In his early career days, when people used to talk about Sehwag, some compared his physique and batting style to Tendulkar, implying that he was a poor imitation. Over the years, Sehwag has created a different legacy for himself even outdoing Tendulkar in some cases with his triple centuries and almost-borderline manic batting in huge innings.
What was always struck me as strange is Sehwag’s great Test average (52.50) compared to his terrible ODI average (33.98). A few have pointed out that the different ODI fielding settings may have something to do with this. Plus Sehwag’s brain-fade when he tries one too many times to assert his authority over some bowler.
But even Sehwag’s Test average seems strange. He has the most Test double-centuries by an Indian. He could have had the most Test triple-centuries if he had made a few more runs yesterday. And when he gets a century, he invariably makes 150+. So why is he still in the low fifties when he could be in the sixties or upper fifties?
To understand that, I compared Sehwag with another great batsman of the same era, who has a similar average and played roughly the same number of Tests. Sehwag has 6248 runs at 52.50 in 123 innings. Kumar Sangakkara has 7545 runs at 55.47 in 147 innings. Not exactly the same, but will do for our purposes. Here is the breakdown of their innings:
One of the first things you will catch is that Sehwag has a much higher percentage of scores below 25 (46% versus 41%) and below 50 (71% versus 64%). Sehwag has 30 scores under 10, while Sangakkara over more innings has 28. But once you start looking at scores above 50, Sehwag looks much more attractive. He has been able to convert more fifties into hundreds and those hundreds into huge scores that have made a big difference to India’s results.
So for the opposition, Sehwag is easier to get early. But once he goes past that fifty, start saying your prayers because he is going to make you pay dearly.
Other reason for Sangakara’s high average and flattened runs is frequency with which he makes runs against weaker teams.
Contrasting, but Sehwag fails against weaker teams.
Is that a factor ?
And any day Sehwag would rank well above the likes of Sangakara or Jaywardhena who would make tons against minnows on flat tracks but would be found wanting when it comes to strong teams and difficult conditions.
@Chandler
Actually you’re wrong… heres the proof
If you take out Bangladesh, Zimbabwe and Windies from their records it looks something like this:
Sehwag 105 innings 3 no’s 5406 runs Average 53 100′s 15
Sanga 112 innings 7 no’s 5447 runs Average 51.5 100′s 15
Almost identical bar a percentage point in the average.
Sanga is actually more consistent across the board as Sehwag only averages 28.5 against New Zealand and England combined in 18 tests – obviously doesn’t like green seaming wickets whereas Sanga’s lowest average is 40 against England.
Yes Sanga has scored more runs against the so called minnows (although their records against Windies are similar) but thats what batsmen are supposed to do!
Both great players, but if it was in England or NZ i’d take Sanga any day!
And actually whilst I’m at it here are Jayawardene’s stats against the same opponents:
142 inns, 8 no’s, 7211 runs, Average 53.8, 100′s 21
Actually a better record than either of them although he only averages 32 against Aus and 34 against Pak. Against SA, India and Eng he averages over 65.
It has always been the perception in England that Sehwag, great player that he is, is a bit inconsistent, perhaps this is changing though.
i think the sehwag’s average cannot be compared with that of others. I had initially thought Sehwag to be an extremely lucky batsman. But luck alone cannot produce such huge scores. Now after watching his recent batting, i believe the only thing that separated Sehwag from greatness was his careless attitude to everything.. Now he is more hungry and focussed. Sangakkara is a classical batsman. But Sehwag is something different. His average does not show his ability, rather it shows only that he has been inconsistent.
It also shows his style is not very good on wickets where the ball swings or moves around…. Great ability to score highly once set but until he does that on all surfaces he can’t be called great.
Venue Mat Inns NO 50s 100s HS Runs Avg
Home 34 59 2 12 9 319 3202 56.18
Away 38 64 2 7 8 309 3046 49.13
Overall 72 123 4 19 17 319 6248 52.50
You see here is average drops away from home, although the main reason it is even this high is an average of 91 against Pakistan and 74 against SL on similar wickets to his home pitches.
How about looking at Jayawardene’s numbers home and away? There’s an even bigger disparity in his average. Ricky Ponting’s away average is 49.23 while his average at home is a shade over 60. I guess it means his style is not good on wickets where the ball swings or moves around either.
I can’t believe no one has touched on the fundamental difference between Sehwag and Sangakkara – One is an opening batsman while the other bats in the middle order. It’s only natural that opening batsmen get out early at times while middle order batsmen don’t. A more apt comparison would be between Sehwag, Smith and Strauss since all of them open the batting.
Last but not least, it would be ridiculous to not look at their strike rates. The quickness with which Sehwag scores his runs sets up the game for his team. Even when his team is not in a winning position his innings can help erase the deficit in double quick time. There needs to be a factor like Average*Strike Rate. It’s a better indicator of a batsman’s ability than his average or strike rate taken in isolation.
Hi Mahek, really good comments there and i actually agree with you on all. There is a huge disparity between Jayawardene’s home and away figures (65-42). I only used these comparisons as they are mentioned in the article and comments prior to mine.
Smith is the interesting one – he actually averages a good deal more away than he does home, although this is helped by some ‘help yourself runs’ against Bangladesh.
Venue Mat Inns NO 50s 100s HS Runs Avg
Home 40 67 4 13 7 200 2710 43.02
Away 38 70 5 12 11 277 3644 56.06
Overall 78 137 9 25 18 277 6354 49.64
For me Sehwag is already a great although his figures against England and New Zealand are very poor by anyones standards so to be truly up there he needs to rectify this. I have no doubt he will.
As far as statistics r concerned I got this from Sanjay Gupta for ODI’s
Averages can be misleading, specially in one day cricket. What one must also look at is the rate at which the runs are scored. In my opinion the runs should be multiplied by the scoring rate and then divided by 100, to calculate an average which truelly reflects the effect of the runs scored on the ultimate result of the match.
By applying the above formula in matches won, we can more accurately judge the impact of a player in the teams winning performances.
Actual Figures:
Sachin:
218 (Matches) 215 (Innings) 10429 (Runs) 56.98 (Average) 90.07 (Scoring rate)
Sehwag:
109 (Matches) 107 (Innings) 4666 (Runs) 46.19 (Average) 108.33 (Scoring rate)
Figures after taking into account Scoring Rate:
Sachin:
10429 (Runs) x 90.07 (Scoring Rate) = 939340.03 / 215 (Innings) = 4369.0234 / 100 = 43.69 (Final Average)
Sehwag:
4666 (Runs) x 108.33 (Scoring Rate) = 505467.78 / 107 (Innings) = 4723.9979 / 100 = 47.24
(Final Average)
Sachin = 43.69
Sehwag = 47.24
Sachin’s ODI record after playing 214 matches
Mat Runs HS Bat Av 100 Wkts BBI Bowl Av 5 Ct St
214 7971 143 42.85 22 78 5/32 47.32 1 72 0
Against Zimbabwe
20 779 127* 51.93 4 6 1/6 59.66 0 4 0
Against Bangladesh
5 163 54 40.75 0 3 2/8 18.00 0 2 0
Against Kenya
4 385 140* 385.00 3 0 - - 0 0 0
Against UAE
1 63 63 63.00 0 0 - - 0 1 0
Total
30 1400 46.67 7
Remove from the first 214 matches
184 6571 35.71 15
Sehwag’s ODI record after playing 214 matches
214 6924 146 34.44 12 88 3/25 40.51 0 81 0
AG Bangladesh
9 304 70 33.77 0 5 2/17 32.40 0 5 0
Ag Bermuda
1 114 114 114.00 1 0 - - 0 0 0
Ag Hong Kong
1 78 78 78.00 0 2 2/5 2.50 0 0 0
Ag Kenya
5 163 55* 54.33 0 0 - - 0 1 0
Ag Namibia
1 24 24 24.00 0 0 - - 0 0 0
Ag Netherlands
1 6 6 6.00 0 0 - - 0 3 0
Ag UAE
1 6 6 6.00 0 0 - - 0 3 0
Ag Zimbabwe
9 230 90 32.85 0 5 2/37 22.00 0 4 0
Total
23 925 1
Remove from grand total
191 5999 31.41 11
Sachin’s average exceeds Sehwag’s only by 4.3 runs, whereas Strike rate is lower by nearly 17%.
Sachin’s ODI record has improved in the last 10 yrs.
See the overall record
Remove the runs against the minnows like Bangladesh, Kenya, Ireland, Namibia,Netherlands, UAE, Zimbabwe
Total runs= 2724 (in 60 matches)
Overall= 17386-2724=14662, Ave= 38.69.
It has improved by 2.98 runs against the stronger teams in the last 10 yrs.
So Sehwag’s record is not as poor as it appears to be.
As far as NZ & England r concerned, his ODI stats r better than test stats.
Ag NZ Ave= 51.40, Ag Eng Ave= 37.42
As far as his ability to counter swing & seam movement r considered look at his stats ag NZ in his 1st tour to NZ in 2002-03:he was the only one to hit 2 centuries in 7 match ODI series. All the kiwi wickets were green tops, the ball would land on the leg and end in 1st slip. That was Sehwag’s 1st tour to NZ, and he was the highest scorer from both sides scoring 299 in 7 matches @42.71, the next highest was Fleming with 157 in 7 matches @ 26.16 . Sachin scored 2 in 3 matches, Dravid scored 116 in 7 matches @ave of 16.57.
If both Strike Rate & Avergae r considered, Sehwag is the best batsman in the present decade.
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