Documenting Cummins

There are broadly two types of successful fast bowlers - attacking and attritional. Attacking bowlers use attacking lines and lengths, and consequently concede more than 3 an over, but typically manage a wicket every 7 or 8 overs (strike rate in the 40s). The attritional bowlers concede less than 3 runs an over and typically have strike rates in the 50s and averages in the early or mid 20s. As you go from left to right along the diagonal in the chart below, the cause of high economy rates shifts from a bowler being extremely attacking (Dale Steyn, Waqar Younis, Kagiso Rabada), to a bowler lacking control (Brett Lee, Shannon Gabriel and in the extreme, Fidel Edwards).

Pat Cummins (164 wickets at 21.6/47.2) belongs in a rare category alongside Malcolm Marshall, Allan Donald and Fred Trueman, who take a wicket more frequently than one every 50 balls, and concede less than 3 runs per over. That he does this in an era when scoring rate are marginally higher than they used to be is remarkable.

The current Australian attack has two bowlers who manage a wicket at better than one every 50 balls. India had the measure of Mitchell Starc (though his pace was down in Brisbane and it appeared that Starc was not in good shape.)

Cricket Australia’s YouTube service publishes beautifully curated highlights after the days play. Yesterday, they posted all of Pat Cummins’ wickets. I extracted all the frames of video [to do this, use youtube-dl and ffmpeg in the terminal]. Cummins has the ability to challenge the top of the right-hander’s off-stump (something he finds harder to do against the left-hander). Here are the dismissals. (Note: lower order wickets are ignored)

1. Mayank Agarwal, Adelaide. Batsman is late coming forward (note the front foot, which is far from being planted), beaten on the inside edge.

2. Shaw, caught on the crease, beaten on the inside edge.

3. Pujara, caught on the crease. This was bowled from wider than usually, and it pitched and straightened (hence the apparent angle of Pujara’s bat). Beaten on the outside edge.

4. Kohli, chases a wider, fuller ball. Is late on it (note the front heel and braced front leg), caught at gully.

5. Gill, drove at a ball on the sixth stump, away from the body. Note how much room he’s giving himself. The front foot is still only on middle stump (compare this to Pujara’s positions and later, Rohit Sharma’s). This is not the only time that this happened to Gill against Cummins.

6. Pujara. Caught on the crease. Beaten on the outside edge.

7. Pujara, drove at a fullish, wider one. He was batting on middle-and-off stump in this innings, as opposed to his more usuall middle-and-leg stump. Beaten on the outside edge, caught at gully.

8. Gill. Plays at a wider one, while still on the move. Is late on the ball (note the front heel again). Ball is outside the line covered by the batsman’s eyes.

9. Short of a good length, off cutter. Rahane cramped for room, played on.

10. Pujara, lifter from short of a length, takes the glove. Pujara called this “one of the balls of the series”.

11. Rohit Sharma, hooking, caught at deep fine leg.

12. Gill, playing away from the body. Caught at 2nd slip (see dismissal 7 above)

13. Rohit Sharma. Had to play because he couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t going to come back and hit the off-stump. He’s late on the ball (note the front heel, the stride is yet to be completed and the ball has already taken the edge.)

14. Short ball, Rahane out a 2nd time in the series trying to score a boundary behind square on the off-side. Ironically, Ajinkya Rahane plays Pat Cummins better than any other Indian batsman, both in this series and overall.

15. Pujara. Short of a good length, kept low. LBW.

Cummins’s deals in four basic lengths. The first is the fullish length which he uses when he bowls wide of the stumps. The second is a perfect good length which forces the batsman into a dilemma about whether to come forward (often, the batsman is caught on the crease). The third is a short of good length which he uses to push the batsman back. And the fourth is the bouncer. With these ingredients (which are all admittedly top drawer from the Cummins’ brand), he’s able to challenge both edges of the bat and the top of off stump. His skill lies not just in his iron control of his length, but in his ability to arrange them in lethal sequences.

Cummins is basically a significantly quicker, more attacking version of Glenn McGrath. It is no surprise that he takes wicket at the same cost as McGrath, but about 5 balls more often.