At the end of the disastrous tour of Australia, it is heartening to note that three of the Fab Four have shown remarkable improvement in consistency.
Statistics offers a wonderful tool for measuring relative consistency of batsmen’s performances – the Standard Deviation of their scores. Standard Deviation is a measure of the variance of their scores around their average. The lower the standard Deviation the less the variance and hence the higher the consistency.
Consider the following chart which plots the Fab Four’s Standard Deviation over their entire career vs. their Standard Deviation over the eight matches they played in the recent England and Australia away tours (Sehwag sat out two of them in England because he was too tired):
Sehwag displayed the most dramatic improvement in consistency with his Standard Deviation dropping from from 60 to a jaw dropping 23! He caught up with Tendulkar and the ever dependable Laxman in terms of consistency! Strangely, the ever studious Dravid shows precious little improvement in consistency. Further investigation revealed that the three centuries he scored in England marred his consistency figures badly. “If only I had not scored those centuries” rued Dravid, “not only my consistency figures would have improved, I would also have got lots more time for shopping”.
“We are very happy to see that such outstanding consistency from our seniors. The improvement of Standard Deviation from 40s and 50s down to 20s is simply fantastic Di. They have fully justified our faith in them Di. Except for Dravid. We surely have to drop him to make way for a deserving youngster Di” said the Chairman of the Selection Committee Krishnamachari Srikant from Chennai.
When queried about the other statistical measure that is often used to measure a batsman’s performance, Srikant enigmatically replied ‘Baalu kalaru redu redu; redu kalaru blacku”.
Ravi Shastri, on the other hand, had the following to say “It is not correct to measure great batsmen like Tendulkar, Dravid, Sehwag and Laxman on the basis of a single statistics such as batting average. One has to take a wholistic view which is provided by their superior Standard Deviation. Only when the younger players display such consistency can the seniors’ position in the team be challenged”.
Sunil Gavaskat reportedly fell off his chair when he saw the consistency figures until he saw the averages chart. He then remarked “Hell, I have to stop talking about the Glorious Uncertainties of Cricket from now onwards”.
To which Srikanth replied “Dingu Dongu Dongu Dingu; Dongu Dingu Bongu”. At which point Ganguly slapped him.
