A mathematician’s plan and modern technology have helped England keep Sachin Tendulkar’s bat quiet in the ongoing Test series against the India, an ESPN report claimed. England have relied on drawing Tendulkar outside his offstump in the early part of his innings rather than let him get his runs on the onside and this ploy is the result of a computer simulator plan, created by team analyst Nathan Leamon.
“We feed into the simulator information about pitches and the 22 players who might play, and it plays the game a number of times and tells us likely outcomes.” Leamon was quoted as saying in a British newspaper. England believe Tendulkar largely gets his runs on the onside until he has made 50 and they have denied him the advantage completely. Of the 261 balls bowled to Tendulkar by England’s fast bowlers till the Edgbaston Test, 254 have pitched outside his off-stump, six have been in the line of the stump and just one beyond leg-stump.
Tendulkar, world’s greatest run-maker ever and on the cusp of his 100th international hundred, has so far got 34,12, 16, 56, 1, 40 and 23 from seven innings for a combined total of 182 from the series at an average of 26.00. Leamon, nicknamed “Numbers” by England players, breaks down the target area of the pitch into 20 blocks, each 100cm x15cm, in his software and bowlers begin to get a better idea of where to aim against a particular opponent. England might claim they have sorted out Sachin Tendulkar as the iconic batsman initially prefers onside run-making but former Indian great Sunil Gavaskar sees no great science behind such a discovery.
“Every batsman has his style of batting. It emerges from his grip. One with a heavy top hand, like the one Sourav Ganguly used to have, would be better on the off-side than he would be on the on-side. “Tendulkar, if you notice, has a round top grip. It gives him a natural advantage on the onside. So that becomes your preferred mode of run-making,” Gavaskar, arguably the greatest technician the game has known, said his uncle and former Indian player Madhav Mantri, who was much respected for his insight into the game, used to say a look at a batsman’s grip would give a clear idea on his style of batting.
England’s hi-tech Sachin plan
