Journal of the Operational Research Society (2008) 59, 729 --742  2008 Operational Research Society Ltd.

Ltd. All rights reserved. 0160-5682/08 $30.00

www.palgrave-journals.com/jors

Extending the range of player-performance measures

in one-day cricket
AJ Lewis∗
Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK
The author’s previous paper on this topic showed that the Duckworth/Lewis methodology has considerable
potential for providing relevant and objective measures of performance in one-day cricket. The present paper
evaluates how these measures can apply in the longer term. This assessment is based upon several series
of matches involving the main players from most of the major cricketing nations. Although data used are
not exhaustive, they are of sufficient quantity to provide strong indications of the long-term viability of the
measures, thus leading to the realistic expectation of inclusion of the methodology into the existing player-
rankings or the development of an independent set of performance indicators that reflect more validly the
value of players’ inputs to matches. Such measures are expected to be of valuable use to team management,
media commentators and to the public.
Journal of the Operational Research Society (2008) 59, 729 – 742. doi:10.1057/palgrave.jors.2602379
Published online 7 March 2007

Keywords: sports statistics; cricket; performance measurement

Introduction Reflecting a growing interest in sporting performance mea-

sures, in recent times other authors have addressed the cre-
This paper is concerned with further evaluating developments
ation of alternative cricketing performance measures. Barr
in measures of player-performance in one-day cricket. In
and Kantor (2004) have devised a criterion for comparing
Lewis (2005) it was shown that the Duckworth/Lewis (D/L)
batsmen, which combines batting average and strike rate.
methodology of target resetting in interrupted limited overs
They used the Cricket World Cup of 2003 in South Africa to
cricket matches could be used to assess performances of
calibrate a model that compares the top batsmen of that tour-
batsmen and bowlers as a contrast to the traditional measures
nament. It uses the two dimensions of probability of dismissal
of batting and bowling averages, and their subsidiaries of
and strike rate to create an efficient frontier, analogous to that
strike and economy rates.
of portfolio theory (Ali, 1975), by which to compare batsmen.
In addition, by using other aspects of the D/L methodology,
By using an analogy with stochastic dominance within port-
Lewis (2005) and Beaudoin and Swartz (2003), have created
folio theory, Damodaran (2006) has evaluated performances
additional measures that objectively assess ‘all-round’ perfor-
of the Indian batsmen of recent times with cautious sugges-
mance, which is not possible using the traditional measures
tions that his results can shed light on how certain players
of performance.
are more suited than others in meeting the particular require-
Lewis showed that the D/L-based measures take into
ments of team situations during its innings.
account the context of the match in which runs are scored,
Swartz et al (2006) have used simulation techniques,
or conceded, and wickets taken, or lost, thereby arguably
which have also involved the performances in recent years of
more objectively comparing batsmen, comparing bowlers,
the leading Indian batsmen, to assist in determining optimal
comparing batsmen with bowlers and in assessing all-round
batting orders.
performance. These measures were shown to help team
Although Lewis (2005) showed how the D/L measures of
management
performance were useful in the short term for single matches
in assessing contributions to the team effort from individual
and for short series, he concluded that analysis of many more
players, not only for a particular match, but also for a series
matches was necessary in order to investigate the reliability
of matches. In addition, they were shown to provide aids to
and validity of these measures in the longer term.
adjudicators in deciding on ‘man-of-the match’ and ‘player
Bryman and Bell (2003) discuss reliability and validity in
of the series’ awards.
relation to quantitative social metrics. Although cricket is a
∗ Correspondence: AJ Lewis, The Business School, Oxford Brookes sport, the style of performance measurement being discussed
University, Wheatley, Oxford, OX33 1HX, UK. in this paper is distinctly different from measures made
E-mail: ajlewis@brookes.ac.uk under more controlled scientific conditions (Hopkins, 2000).
730 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6
Cricket’s performance measurements are therefore regarded
as of a ‘social’ nature so that the criteria of Bryman and Bell
will be used to assess the long-term reliability and validity
of the measures of performance discussed in this paper.
Bryman and Bell regard reliability as the stability of
the measure following additional observations of the same
characteristic. In cricketing terms reliability would then be
exhibited if the metrics were stable, that is that they did not
fluctuate too much (Bryman and Bell, 2003) if a batsman
or bowler were performing consistently to the same stan-
dard. Bryman and Bell define validity as whether the metric
that has been designed to measure a certain concept really
measures that concept. In particular, convergent validity can
be gauged (Bryman and Bell, 2003) by comparing a metric
to other measures of the same basic concept. In cricketing
terms all the measures presented in this Introduction are
intended to assess the players’ cricketing abilities as batsmen
or bowlers. Convergent validity would be evident in the
proposed D/L measures if there were statistically significant
agreement with the appropriate standard measures and with
other external performance measures.
In subsequent sections of the paper, firstly the concepts of
the D/L measures are reviewed. Secondly, the measures are
applied to a large number of matches covering a majority of
the major countries playing one-day internationals (ODIs) and
a majority of the leading players in ODIs from those countries.
Thirdly, the results of the analysis obtained on these players
are discussed and finally, conclusions are drawn on the validity
and reliability of the measures in the longer term. In drawing
these conclusions, comparisons are made with the popular
LG ICC ratings (http://www.lgiccrankings.com/, accessed 8
November 2006). These are produced for the International
Cricket Council (ICC) and sponsored by the LG marketing
company.
Further work is then suggested for additional refinements
to the measures.
Review of D/L performance measures
The performance measures proposed in Lewis (2005), of net
contributions and resource percentage averages are based on
the D/L methodology (Duckworth and Lewis, 1998, 2004).
There follows a review of these measures. In this review, and
in the subsequent developments, players are referred to in
the male gender. This is partly because the data used have
come solely from the men’s series of ODIs between the rele-
vant countries. Clearly, however, the measures discussed are
equally applicable in women’s cricket but, to smooth the
narrative in this paper, cross gender terms, such as ‘he/she’,
will not be employed. In addition, it is of interest to note
that in women’s cricket, male terminology is still used such
as ‘batsman’ and not ‘batswoman’ for the player batting,
and ‘third man’ for one of the traditional fielding positions
(Engels, 2006).
Net contribution
The measure called net batting (or bowling) contribution is a
summation, on a ball-by-ball basis, of what a batsman scores
(or a bowler concedes) compared with the runs expected
from the D/L model (Lewis, 2005). This summation includes
the ball that takes the wicket, since a batsman thereby loses
run-scoring potential for his team, and the bowler saves his
side runs by the taking of the wicket. Because cricket is a
zero-sum game, adjustments to these net runs are necessary to
allow for the asymmetric way that some forms of ‘extras’ are
debited against bowler but not credited to the batsman.
The measure for each player is in the form of a positive
or negative number of runs, which is usually non-integral,
that represents the overall extent to which the player has
performed above, or below, expectations for the match situa-
tion for the balls received or delivered.
Resource percentage average
The second measure of player-performance proposed in Lewis
(2005) was the batting (or bowling) resource percentage
average. According to the D/L methodology, the delivering
and receiving of a ball and the loss and taking of a wicket
involve consumption of resources by the batsman and contri-
bution of resources by the bowler. The respective resource
percentage averages are the average runs scored per unit
of resource consumed by the batsman and the average runs
conceded, including wides and no-balls, per unit of resource
contributed by the bowler.
Beaudoin and Swartz (2003) have produced a measure
called ‘runs per match’ (RM) for both batsmen and bowlers.
These measures are multiples of 100 of the respective batting
and bowling resource percentage averages. They are inter-
preted as the average number of runs scored or conceded were
the player to do all of the batting or the bowling himself.
According to the D/L model of one-day cricket (Duckworth
and Lewis, 1998, 2004), the average runs in 50 overs, with all
wickets available, is represented by Z(50,0) and has a value of
235. An RM measure above 235 represents an above average
batsman with the converse true for a bowler.
All-round performance
Lewis (2005) showed that both of these two types of measures
arguably produced better assessment of players’ performances
separately for batting and for bowling in single matches, and
in a series of matches. Further, he showed that the net contri-
butions of bowlers and batsmen, being on a common and addi-
tive scale, can be compared directly and that performances
in batting and bowling can be added to help assess all-round
performance.
Although the RM measures of bowlers and batsmen are not
directly comparable, Beaudoin and Swartz (2003) proposed
that all round performance can be assessed by finding the
difference of a player’s batting and bowling RMs. Their
interpretation of this measure is the average performance of

the player were he to do all of the batting and the bowling
himself.
Assessing performances in the longer term
Batting and bowling averages are the traditional ways of eval-
uating player performance in the long term, though couched
in qualifying terms because of the known weaknesses in
these measures (Lewis, 2005; Beaudoin and Swartz, 2003).
Using their RM measures, Beaudoin and Swartz (2003) under-
took an analysis of the performances of several high-profile
players between 1998 and September 2002 in order to achieve
more meaningful measures of performance over those players’
careers during that period. Some of these players also appear
in the analysis that follows. Several useful comparisons will
be made, which will be used also for the assessment of the reli-
ability and validity of the D/L-based performance measures.
The analysis that follows examines whether net contri-
butions and resource percentage averages would assist in
the longer term in providing measures of player-performance
that are more valid than existing measures of performance,
and whether the all-round performance measures outlined are
valid indicators of such performances.
In order to gain some indications as to how the measures
would work in the longer term, several ODI series have been
analysed, in exactly the same way as the Victoria Bitter
(VB) Series for 2003, which is discussed in some detail in
Lewis (2005). The series of matches summarized in subse-
quent analyses, in chronological order, are as follows. This list
defines several abbreviations subsequently employed in this
paper.
(i) VB 2002 (VB02): between Australia (Aus), South
Africa (RSA) and New Zealand (NZ) [14 matches]
(ii) NatWest Series 2002 (NW02): England (Eng), India
(Ind) and Sri Lanka (SriL) [10]
(iii) VB 2003 (VB03): Australia, England, Sri Lanka [14]
(iv) NatWest Series 2003 (NW03S): England, South Africa,
NZ [10]
(v) NatWest Challenge 2003 (NW03C): England, Pakistan
(Pak) [3]
(vi) Tour 2003: West Indies (WI), Australia [7]
(vii) TV Sundaram Iyengar & Sons Cup 2003 (TVS03):
India, Australia, NZ [10]
(viii) VB 2004 (VB04): Australia, India, Zimbabwe (Zim)
[14]
(ix) Tour 2004: West Indies, England [5]
(x) Tour 2004: Sri Lanka, Australia [5]
(xi) NatWest Series 2004 (NW04S): England, NZ,
West Indies [10]
(xii) NatWest Challenge 2004 (NW04C): England, India [3]
(xiii) Tour 2005: South Africa, England [7]
(xiv) VB 2005 (VB05): Australia, NZ, Pakistan [14]
(xv) Tour 2005: NZ, Australia [5]
(xvi) NatWest Series 2005: England, Australia, Bangladesh
(Bang) [10]
AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 731
All major ODI countries have featured in at least three of
these series with the exceptions of Pakistan, Zimbabwe and
Bangladesh. Consequently, the principal players from these
three countries are not included in subsequent analysis.
Because the sources of the author’s electronic data are located
in the United Kingdom and Australia, there is a prepon-
derance of matches involving England and Australia. Such
volume of data aids in establishing the longer-term stability
of the proposed D/L measures. However, a priori, there is
no reason to believe that bias towards results from these
two countries would invalidate the general conclusions to be
drawn.
Because of the turnover of players during the three-year
period of the data for this research, many players have played
insufficiently for their overall performances to be regarded as
representative. In order to reduce bias due to small volumes of
input, players included in subsequent analyses are only those
who have played a role in more than 12 innings. Moreover, in
order that comparisons are as current as possible, only players
who have retained a ranking in the top 100 of the LG ICC
ratings are included.
The LG ICC ratings
There are two sets of LG ICC player rankings, one for Test
Matches, and one for ODIs. This paper is concerned only
with the latter set, which includes ratings and rankings for
batsmen and bowlers and more recently, rankings for all-
round performance. The ratings are provided on a scale from
0 to 1000. The Internet website cited gives a general overview
of the principal features of the ratings but does not provide
full details of the calculations due to commercial sensitivity.
However, it is known that the ‘all-round’ rating is the product
of the player’s batting and bowling rating. The administrators
of the ratings produce this only for selected players deemed
to be all-rounders.
The mechanism of the LG ICC ratings uses only infor-
mation provided by a ‘standard’ summary scorecard as
typically reproduced in Engels (2006). For batsmen, infor-
mation recorded includes runs scored, which bowler took his
wicket if dismissed, and the batsman’s strike rate. For bowlers,
information recorded includes the names of the batsmen
dismissed, the numbers of overs bowled, wickets taken and
runs conceded including wides and no-balls, and the economy
rate, that is, runs conceded per over bowled.
In these ratings, bowlers get extra credit for the quality of
the batsmen dismissed, but no account is taken of the stage
of the team’s innings that the wickets are taken. The reverse
consideration, however, cannot be given to the batsmen for
scoring runs against the better-ranked bowlers since such data
are not recorded in the scorecard. Consequently, the infor-
mation captured by these ratings is likely to be more limited
in scope than that used for analysis in this paper. Further-
more, because of a discounting factor over time in the LG
ICC ratings, greater weight is given to players’ performances
732 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6
that are more recent, so that players who are not selected for
play, quickly lose their status in the rankings.
Whereas the information in the traditional scorecard
provides the details for calculation of the averages, it is not
sufficient for the analysis undertaken in this and the previous
paper (Lewis, 2005); substantial details on the outcome of
every ball are required. The author’s data-sources, from
Australia and the United Kingdom that are acknowledged
later, provide detail to the level of who bowled to whom, how
many runs were scored, or byes and leg-byes, wides and no-
balls conceded and the mode of dismissal when the wicket
is taken. These details are supplied in electronic form so that
the processing into the summary information needed for the
proposed measures is relatively straightforward compared
with the approach by Beaudoin and Swartz (2003). They
transcribed verbal commentaries such as those on Cricinfo
(http://uk.cricinfo.com/db/ARCHIVE/, accessed 8 November
2006) into a form for digital processing. Beaudoin and Swartz
admit that the workload involved in this process was very
onerous.
Analysis of performance measures
The author stresses that the analysis that follows is intended
to indicate how the measures of net contribution and of
resource percentage average would operate over the several
series of matches. Although some 141 matches have been
included to produce these statistics, in the main they are still
a minority of matches from most players’ careers and so con-
clusions on ratings and rankings can only be indicative at this
stage. Consequently, there are no suggestions that the rank-
ings subsequently derived in this paper, will be definitive for
players’ career performances. To some extent, however, com-
parison will be made with the current LG ICC international
player ratings and with the results of the study by Beaudoin
and Swartz (2003). As well as being of considerable interest,
such comparisons will be relevant to assess the validity and
reliability of the D/L-based performance measures.
In order to standardize the analysis, the net contribu-
tions and resource percentage averages will be based on the
D/L model and tables of September 2002 (http://www.icc-
cricket.com/rules/d-l method.pdf, accessed 8 November
2006) even though two of the series analysed (VB02 and
NW02) took place before this date. The former edition of
the tables (see Duckworth and Lewis, 2004; or Beaudoin and
Swartz, 2003) would have been applicable to any D/L target
calculations in those two series.
Evaluating the batting performance measures
Table 1 provides the performances of the eligible players
(according to the criteria previously defined) over the one-day
series mentioned above. The ranking of players in the table is
in accordance with their traditional batting averages, but their
ranks by the two measures suggested by this paper (called the
D/L-based measures) are included for comparative purposes.
The Beaudoin and Swartz batting RM measure is not included
as it is merely a multiple by 100 of the batting resource
percentage average. Table 1 also provides the number of
innings in which each player had batted, together with the
LG ICC rating applicable to 31st May 2005. This was the
date of the rating’s publication as near as possible to the last
match of the final series included in the database, that of the
NatWest Series of 2005 which concluded on 3rd July 2005.
Several features emerge from Table 1. One is the variation
in the rankings of the players under the various methods
of measuring batting performances. Kallis (RSA) has a
high batting average of 54.87, yet ranks more lowly under
net contribution and resource percentage average. Quite
probably, this is due to the nature of his play, which is to
build an innings more slowly than his counterparts thereby
consuming more resources and run-scoring potential for his
innings, which drops him down the D/L-based rankings.
Beaudoin and Swartz (2003) obtained a similar pattern for
the measures of Kallis. Conversely, Gilchrist (Aus) who has a
modest 23rd-ranked batting average of less than 40, is ranked
1st and 4th under net contribution and resource percentage
average, respectively and 2nd by the LG ICC ratings. His
role has been to score runs more quickly, particularly during
the earlier phase of an innings.
Pietersen (Eng) tops the standard batting averages partly
because his figures are based on several high scores in
relatively few matches and even fewer completed innings.
However, he is highly ranked also by resource percentage
average and by net contribution. The mechanism of the LG
ICC ratings means that there is a necessity for sustained high
performance in order to climb the rankings, which takes more
time than he had spent playing ODIs, hence his relatively
low LG ICC ranking compared with the other measures.
Batting correlations
Table 2 summarizes the correlations of the players’ batting
performance measures with each other and with the number of
innings in which the batsmen have contributed. The table also
summarizes the significance of the sample correlations from
zero on a two-tailed alternative hypothesis. These correlations
are obtained from all the 47 batsmen who have batted in more
than 12 innings and have an LG ICC rating.
The correlations between the three performance measures
are statistically significant and, using verbal descriptors
defined by Cohen (1988), they are moderate to large, the
largest being between the D/L-based measures (as might be
expected), and the lowest between the standard batting
average and net contribution. Beaudoin and Swartz (2003)
found a correlation of 0.67 between batting average and their
RM measure, which is not inconsistent with the equivalent
0.746 for the study of this paper.
The correlations of the performance measures with the LG
ICC ratings are moderate in all cases with the highest being
for net contribution.
 AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 733

Table 1 Summary of batting performance measures for qualifying batsmen

Batting
Batting Batting Batting res% LG LG
Batting Batting avge Batting contrib res% avge ICC ICC
Player Country innings avge rank contrib rank avge rank rating rank *
Pietersen Eng 13 99.57 1 252.3 7 3.473 1 611 23
Lehmann Aus 14 68.12 2 126.5 14 2.836 5 544 31
Kallis RSA 20 54.87 3 40.6 26 2.306 31 708 8
Tendulkar Ind 21 54.68 4 280.3 5 2.996 3 692 10
Sarwan WI 23 50.82 5 156.1 11 2.661 10 672 13
Kaif Ind 13 46.87 6 66.8 20 2.652 11 532 34
Clarke Aus 33 46.66 7 243.9 8 2.649 12 705 9
Flintoff Eng 31 43.96 8 309.8 3 2.998 2 711 5
Sangakkara SriL 17 42.86 9 127.7 13 2.703 7 709 7
Laxman Ind 21 41.66 10 57.8 22 2.389 24 532 35
Strauss Eng 29 41.40 11 120.3 15 2.483 16 488 39
Lara WI 22 41.15 12 158.5 10 2.681 8 646 20
Smith RSA 14 41.00 13 40.0 27 2.368 26 722 3
Hayden Aus 49 40.33 14 294.8 4 2.622 13 671 14
Chanderpaul WI 16 39.73 15 69.3 19 2.444 20 625 21
Martyn Aus 55 39.67 16 4.2 38 2.192 39 654 19
Ponting Aus 61 39.52 17 253.3 6 2.478 18 759 1
Trescothick Eng 53 38.57 18 396.3 2 2.747 6 658 18
Jayawardene SriL 19 38.33 19 72.8 18 2.409 23 555 29
Symonds Aus 47 37.75 20 241.0 9 2.596 14 660 17
Dravid Ind 24 37.04 21 −1.5 40 2.184 40 711 5
Gilchrist Aus 56 36.96 22 508.0 1 2.945 4 724 2
Jayasuriya SriL 18 35.83 23 133.3 12 2.663 9 670 15
Gayle WI 24 35.36 24 10.7 36 2.217 36 717 4
Gibbs RSA 24 33.3 25 34.6 30 2.306 32 674 12
Y. Singh Ind 25 32.63 26 82.9 17 2.477 19 546 30
Fleming NZ 23 32.04 27 38.4 28 2.280 34 670 15
Solanki Eng 22 31.85 28 49.8 23 2.370 25 490 38
McMillan NZ 24 31.71 29 14.1 34 2.211 37 578 25
Cairns NZ 17 31.64 30 58.9 21 2.501 15 588 24
Vaughan Eng 41 31.64 31 0.7 39 2.198 38 569 26
Boucher RSA 20 30.5 32 45.1 24 2.434 21 542 32
Collingwood Eng 37 30.34 33 95.4 16 2.431 22 512 36
Sehwag Ind 22 28.81 34 41.6 25 2.332 28 618 22
Atapattu SriL 19 28.63 35 −24.3 43 2.043 43 675 11
Katich Aus 14 28.54 36 37.9 29 2.480 17 348 46
JonesG Eng 21 28.43 37 21.4 31 2.325 29 419 43
Astle NZ 15 27.46 38 −54.8 47 1.921 46 569 27
Hogg Aus 22 26.25 39 −44.8 45 1.928 45 407 44
Ganguly Ind 21 25.85 40 −37.6 44 2.024 44 557 28
Harris NZ 16 24.58 41 −50.4 46 1.844 47 426 42
Styris NZ 15 24.15 42 −9.7 42 2.063 42 535 33
McCullum NZ 14 24.08 43 −6.6 41 2.120 41 450 41
Powell WI 19 23.93 44 20.0 32 2.315 30 503 37
Pollock RSA 17 21.90 45 5.9 37 2.271 35 472 40
LeeB Aus 23 18.93 46 13.9 35 2.287 33 346 47
Vettori NZ 16 15.61 47 16.2 33 2.359 27 368 45
∗ The LG ICC ranking displayed is for the 47 players of this table having excluded players from the LG ICC lists not qualifying by the criteria of this
paper.

It will be seen that the correlation of the number of innings
with the standard batting average, 0.004, is not only insignif-
icant in the statistical sense but it is insignificant also in the
cricketing sense. Such insignificance provides justification for
using the standard batting average as a long-term measure of
performance evaluation of the particular aspect of batting that
it is meant to reflect.
On a two-tailed alternative hypothesis, the number of
innings by batsmen, correlates lowly, at 0.169, and statistically
insignificantly, with resource percentage average. This is
734 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6

Table 2 Correlations of 47 players’ batting performances and number of innings

Batting Batting Batting Batting Batting LG ICC
correlations innings avge contrib res% avge rating
Batting innings 1
Batting avge 0.004 (NS) 1
Batting contrib 0.590 ( p < 0.0001) 0.479 ( p < 0.001) 1
Batting res% avge 0.169 (NS) 0.746 ( p < 0.0001) 0.810 ( p < 0.0001) 1
LG ICC rating 0.400 ( p < 0.001) 0.437 ( p < 0.001) 0.499 ( p < 0.001) 0.35 ( p < 0.05) 1

Table 3 Progressive batting performance measures for Ponting (Aus)

Prog. Cum. Batting Prog.
ODI Times Batting batting Net net res% Res% res% Batting
series Runs out avge avge contribution contrib contrib avge avge innings
VB02 254 7 31.75 31.75 15.32 15.32 106.9 2.376 2.376 8
VB03 306 8 43.71 37.33 43.14 58.46 118.9 2.573 2.479 8
WI-Aus03 200 5 40.00 38.00 24.32 82.78 80.6 2.482 2.480 7
TVS03 257 6 42.83 39.12 29.98 112.76 106.1 2.421 2.465 7
VB04 315 9 35.00 38.06 43.55 156.31 125.5 2.509 2.475 9
SL-Aus04 257 4 64.25 40.74 73.44 229.75 83.5 3.078 2.556 4
VB05 184 7 26.29 38.54 −33.82 195.93 100.7 1.827 2.455 8
NZ-Aus-05 266 3 88.67 41.61 78.66 274.59 83.8 3.173 2.529 4
NatWest05 135 6 22.50 39.53 −21.26 253.33 71.2 1.896 2.478 6
Totals 2174 55 39.53 253.33 877.4 2.478 61

suggesting, as is the case with standard batting average, that 300 3.0

with sufficient volumes of input, the resource percentage 250

2.8
Runs - Avge or Cum

average will stabilize in the medium to long term enabling 200

Contribution

Res % Avge
players with unequal volumes of input to be compared 2.6
150
directly. However, resource percentage average will not 2.4
have the deficiency of the standard batting average of being 100
2.2
distorted by the number of ‘not-out’ innings in the players’ 50
careers. 0 2.0
Table 2 shows that the number of innings by a batsman
02

03

04

04

05

05

S
s0

S0

05
VB

VB

VB

us

VB

s-
Au

TV

W
Au
-A

correlates much more highly, at 0.590, with net contribution N

I-

SL

Z-
W

and is statistically significantly different from zero. This is
suggesting the more that batsmen play the greater the effect
on their net contribution. As there is a clear cause and effect,
this indicates strongly that the net contributions of the better
batsmen will generally increase the more they play, whereas
for weak batsmen net contributions will generally decrease
the more they play.
In order to illustrate this feature, Table 3 summarizes
the progressive batting performance of Ponting (Aus), who
has appeared in all the tournaments of this study involving
Australia. For a previous period of his career, Beaudoin and
Swartz (2003) found Ponting’s batting average to be 40.6
with an RM of 251.4, which are very similar to the batting
average of 39.53 and the equivalent resource percentage
average of 2.478 for the study in this paper. Figure 1, in
which the horizontal axis is not to a time scale but represents
the various ODI series above in chronological order, illus-
trates very clearly that while Ponting’s resource percentage
ODI Series over time
Figure 1 Progressive batting measures: Ponting (Aus).
average is fairly stable and above the average of 2.35 (or
235 RM), his net contribution has a strongly upward trend.
Consequently, for such players as Ponting, their net contri-
butions do not stabilize in order for this measure to be used
to compare players with different volumes of input.
This characteristic has implications on how net contribution
can be used as a long-term measure of batting performance. It
suggests that the measure might not be helpful in comparing
active players who have played in significantly different
numbers of matches. However, the measure’s use over
players’ careers would still be of value, and maybe more so,
than another commonly used measure of career performance,
namely the aggregate of the batsmen’s runs. Aggregates of
runs are monotonic increasing measures that reflect, to a
 AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 735

Table 4 Career runs for selected ODI batsmen

Career Career Batting D/L net D/L
Batsman Country runs matches average contribution innings
Tendulkar Ind 14 146 362 44.20 280.3 21
Jayasuriya SriL 10 625 357 31.90 133.3 18
Ganguly Ind 10 123 279 40.65 −37.6 21
Azaruddin Ind 9378 308 36.92 Retired
Lara WI 9359 259 41.41 158.5 22
Dravid Ind 9048 280 40.21 −1.5 24
Ponting Aus 8958 247 42.25 253.3 61
Gilchrist Aus 7999 235 36.35 508.0 56
Kallis RSA 7954 229 44.18 40.6 20
Waugh S Aus 7569 325 32.90 De-selected
Bevan Aus 6918 232 53.58 De-selected
Border Aus 6524 273 30.62 Retired
Hayden Aus 4131 119 40.10 294.8 49
Trescothick Eng 3923 114 36.66 396.3 53
Lehmann Aus 3078 117 38.96 126.5 14
Flintoff Eng 2601 98 35.14 309.8 31
Pietersen Eng 888 25 68.30 252.3 13

substantial extent, the sheer volume of matches played.
Table 4 lists the career totals of runs for the batsmen in
Table 1 whose career aggregates of runs in ODIs are in the
top 25, as summarized in Engels (2006), and updated to 1st
March 2006 (http://www.stats.cricinfo.com/guru, accessed
8 November 2006). Several players are included in the list
of Table 4 whose ODI careers have terminated due to de-
selection or retirement. The net contributions of batsmen
qualifying for this study are provided for comparative
purposes. The correlation of career runs to career matches
of the 25 players is 0.927, whereas the correlation of D/L
net contribution to number of innings, for the smaller set of
qualifying players in Table 4, is 0.661 so that this measure
is less dependent on volume of input. In addition, since the
aggregate D/L net contribution can decline as well as rise,
periods of loss of form or declining ability are reflected in
the reduction of net contribution, it becomes a basis for the
comparison of players’ performances over whole careers and
for comparison of players of different eras.
For example, in Table 4 we see that Tendulkar (Ind)
has scored more runs in ODIs than any other player. He
heads this performance measure by a considerable margin.
However, he has played in far more matches than any other
player. Although his batting average would also be mentioned
in discussion in order to help justify his top ranking, it
is argued that a career total net contribution would be a
better measure by which to compare the longest serving
players.
In addition, Table 4 shows Ponting has accumulated almost
9000 runs from his 247 matches, and has a slightly lower
batting average than that of Tendulkar. For the series covered
in this study, his net contribution from 61 matches is slightly
below that of Tendulkar but, from Table 3, it has not risen
continuously as does his career aggregate of runs; two of
his last three series have shown negative net contributions.
If a player’s aggregates could decline as well as rise then
assessment of merit would be based more on the quality of
their performances and less on their quantity.
Reliability and validity
The discussion of the previous section illustrates the validity
of the D/L measures for assessing batting performance. As
required by Bryman and Bell (2003), there are significant
correlations of these with the traditional measure of batting
average, although high correlation is not expected because of
the different construct of the D/L measures compared with
the construct of batting average. There is also significant,
yet moderate, correlation of the D/L measures with the LG
ICC ratings, with variations expected for the same reasons of
construct.
Bryman and Bell’s requirement for reliability for the
resource percentage average is met by its insignificant corre-
lation with number of innings, and supported by the similarity
of the results of this study to that of Beaudoin and Swartz
(2003). In the long term, therefore, resource percentage
average would reliably compare batsmen’s performances.
Net contribution is also a valid measure according to
Bryman and Bell by similar arguments to the previous
paragraph. However, net contribution does not stabilize, as
required by Bryman and Bell, consequently it is unreliable
for comparing batsmen’s careers while they are in progress,
but it has considerable relevance when comparing batsmen’s
whole careers.
Evaluating the bowling performance measures
Table 5 summarizes the three bowling performance measures
of standard average, net contribution and resource percentage
average. These cover the 36 players in this study who have
played in more than 12 innings and whose appearances have
736 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6

Table 5 Summary of ODI bowling performance measures

Bowling Bowling Bowling Res% LG LG
Bowling Bowling avge Bowling contrib res% avge ICC ICC
Player Country innings avge rank contrib rank avge rank rating rank *
McGrath Aus 34 19.30 1 388.8 1 1.686 1 865 1
LeeB Aus 48 22.32 2 246.3 2 2.015 3 819 3
Kasprowicz Aus 13 22.50 3 69.8 6 1.985 2 632 12
Ntini RSA 22 22.82 4 90.8 4 2.222 8 757 6
Flintoff Eng 31 24.50 5 55.7 7 2.163 5 727 8
Styris NZ 14 25.53 6 −1.8 15 2.294 12 629 13
Khan Ind 13 25.75 7 −63.5 28 2.509 20 625 16
Anderson Eng 29 25.95 8 24.9 11 2.243 9 652 11
Lehmann Aus 13 26.53 9 −37.9 19 2.592 24 436 30
Agarkar Ind 17 26.96 10 −36.4 18 2.395 17 596 20
Gough Eng 42 28.01 11 79.7 5 2.178 6 732 7
Harmison Eng 27 28.27 12 −3.7 16 2.297 13 618 18
Cairns NZ 18 29.45 13 −14.2 17 2.365 16 624 17
Gayle WI 18 29.50 14 14.7 13 2.412 18 525 24
Hogg Aus 37 29.64 15 18.2 12 2.249 10 627 15
Pollock RSA 23 29.92 16 136.6 3 2.020 4 805 4
Bravo WI 13 30.15 17 32.6 9 2.302 14 452 29
Vaas SriL 18 31.33 18 −38.3 20 2.702 29 831 2
Clarke Aus 33 32.61 19 −89.6 31 2.677 28 281 35
Boje RSA 15 32.73 20 12.8 14 2.354 15 560 22
Gillespie Aus 39 33.24 21 −133.7 34 2.503 19 786 5
Pathan Ind 13 33.68 22 −60.7 26 2.520 21 629 14
Watson Aus 17 34.11 23 −81.4 29 2.660 25 370 33
Kallis RSA 19 34.85 24 −60.5 25 2.712 30 470 28
Vettori NZ 25 35.36 25 26.4 10 2.263 11 722 9
Symonds Aus 45 37.42 26 −164.6 35 2.528 23 515 26
Collingwood Eng 31 38.83 27 −132.2 33 2.672 27 393 31
Nehra Ind 13 40.61 28 −104.4 32 2.819 34 607 19
Ganguly Ind 14 40.66 29 −63.2 27 2.733 32 314 34
Giles Eng 31 43.03 30 41.5 8 2.196 7 675 10
Sehwag Ind 14 45.50 31 −53.1 23 2.671 26 390 32
Vaughan Eng 16 46.00 32 −57.5 24 2.71 31 279 36
Jayasuriya SriL 18 48.30 33 −84.4 30 2.815 33 553 23
Harris NZ 17 49.54 34 −46.3 22 2.525 22 474 27
Dillon WI 15 57.83 35 −40.0 21 2.897 35 594 21
Kumble Ind 16 59.33 36 −168.4 36 2.968 36 519 25
∗ The LG ICC rankings quoted are for the 36 players of this table, suitably adjusted for ODI players not qualifying for the table.

been sufficiently recent that they have acquired and retain
an LG ICC rating. A notable, and regrettable, absentee from
the list is Muralitharan (SriL), who has an LG ICC rating of
742 and is ranked 3rd in the complete listings of 31st May
2005. His omission from Table 5 is because injury prevented
him from playing sufficient innings in the few matches of the
limited number of series covered by this paper in which Sri
Lanka took part.
Table 5 ranks the players by their standard bowling aver-
ages. There would likely be no disagreement in the conclu-
sion that the best bowler within the study of this paper has
been McGrath (Aus); there is a clear difference in all his
performance measures from the next-best bowler. In addition,
there is consistency in his performances with the Beaudoin
and Swartz study, which found for him a bowling average of
20.1 and an RM of 164.0. In their study, Muralitharan just
edged McGrath into 2nd place.
Elsewhere in Table 5, it will be seen that there is less
variation in the rankings than with the batsmen in Table 1.
Significant variations, however, are evident such as for Khan
(Ind), Pollock (RSA), and Giles (Eng). Whereas Khan has a
7th-ranked bowling average of 25.75 (and 26.6 by Beaudoin
and Swartz, 2003) which relies heavily on wickets taken, the
runs conceded for the stage of innings bowled has led to a
negative net contribution. The reverse is the case for Pollock.
Although his bowling average of 29.92 is modest for this study
(formerly 23.0 by Beaudoin and Swartz, 2003), his relative
economy is reflected in a strong net contribution of +136.6
runs during the study and a much better than normal resource
percentage average at 2.020 (formerly 1.866 by Beaudoin and
Swartz, 2003).
Despite a 30th-ranked bowling average (partly due to the
small number of wickets taken), Giles (Eng) has been an
effective one-day bowler by bowling relatively economically

Table 6 Correlations of players’ bowling performances and number of innings
Bowling Bowling Bowling
correlations innings avge
Bowling innings 1
Bowling avge −0.272 (NS) 1
Bowling contrib 0.300 (NS) −0.580 ( p < 0.001)
Bowling res% avge −0.422 ( p < 0.05) 0.746 ( p < 0.0001)
LG ICC rating 0.375 ( p < 0.001) −0.455 ( p < 0.001)
to produce a net contribution of +41.5 and a slightly better
than normal resource percentage average of 2.196. These
figures have helped raise his ranking to the top ten by all the
D/L-based measures.
Bowling correlations
Table 6 summarizes the correlations between the bowling
performance measures and the number of innings played that
produced them.
Similar to the situation with the batting measures, the
correlations between the three bowling performance measures
are all statistically significant and are moderate to large, the
largest again being between the D/L-based measures and the
lowest between the standard bowling average and net contri-
bution. Bowling average and bowling resource percentage
average are very highly correlated (0.746). In order to illus-
trate this feature, in Table 5 it can be seen that there is
only one name different in the top 12 players by these two
measures, and there is close agreement in their rankings.
Beaudoin and Swartz found an even higher correlation of
0.93 but they used only the top 12 bowlers active at the time.
In contrast, however, with the situation relating to the
batting measures, the bowling net contribution is lowly corre-
lated (0.300) with the number of innings in which the bowler
contributes and it is not statistically significantly different
from zero. It would appear, therefore, that for medium and
long-term purposes, net bowling contribution may well be
suited for comparison of players’ performances. This would
be applicable within careers and over whole careers. It would
be an additional measure not only to the traditional career
bowling average but also in addition to the aggregate number
of wickets, which is also used to assess bowlers’ career
performances (Engels, 2006).
The correlation of bowlers’ number of innings with
resource percentage average, at −0.422, is significant at the
5% level. Contrasted with the situation for the equivalent
batting measure, this might suggest that resource percentage
average would not stabilize in the medium to long term in
order to be used as a performance measure. Nevertheless,
because of the apparent equivalence with the situation for
the batting measure, there is considerable logic, (supported
by the fact the correlation with bowling average is highly
significant) that resource percentage average would still be
a valuable measure by which to compare bowling perfor-
AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 737
Bowling Bowling LG ICC
contrib res% avge rating
1
−0.855 ( p < 0.0001) 1
0.595 ( p < 0.001) −0.628 ( p < 0.0001) 1
mances in the medium term and also between player’s who
have played different numbers of times for their countries.
Reliability and validity
In a similar vein to that of batsmen, the discussion of the
previous section illustrates the validity of the D/L measures for
assessing bowling performance. There are significant correla-
tions of these with the traditional measure of bowling average
that confirm their validity (Bryman and Bell, 2003). Further-
more, high correlation is not expected because of the different
construct of the D/L measures compared with the construct
of bowling average. As further evidence of validity, there are
also significant yet moderate-to-large correlations of the D/L
measures with the LG ICC ratings, with variations expected
for the same reasons of construct.
In contrast with the batting measures, Bryman and Bell’s
requirement for reliability for the resource percentage average
is not quite met as there is a significant correlation ( p < 0.05)
with the number of innings. Nevertheless, the results of this
study are similar to the study by Beaudoin and Swartz (2003),
and, for reasons stated in the previous section, it is reasonable
to believe that this measure would reliably compare bowlers’
performances in the longer term.
By arguments similar to those for the resource percentage
average, bowlers’ net contribution is also a valid measure
(Bryman and Bell, 2003). In assessing its reliability, however,
it is noted that net contribution is not significantly correlated
with number of innings. This would suggest that it would be
stable in the longer term, which is counter-intuitive. However,
possibly due to the small sample size, and that bowlers only
get the opportunity to bowl 20% of the overs of the innings
(Engels, 2006), it seems likely that the pattern and conclu-
sion for batsmen has not yet been confirmed, in the way
that logic suggests it should. Further analysis of more data
and players could indicate that net contribution is unreliable,
according to Bryman and Bell, for comparing bowlers’ careers
while in progress. However, again it would have consider-
able relevance when comparing bowlers’ whole careers as a
contrast with career-total of wickets taken, which is mono-
tonic increasing.
Evaluating all-round performances
Although the batting net contribution depends upon frequency
of appearances, nevertheless when combined with bowling
738 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6

Table 7 Summary of ‘all-round’ performance measures for qualifying players

Total RM LG
Total contrib Batting Bowling RM Diff ICC
Player Country contrib rank RM RM Diff rank rank
Flintoff Eng 365.4 1 299.8 216.3 83.5 1 1
LeeB Aus 260.2 2 228.7 201.5 27.2 2
Pollock RSA 142.5 4 227.1 202.0 25.1 3 2
Lehmann Aus 88.6 5 283.6 259.2 24.4 4
Cairns NZ 44.7 8 250.1 236.5 13.7 5
Vettori NZ 42.6 9 235.9 226.3 9.6 6
Symonds Aus 76.3 6 259.6 252.8 6.8 7
Clarke Aus 154.3 3 264.9 267.7 −2.7 8
Jayasuriya SriL 48.9 7 266.3 281.5 −15.2 9
Gayle WI 25.4 10 221.7 241.2 −19.6 10 4
Styris NZ −11.5 11 206.3 229.4 −23.1 11
Collingwood Eng −36.8 15 243.1 267.2 −24.1 12
Hogg Aus −26.6 14 192.8 224.9 −32.2 13
Sehwag Ind −11.5 12 233.2 267.1 −33.8 14
Kallis RSA −19.9 13 230.6 271.2 −40.6 15
Vaughan Eng −56.8 16 219.8 271.4 −51.6 16
Harris NZ −96.7 17 184.4 252.5 −68.1 17
Ganguly Ind −100.9 18 202.4 273.3 −70.9 18

net contribution, their sum, identified as total net contribu-
tion may still have value in order to provide an indicator of a
player’s all-round ability. All-round performance will also be
assessed using the Beaudoin and Swartz (2003) RM difference
and will be compared with the recently introduced LG ICC
all-round ranking. Table 7 provides the all-round information
on the 18 players in this study who had batted and bowled
in more than 12 innings and whose performances were suffi-
ciently current that they retained an LG ICC rating for both
batting and bowling. The ranking of these players is provided
according to their RM difference over the 16 one-day series
considered in this paper.
Again, several interesting aspects of their rankings are
apparent. There is substantial agreement in the rankings with a
Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient of 0.930. By a consid-
erable margin, the best all-rounder is Flintoff (Eng) by both
of the D/L-based measures.
Since all bowlers get some opportunities to bat, in the
modern game it is becoming more and more important for
bowlers to improve their batting skills. This is not only to
score runs but also, towards the end of the innings, to support
the other batsman who may be a higher-order player capable
of scoring many runs and guiding the team to victory. Lee
(Aus) is regarded as a specialist bowler but he has acquired
batting expertise of the nature mentioned in the VB series of
2003 (Lewis, 2005) which, when aggregated with his perfor-
mances in the other series in this study, rates his all-round
performance as second. Pollock (RSA) is also regarded as an
all-round player. He is a better batsman than Lee but not quite
as effective as a strike bowler and has been ranked just below
Lee by this study.
Collingwood (Eng) also is thought of as an all-round player,
but his bowling performances in these series, summarized in
Table 5, have not supported his stronger batting so that his
all-round rankings are rather low at 12 and 15.
Reliability and validity
Subject to the previous caveat in relation to the reliability
of the bowling resource percentage average, the derivative
all-round measure of the RM difference would carry the prop-
erties of its two parts and would therefore exhibit reliability
(Bryman and Bell, 2003). Although batting and bowling net
contributions do not exhibit reliability, because of the very
high correlation of the all-round measures of total net contri-
butions and resource percentage average there is good support
for the use of total net contribution as an all-round measure
of performance.
Whereas the two D/L-based measures of all-round ability
are consistent among themselves, there is limited external
evidence available to ascertain their validity (Bryman and
Bell, 2003). However, the LG ICC all-rounder ratings of Table
7 are clearly consistent and therefore are not unsupportive of
their validity.
Proposals for D/L performance indices
Although suspect in the same way as standard batting and
bowling averages to low volumes of input, the resource
percentage averages, and their RM derivatives, arguably
provide a reliable and valid way of comparing batsmen and
comparing bowlers for the medium and longer term and when
there are differing volumes of input. However, in their current

form they are incompatible for the purposes of comparing
batsmen with bowlers. A difficulty also is in their popular
interpretation, although Beaudoin and Swartz have made a
valiant attempt with the RM measures themselves. But the
interpretation of the all-round RM difference, as summarized
in Table 7, as being the average net performance of the player
were he to do all of the batting and bowling himself (Beau-
doin and Swartz, 2003) is perhaps rather a severe stretch
of the imagination for the typical cricket supporter. This
paper now discusses a further derivative of the D/L-based
performance measures in order to create player-performance
indices that could overcome the problems of interpretation.
D/L batting and bowling indices
The LG ICC ratings of teams, introduced in 2002
(http://www.lgiccrankings.com/, accessed 8 November 2006),
rank the major cricket playing countries using an index based
upon 100 as the ‘average’ both for Test matches and ODIs. As
an example, on 30th June 2005, among the 11 ODI-playing
countries, Australia topped the ratings with 137, England
were 6th on 106, West Indies 9th on 95 and Zimbabwe’s
9th-ranked rating was 50. Since such ranking indices are
now familiar to cricket enthusiasts, equivalent performance
measures for players are now proposed.
In Lewis (2005), a batsman’s


resource percentage average
for a match is defined as si / pi where the si are the runs
scored on the ith ball remaining. The pi are the resources
consumed for the ith ball remaining including the resource
percentage consumed for the loss of the wicket at the terminal
ball. These are then summed over the balls received during
his innings. This is easily extended to the many matches in a
player’s career. The resource percentage
average

Pa for

the
batsman’s career to date would be Pa = j i si j / j i pi j
where si j now represents the runs scored from the ith ball
remaining in the jth innings in his career. There would be a
similar quotient Pb for a bowler where the si j of runs con-
ceded, would be replaced by si j +h i j , which includes the num-
ber of extras, that is, wides and no balls h i j , that are charged
against the bowler. The pi j are the resource percentages
contributed by the bowling of balls and the taking of wickets.
The average value of P(.) is Z (50, 0)/100, namely 2.35
in the Standard Edition of the D/L model (Duckworth and
Lewis, 2004) that has been used in the analysis and has been
applicable for the majority of the series of matches identified
above. The proposal is that a player’s batting index Ia is
defined as 100Pa /Z (50, 0) and expressed as a percentage; the
higher the figure the better the evaluation of the batsman. For
a batsman such as Lehmann (Aus) from Table 1, his batting
index, Ia , would be 100 × 2.836/2.35 = 120.7. This would be
interpreted as assessing Lehmann as a batsman performing at
20.7% above that of an average ODI batsman.
The problem with the equivalent bowler’s index is that
good performance would generate a low index, contrary to the
batting index, which would again make direct comparisons
AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 739
of batsmen with bowlers impossible. In order to preserve the
nature of high indices representing good performance and
high ranking, the proposal for the bowler’s index Ib is the
reciprocal of the formula for the batsman so that Ib is defined
as Ib = Z (50, 0)/Pb .
As an example, Lehmann from Table 5 would have a
bowling index of 235/2.592=90.7. His bowling performances
would be 90.7% of an ODI average bowler, which is 9.3%
below average.
All round index
An all-round index Ir could be defined as the geometric √ mean
of the batting and bowling indices so that Ir = Ia × Ib .
For
√ Lehmann, his all-round index would have the value of
120.7 × 90.7=104.6 representing an all-round performance
4.6% above average.
It will be seen that Z (50, 0) is √ eliminated and the index
is thereby defined as merely 100 Pa /Pb . The removal of
the D/L reference point means that an index of, say, 104.6
may have arisen from many combinations of batting resource
percentage average Pa and bowling resource percentage
average Pb . For Lehmann these were 2.836 and 2.592,
respectively. Another combination of say 1.845 and 1.686,
respectively would yield the same all-round index of 104.6
but with a much stronger bowling than batting performance.
Far from being a disadvantage to the proposed index, it is
suggested that the endless permutations in obtaining a given
value of the index would be appreciated by aficionados of
cricket statistics as providing quantitative information to
discussions on who is, or was, the best all-round cricketer!
Although the geometric mean is a recognized mechanism
for the averaging of indices, there is arguably a very prac-
tical cricketing interpretation to its square. This interpretation
would be that of the compound effect of the player’s perfor-
mance in the two disciplines. For Lehmann, his all-round
index would then be 109.4. Lehmann has a batting index of
120.7 representing performances 20.7% above average, but his
bowling index of 90.7 represents bowling performances 9.3%
below average. The multiplication of these indices gives 109.4
and provides a compounded all-round performance measure
representing 9.4% above that of an ‘average’ ODI cricketer.
Table 8 summarizes the various indices of all the players
in this study who had contributed in more than 12 one-day
innings and held LG ICC ratings that were current for both
of cricket’s main disciplines. These players’ ratings and rank-
ings include their D/L, RM and LG ICC ratings for batting
and bowling, and their rankings as all-rounders. Clearly, for
ranking purposes, there is no difference between using the
geometric mean or its square. Table 8, however, records the
square of the geometric mean as the D/L all-round index.
The LG ICC all-round rankings are also based on the square
of the geometric mean, or simply, the product of the player’s
LG ICC ratings. With such a mechanism a player with LG
ICC batting and bowling ratings each of 500 would rate better
740 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6

Table 8 D/L indices for batting, bowling and all-round performance measures for qualifying players
RM LG ICC LG ICC LG ICC D/L D/L D/L D/L
RM diff batting bowling all-round batting bowling all-round all-round
Player Country diff rank rating rating rank index index index rank
Flintoff Eng 83.5 1 711 727 1 127.6 108.7 138.6 1
LeeB Aus 27.2 2 346 819 97.3 116.6 113.5 2
Pollock RSA 25.1 3 472 805 2 96.6 116.3 112.4 3
Lehmann Aus 24.4 4 544 436 120.7 90.7 109.4 4
Cairns NZ 13.7 5 588 624 106.4 99.4 105.8 5
Vettori NZ 9.6 6 368 722 100.4 103.8 104.3 6
Symonds Aus 6.8 7 660 515 110.4 93.0 102.7 7
Clarke Aus −2.7 8 705 281 112.7 87.8 99.0 8
Jayasuriya SriL −15.2 9 670 553 113.3 83.5 94.6 9
Gayle WI −19.6 10 717 525 4 94.3 97.4 91.9 10
Collingwood Eng −24.1 12 512 393 103.4 88.0 91.0 11
Styris NZ −23.1 11 535 629 87.8 102.5 89.9 12
Sehwag Ind −33.8 14 618 390 99.3 88.0 87.3 13
Hogg Aus −32.2 13 407 627 82.0 104.5 85.7 14
Kallis RSA −40.6 15 708 470 98.1 86.6 85.0 15
Vaughan Eng −51.6 16 569 279 93.5 86.6 81.0 16
Ganguly Ind −70.9 18 557 314 86.1 86.0 74.1 17
Harris NZ −68.1 17 426 474 78.5 93.1 73.0 18

as an all-rounder than say a player with ratings of 900 and
100 (in either permutation). The website for the LG ICC ODI
player ratings initially posted the actual ratings for just the
top five players deemed to be international all-rounders. More
recently, this list has been extended to the top 10 all-rounders
(http://www.cricketratings.com, accessed 8 November 2006).
The relative rankings of batsmen by the D/L index are, of
course, identical to that using the batting RM since the former
is a constant divisor of the latter. The relative bowling rankings
by the D/L index are slightly different from the RM bowling
rankings due to the reciprocal nature of the two measures. The
D/L all-round index provides identical rankings to the RM
difference for the top ten players. Thereafter there are minor
differences in the rankings of no more than one position. It is
argued, however, that Flintoff’s clear first-place ranking, with
an index of 138.6, assessing the player’s combined perfor-
mances as 38.6% above average would have more meaning
than the equivalent RM difference. To rate him as scoring on
average 83.5 runs per match more than the opposition were
he to do all of the batting and bowling himself, might stretch
abilities of interpretation rather more than the proposed D/L
all-round index.
There is little information provided on the ICC website for
the all-rounder rankings. The rankings provided in Table 8,
as applicable on 31st May 2005, are consistent among them-
selves but omit two all-rounders from Pakistan who have not
qualified for inclusion in the analysis of this paper due to
insufficient contributions with either bat or ball or both. The
LG ICC ratings are also unclear on the criteria by which a
player is deemed an all-rounder. Indeed, at the time of this
study, the site only ranked five players suggesting a dearth of
players purporting to be international all-rounders. Using the
criteria above, there is no need for a subjective judgment as
to whether the player is considered an all-rounder. A substan-
tial proportion of batsmen do not bowl and they would not,
therefore, meet the minimum bowling contribution require-
ment for inclusion. However, all bowlers will be required to
bat at some stage. Subject to minimum participation require-
ment, in due course bowlers will acquire a batting index and
hence an all-round index. It would be their ability in both
disciplines of cricket that would indicate, or otherwise, that a
bowler could be regarded as an all-round player, with subjec-
tive judgment thereby removed. For example, in Table 5 Lee
(Aus) is a highly rated bowler by all measures. From Table 1,
he has also made a small but positive net contribution of 13.9
runs with the bat even though his batting average is below
20 and his D/L batting index is just below 100. In this study,
his combined performances have placed him in second place
of the all-rounder list of Table 8. Compared with compatriot
Lehmann, who is a better batsman but a poorer bowler, he
has performed slightly better overall as an all-rounder.
Reliability and validity
Previous sections have discussed the reliability and validity of
the batting and bowling resource percentage average. Since
these measures are the basis of the construct of the D/L
indices, it is argued that these indices will therefore exhibit the
same characteristics. In addition there is consistency with the
limited information from the LG ICC all-rounder rankings.
Applications for the D/L performance measures
There are two areas where it is anticipated the measures
produced in this paper could be useful within the cricketing

world. The obvious one, as indicated in the paper’s title, is
in the extension of valid measures of performance of players.
For cricket enthusiasts there would be more objective ways of
comparing batsmen and comparing bowlers. In addition, some
of the measures devised enable batsmen and bowlers to be
compared directly, hitherto impossible with the old measures,
along with the ability to combine batting and bowling perfor-
mances into an all-rounder measure.
The second major area of usage would be as aids to team
management and coaches. The measures are not intended to
have predictive power but, for individual matches or short
series, net contribution in particular highlights, clearly, where
batsmen and bowlers achieve positive or negative contribu-
tions, which can aid in coaching strategies, in team selection
and in deciding the batting order.
In addition, the measures produced arguably are fairer in
evaluating performance and contributions within a team and
that self-sacrifice by a batsman towards the end of the innings
is not counted significantly against him. Similarly, a bowler
credited with sacrificed wickets is not unjustifiably flattered.
Further study on weightings of contributions
There is one area of further study that suggests itself in order
to improve the D/L-based measures that have been discussed.
This is in relation to the weighting of performances during
players’ careers.
The data used in this study date from January 2002 to July
2005. During this time many players have appeared for their
respective countries. Some of these have played many times
but others have made few appearances. Some have been near
the end of their careers and others either have since retired or
have no longer been selected for their national teams.
Of those players who have met the minimum contribution
criteria described, several have made appearances throughout
the time-span of the study. Their D/L-based performance
measures and their standard batting and bowling measures
include all performances with equal weight so that, subject to
the limitations already outlined, the measures can be used to
compare players’ careers, both ongoing and as a whole. From
the outset, this has been a primary focus of the study and,
it is argued, has been quite successful in defining potentially
valid and reliable additional mechanisms for this purpose.
The LG ICC ratings and rankings assess current form and
contributions. Consequently, they have an inbuilt discounting
procedure that weights recent performances greater than those
earlier in players’ careers and depreciates players’ earlier
contributions more quickly especially when they are not
selected, or are not available. The LG ICC website already
cited provides an overview of the process of evaluating
players but does not provide the detail of their calculations
due to commercial confidentiality.
In order to compare the D/L-based performance measures
with the LG ICC ratings more accurately, it would be desir-
able to define a mechanism that discounts performances over
AJ Lewis—Extending the range of player-performance measures 741
time. Further work might suggest that performances could
be discounted exponentially. If the function were analogous
to a financial discount factor, recent performances would be
discounted more quickly than earlier performances. This is
likely to be contrary to the intent of the LG ICC ratings and
there would be no natural cut-off point when a player could be
removed from the ratings as having lost all currency of perfor-
mance. A more realistic function might be one that discounts
recent data slowly, but earlier data to zero more quickly. Such
functions might include those from the family of exponential
smoothing functions.
Summary
This paper has looked at whether the measures of player
performance called net contribution and resource percentage
average for batsmen and bowlers as defined in Lewis (2005)
are valid and reliable for the purposes of evaluating ODI
cricket players in the longer term and over players’ careers.
Through the analysis of many series of matches, with a
three-year time span and involving several of the world’s
regular and leading players, it has been shown that there are
some limitations to the net contribution measure. Whereas this
measure was shown to be very effective in evaluating perfor-
mances in single matches and for a series of matches with
a major advantage of being able to assess all-round ability,
the analyses in this paper reveal that the measure depends
on the frequency of playing. This suggests that net contri-
bution would be a valid and reliable measure for comparing
the careers of players overall. Traditionally aggregate runs
are used to evaluate batsmen’s careers and total wickets used
to evaluate bowlers’ careers. Whereas these measures cannot
decline, the net contribution would have this characteristic so
that continuing playing but to a lower standard would reduce
the net contribution and arguably better reflect career-length
performance.
The resource percentage average was shown to be unstable
and therefore not a reliable measure when applied in small
numbers of matches (Lewis, 2005), but it becomes a more
reliable measure of performance over the longer term. This
measure, for batsmen, combines features of quantity of runs
scored but suitably weights the value of the loss of the
batsmen’s wickets for the stage of the innings it was lost
through the resources that were consumed. Similarly, the
measure encompasses aspects of the strike-rate measure by
better evaluating their merit according to stage of the innings
the runs were scored.
There is, arguably, a practical difficulty in the interpretation
of resource percentage averages. Beaudoin and Swartz (2003)
solve this by multiplying by 100 and calling the result ‘runs
per match’ that they interpret as the average performance of
the batsman, or bowler, were he to do all of the batting, or
bowling, himself. As an alternative, this paper proposes a D/L
index, based on the player’s resource percentage average as
a percentage of the ODI average of 2.35 runs per unit of
742 Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 59, No. 6
resource. As international country rankings are given in index
form, it is suggested that the cricketing public might more
easily accept a measure of performance in this form.
An all-round measure of performance index is suggested
as the product of a player’s batting and bowling indices,
which has the virtue of reflecting the compounding effect of
performance in the two disciplines. With a ‘norm’ of 100,
the index would be more easily interpreted than the Beaudoin
and Swartz RM difference and its ‘hard-to-swallow’ interpre-
tation that it captures the average performance of the player
were he to do all of the batting and the bowling himself.
Comparisons of rankings have been made with the LG
ICC ratings, which show reasonable agreement for the players
qualifying for the analysis summarized in this paper. There
are major differences in the methodology of these ratings in
comparison with the methods proposed in this paper. One
difference relates to the limited nature of the information in
a ‘standard’ scorecard from which the LG ICC ratings are
developed. A second difference is the use of a discounting
factor in the LG ICC ratings that attempts to assess current
rather than career levels of performance. Further work on
this aspect is suggested if the methodology of the measures
proposed in this and the previous paper (Lewis, 2005) are to
be incorporated into the LG ICC ratings, or are to be used to
create a separate set of D/L performance measures.
Acknowledgements — The author would like to acknowledge, with thanks,
assistance received in preparing this paper:
• His colleague Frank Duckworth for valuable comments on the draft
manuscripts
• Champion Data (Australia) and the Press Association (Sports) for the
provision, in electronic form, of the ball-by-ball details of the matches
absolutely essential for undertaking the analyses summarized in this
paper.
• The two anonymous referees for very helpful comments to improve the
paper’s content and its presentation.
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Received March 2006;
accepted November 2006 after three revisions