussey? He isn't the most talked about batsman in world cricket and after a Bradmanesque start to his test career his test average has settled at a more human 53.26. Having played all his international cricket in an era which has seen an increase in averages and scoring rates, it is a very good but not a great number. What is amazing, though, is that this is still the tenth highest average among batsmen who have played 60 or more tests. Three of the batsmen above him  - Kallis, Sangakkara, Tendulkar - have played a lot of their cricket in the same era, so they have benefited just as much as Mr. Cricket. Infact, even with a very generous cut-off of 60 innings in the last 6 years, Hussey has the sixth best average. The 3 batsmen mentioned earlier are ahead of him, a testament to their calibre and their status in the pantheon of batting greats.

But this isn't what makes Hussey so good. It is his ability to seamlessly go from one format to another taking hardly any time to change his approach to batting based on the format that sets him apart from any cricketer of this generation. Among batsmen who have played atleast 160 ODIs, Hussey has the second best average and the eleventh best strike rate. The argument used against most batsmen who bat in the lower middle order is that they pad their averages by virtue of remaining not out. It is one of the most cliched excuses given against batsmen who time and again show the skill and composure to score quickly at the end of an innings and yet remain unbeaten. Historically, as well as since Hussey's debut, batsmen in the top 4 have averaged more than those batting from 5 to 7.

Batting Position	All-time
	Innings	Average	Strike Rate	Not Outs
Openers	12666	32.3	70.17	4.74%
3-4	12413	33.85	71.69	10.36%
5-7	16526	26.61	75.13	19.56%
Batting Position	Since Hussey's Debut
	Innings	Average	Strike Rate	Not Outs
Openers	4366	32.23	78.19	4.54%
3-4	4267	34.34	75.11	10.05%
5-7	5731	28.57	79.15	18.32%
Batting Position	Hussey's Numbers
	Innings	Average	Strike Rate	Not Outs
Openers	2	36	69.23	50%
3-4	20	62	85.71	25%
5-7	113	48.51	88.91	30.97%

As one can see, the batting averages of batsmen in the top 4 have remained more or less same. However, there has been a considerable increase in their strike rates. It's not something unknown to us, most of the changes in playing conditions in ODI cricket have been to the benefit of batsmen. The fact that batsmen in the lower middle order pad their averages due to greater frequency of remaining unbeaten is also offset by the fact that they can't score as big as batsmen before them and at times have to sacrifice their wicket in trying to score quickly.

Finally, the shortest format of the game and once again Hussey is right up there in the list of batsmen. He has the third best average and fourth best strike rate among batsmen who have played 15 or more innings in T20 Internationals. What is amazing about this is he usually bats in the middle order for Australia (he has batted at 4 or below in 19 of his 20 T20 innings) while he usually opens the innings for Chennai Super Kings, for whom he averages 43.27 at a strike rate of 122.

I don't know how much longer Hussey is going to be around. Any talk of his place in the list of batting greats would be premature and should happen once he has retired. Until then, we can just marvel at his performance across all formats, and how on earth did 9 IPL teams allow Chennai to buy him for just $425,000.