The Standard of Cricket at PSL 6

[Saj]

I'm reading some views that people aren't happy about the standard of cricket so far at PSL6.

Some are saying that the low totals and lack of stroke-play doesn't help the standard of tournament.

However I quite enjoy a more even battle between bat and ball, rather than every ball flying over the ropes which are set at 50 or 60 metres.

Thoughts?

 

[Muhammad Saad]

Batsmen should have been better.

 

[ElRaja]

lack of local batting talent is magnified by decent quality of emerging bowling talent.

 

[UzmanBeast]

I'm reading some views that people aren't happy about the standard of cricket so far at PSL6.

Some are saying that the low totals and lack of stroke-play doesn't help the standard of tournament.

However I quite enjoy a more even battle between bat and ball, rather than every ball flying over the ropes which are set at 50 or 60 metres.

Thoughts?

A target of 100-130 is nothing in T20s anymore, players can hit about 40-50 runs in 3-4 overs alone if they're good.

Part of the reason the standard is so low at the moment is that teams are making horrendous team selections.

Every single team has gone in with 1 batsman short, meaning that once you get rid of maybe two wickets in the powerplay, there is no major batting left.

Personally I think this season is going to be between KK, LQ, IU, and MS. PZ and QG don't have a chance in my opinion.

 

[Rana]

Local batsmen as usual too shy to bat like they do when inflating their stats and strike rates in the National cup and T20 cup.

 

[UzmanBeast]

lack of local batting talent is magnified by decent quality of emerging bowling talent.

The emerging bowlers are holding their fronts well whereas the emerging batsmen, even our younger local batsmen, are throwing away their wickets.

Perhaps reduce the boundary rope size at NSK to make targets a bit higher, because a tournament at 120-130 scores isn't very entertaining.

 

[Titan24]

I share the similar sentiments as you, tons of 4s and 6s becomes too monotonous and I always find a good contest between bat and ball more interesting.

It has just been couple of matches and obviously we will see quite a few high scoring matches as well but. Number of 4s, 6s and 200s hit has nothing to do with the quality of the league for me rather how much all aspects of the game come into play.

That being said, would definitely like some local batsmen to shine as the tournament progresses.

 

[LeedsGreen]

its been not even two games .... players have to adjust to new team mates new surface, new expectations and a new experience... perhaps we should wait until every team has played 2/3 games before commenting on the standards

 

[Hasan123]

Hopefully we do get games where there are some high scores. T20s aren't about scoring 130/140 scores .

 

[Indiafan]

Local batsmen as usual too shy to bat like they do when inflating their stats and strike rates in the National cup and T20 cup.

This is one thing I have noticed too. The bowlers seem fearless but the young Pakistani batsmen seem to bat with fear, they keep tuking and then trying to play a get out-of jail free card shot which costs them their wickets

 

[Indiafan]

I'm reading some views that people aren't happy about the standard of cricket so far at PSL6.

Some are saying that the low totals and lack of stroke-play doesn't help the standard of tournament.

However I quite enjoy a more even battle between bat and ball, rather than every ball flying over the ropes which are set at 50 or 60 metres.

Thoughts?

The question is, iz that because of pitch/bowlers or because of poor standard of batting

 

[Rana]

This Salman Agha bloke has an FC average of 50 odd last season hence he was called up to the national side.

2 deliveries by Mujeeb have completely bamboozled him, and Mujeeb isnt even a renown Test match bowler.

 

[BunnyRabbit]

Lack of crowd is hurting the atmosphere of PSL sadly.

A lot of batters have looked pretty rusty till now. Hopefully things can pick up some pace in coming days.
Lack of big oversees names is also hurting the overall appeal this year.

 

[Rana]

Lack of crowd is hurting the atmosphere of PSL sadly.

A lot of batters have looked pretty rusty till now. Hopefully things can pick up some pace in coming days.
Lack of big oversees names is also hurting the overall appeal this year.

Its better to use the artificial crowd sounds instead of this 20% garbage

 

[Square Drive]

It always starts off like this lol.

Soon enough we'll see the scores of 170-180+ that everyone wants to see.

 

[Stewie]

I think the level of bowling is pretty high and we have had a couple of balanced games. Nothing wrong with a bit of balance between bat and ball, although it’s too early to tell.

 

[Zaz]

Yes run fests are boring but teams should be hitting on avge of 160 Most teams are a batsman short with them prefering a bits m pieces cricketers to a proper batsman

So far its esrly days but the batting quality n the quality of local batsmen as usual has been poor as has been the case over all the psl tournaments

 

[Saj]

I guess this brings to the discussion, the argument about PSL being a tournament with some excellent bowling talent.

 

[silentkiller187]

The bowling standard has been about 7,8 out of 10 the batting 1,2 out or ten such a big gulf in class between the two will always lead to low scores

 

[Stewie]

I guess this brings to the discussion, the argument about PSL being a tournament with some excellent bowling talent.

Saqib, Hasnain, wahab, amir, all have put in really really good performances. Im also impressed with Amad Butt’s pace. And he can bat as well.

 

[shariqnoor]

The only standard so far in PSL 6 has been the production quality. Top class graphics. Really enjoying that. Apart from that, the standard of cricket has been truly awful.

 

[BunnyRabbit]

Its better to use the artificial crowd sounds instead of this 20% garbage

Like Thunderdome with noise?

 

[Titan24]

I am not sure whats with the people’s infatuation with high scores. High score doesn not = quality and contests can be good ones when bowlers are on top as well. Maybe thats just me but I like good contests irrespective of which aspect of cricket brings that.

 

[Kroll]

T20 especially T20 leagues aren't really about an even contest between bat and ball - this is where test cricket comes in. If fans were allowed, they want to see high scores with a few boundaries and sixes.

Its only a couple of game in, but the standard of batting first up has been awful with totals of 120 and 140 - that's absolute garbage.

The side chasing then has an easy ride to get to the total by not having to go all out and its making for very dull games. Really poor stuff all round.

 

[Saj]

T20 especially T20 leagues aren't really about an even contest between bat and ball - this is where test cricket comes in. If fans were allowed, they want to see high scores with a few boundaries and sixes.

All fans don't want to see high scores.

 

[mastimasti]

I'm reading some views that people aren't happy about the standard of cricket so far at PSL6.

Some are saying that the low totals and lack of stroke-play doesn't help the standard of tournament.

However I quite enjoy a more even battle between bat and ball, rather than every ball flying over the ropes which are set at 50 or 60 metres.

Thoughts?

The Karachi ropes are set at about 60-70 metres, as mentioned during the international season and the start of the first game. These boundaries are larger than what most batsmen are used to these days, so clearing the rope is much more difficult, which I enjoy. Add to that some terrific bowling, Shaheen, Arshad, Hasnain have all bowled brilliantly.

The fielding and catching has been good too.

Not sure who could say this is bad quality cricket.

 

[mastimasti]

The only standard so far in PSL 6 has been the production quality. Top class graphics. Really enjoying that. Apart from that, the standard of cricket has been truly awful.

So you thought he reverse swinging yorkers from Riaz and Saqib were low quality? Or the swing and seam from Shaheen and Hasnain was low quality?

 

[Rafa]

8/1 in 3 overs is an even contest between bat and ball ?

 

[imshally81]

I like the contest between bat and ball...

 

[shaz619]

I'm reading some views that people aren't happy about the standard of cricket so far at PSL6.

Some are saying that the low totals and lack of stroke-play doesn't help the standard of tournament.

However I quite enjoy a more even battle between bat and ball, rather than every ball flying over the ropes which are set at 50 or 60 metres.

Thoughts?

The standard of bowling is pretty good but that still doesn’t excuse the horrific batting on display thus far, lets see if this improves deeper in the tournament but for Pak fans, it really does like the resources batting wise are in dire straits sadly

 

[Savak]

The PSL usually picks up in the middle

 

[Saj]

8/1 in 3 overs is an even contest between bat and ball ?

I'd prefer that to 40/0 from 3 overs.

But I guess, each to their own.

 

[Kroll]

Another subpar total. Means IU can chase easily without taking any risk. Dull and duller.

 

[Local.Dada]

Low scoring or high scoring contests are not a benchmark for good quality.

There have been plenty of substandard low/ high quality games and there have been high quality games in that range as well.

However, quality of the teams, the fielding, production values, quality of stature of the players etc is what defines if something is good or not.

There might be close contests between 2 gully cricket teams doesn’t make them high quality.

India got bowled out for 36 but that series itself has been hailed as one of the highest quality cricket seen in recent years. Similarly England beat India in a one sided game and India returned the favor but despite the results there was some quality cricket.

Quality of cricket cannot be measured in terms of scores.

 

[Varun]

Is Kamran Akmal still the champion performer of this league?

 

[Flat_Track_Bully]

The quality of overseas players is very poor. The poorest I have seen since season 1. Majority are has beens or nobodys.

Where is Rabada, Starc, Smith, Warner etc etc etc??????

All we have is a bunch of old pensioners, unknown kids and Afghan players.

The domestic lot are awful too.

 

[Babar_Azam_fan]

No words to describe the atrocious batting

 

[Rafa]

Now we finally have an entertaining third match of the tournament when the target was decent rather than a below par 120-125 runs target where the chasing team has no pressure and chase with ease thus resulting into a dull contest. A good T20 good should have a target range of 150-180 runs anything below that often leads to a dull match. A team chasing 120 runs can take their sweet time and bat till 18 overs without taking any risk so no tension in the match or any seesaw battles.

 

[Savak]

The quality of overseas players is very poor. The poorest I have seen since season 1. Majority are has beens or nobodys.

Where is Rabada, Starc, Smith, Warner etc etc etc??????

All we have is a bunch of old pensioners, unknown kids and Afghan players.

The domestic lot are awful too.

Lol you better pay top bucks to attract the best. They are saying that Smith might consider skipping the IPL because the price he has gotten $380,000 is much lower than he is used too. The best price the PSL pays is $140,000. That should explain why the PSL is struggling to attract the big names

 

[Usman Chadda]

So you thought he reverse swinging yorkers from Riaz and Saqib were low quality? Or the swing and seam from Shaheen and Hasnain was low quality?

Anything happening in the IPL is high quality cricket. Even dropped catches in that league are considered as such by these fans.

 

[Bewal Express]

The standard of batsman is poor, not helped by the likes of Shadab and Safaraz batting in positions they are not even remotely suited to.

 

[street cricketer]

The sooner people come out of this misguided notion of PSL being a league with "high bowling quality" and use it to justify the low scores in the tournament, the better. There's no factual basis for that argument because you can't judge a bowler without considering the quality of the batsman facing him and vice versa. A poor bowler will make an average batsman look much better than he is and vice versa. The only decent way to compare bowling attacks is when they all face the same level of competition, i.e., in international cricket.

And Pakistan ranks as the 7th best bowling attack in the world in the last 2 years in T20 cricket, with only West Indies and Bangladesh below them.



If you compare purely the pace attacks of different countries, then West Indies leapfrogs Pakistan to push Pak to 8th place above Bangladesh.



It's clear from the stats that Australia have the best pace and overall bowling attack in world cricket in the T20 format.

I would say the batting talent on display has more to do with the low scores in the PSL than bowling quality. I mean, when you have plodders like Luke Ronchi and Ravi Bopara ruling the batting charts, surely that must send the alarm bells ringing. The other day I think I saw Samit Patel's name in the scorecard, I didn't even know the bloke was still playing cricket. PSL have some good overseas batsmen like Hales, Vince, Banton, Roussow, etc., but it must be remembered that a lot of hitters who make their name in the BBL or the English T20 tournaments tend to struggle in asia against the slow bowlers as they're used to hitting through the line with pace on the ball with minimal feet movement. So it's usually the domestic batters who make or break the batting quality of a T20 tournament as they grow up playing in these conditions against spinners day in day out and at the moment, the young domestic Pak batsmen need to up their game to make consistently high totals in the PSL.

 

[shah_1]

The standards are not that great

 

[observer1]

I've enjoyed it so far.

No team seems to be standing out, which is a good thing.
I'm all for a close and competitive game as opposed to a mindless boundary fest

 

[hoshiarpurexpress]

The sooner people come out of this misguided notion of PSL being a league with "high bowling quality" and use it to justify the low scores in the tournament, the better. There's no factual basis for that argument because you can't judge a bowler without considering the quality of the batsman facing him and vice versa. A poor bowler will make an average batsman look much better than he is and vice versa. The only decent way to compare bowling attacks is when they all face the same level of competition, i.e., in international cricket.

And Pakistan ranks as the 7th best bowling attack in the world in the last 2 years in T20 cricket, with only West Indies and Bangladesh below them.

View attachment 107344

If you compare purely the pace attacks of different countries, then West Indies leapfrogs Pakistan to push Pak to 8th place above Bangladesh.

View attachment 107345

It's clear from the stats that Australia have the best pace and overall bowling attack in world cricket in the T20 format.

I would say the batting talent on display has more to do with the low scores in the PSL than bowling quality. I mean, when you have plodders like Luke Ronchi and Ravi Bopara ruling the batting charts, surely that must send the alarm bells ringing. The other day I think I saw Samit Patel's name in the scorecard, I didn't even know the bloke was still playing cricket. PSL have some good overseas batsmen like Hales, Vince, Banton, Roussow, etc., but it must be remembered that a lot of hitters who make their name in the BBL or the English T20 tournaments tend to struggle in asia against the slow bowlers as they're used to hitting through the line with pace on the ball with minimal feet movement. So it's usually the domestic batters who make or break the batting quality of a T20 tournament as they grow up playing in these conditions against spinners day in day out and at the moment, the young domestic Pak batsmen need to up their game to make consistently high totals in the PSL.

Fact based and well analysed. Hopefully becomes POTW.

 

[KingKhan12]

The sooner people come out of this misguided notion of PSL being a league with "high bowling quality" and use it to justify the low scores in the tournament, the better. There's no factual basis for that argument because you can't judge a bowler without considering the quality of the batsman facing him and vice versa. A poor bowler will make an average batsman look much better than he is and vice versa. The only decent way to compare bowling attacks is when they all face the same level of competition, i.e., in international cricket.

And Pakistan ranks as the 7th best bowling attack in the world in the last 2 years in T20 cricket, with only West Indies and Bangladesh below them.

View attachment 107344

If you compare purely the pace attacks of different countries, then West Indies leapfrogs Pakistan to push Pak to 8th place above Bangladesh.

View attachment 107345

It's clear from the stats that Australia have the best pace and overall bowling attack in world cricket in the T20 format.

I would say the batting talent on display has more to do with the low scores in the PSL than bowling quality. I mean, when you have plodders like Luke Ronchi and Ravi Bopara ruling the batting charts, surely that must send the alarm bells ringing. The other day I think I saw Samit Patel's name in the scorecard, I didn't even know the bloke was still playing cricket. PSL have some good overseas batsmen like Hales, Vince, Banton, Roussow, etc., but it must be remembered that a lot of hitters who make their name in the BBL or the English T20 tournaments tend to struggle in asia against the slow bowlers as they're used to hitting through the line with pace on the ball with minimal feet movement. So it's usually the domestic batters who make or break the batting quality of a T20 tournament as they grow up playing in these conditions against spinners day in day out and at the moment, the young domestic Pak batsmen need to up their game to make consistently high totals in the PSL.

Can you please show where Bopara has ruled the bat charts in PSL. I don't remember it at all. Or even Samit Patel.
Yes batting standards ain't great but then some people to undermine PSL so much come up with so much lies

 

[RickyG]

I've been a big supporter in the past of PSL's quality. But in the 3 games the standard of batting has been pretty bad. The bowlers don't need to do anything special. Lewis Gregory looks like a superstar compared to our local batsmen.

It's fine to want an even contest but when your batsmen can't even clear 59 meter boundaries. That's just embarrassing.

 

[RickyG]

The quality of overseas players is very poor. The poorest I have seen since season 1. Majority are has beens or nobodys.

Where is Rabada, Starc, Smith, Warner etc etc etc??????

All we have is a bunch of old pensioners, unknown kids and Afghan players.

The domestic lot are awful too.

This is true and is so disappointing. No Pollard, Russell or Narine from West Indies. Not even Bravo or Hetmyer or Pooran.

Outside of Lynn and Christain literally no one of significance from Australia.

I don't think there even is anyone from South Africa or New Zealand.

A couple of decent cricketers from England. I suppose COVID doesn't help the situation one bit.

Overall, this is probably the least excited I've been for the PSL. I really hope the local batsmen take the opportunity to shine though this year.

 

[Snowflake]

Sub standard quality in all departments across all teams would obviously make for close contests and "exciting" games, but I am not sure if that is the kind of contest that people want to see.

The few games that have been played have been an exhibition of very ordinary batting and decent enough bowling. None of the batsmen have really stood out which is a sad to see. Hopefully things pick up from here.

 

[Shoaibbtt]

Really could do with the likes of Rabada, Stokes, Butler, Jamieson and Lockie Ferguson next season.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

The sooner people come out of this misguided notion of PSL being a league with "high bowling quality" and use it to justify the low scores in the tournament, the better. There's no factual basis for that argument because you can't judge a bowler without considering the quality of the batsman facing him and vice versa. A poor bowler will make an average batsman look much better than he is and vice versa. The only decent way to compare bowling attacks is when they all face the same level of competition, i.e., in international cricket.

And Pakistan ranks as the 7th best bowling attack in the world in the last 2 years in T20 cricket, with only West Indies and Bangladesh below them.

View attachment 107344

If you compare purely the pace attacks of different countries, then West Indies leapfrogs Pakistan to push Pak to 8th place above Bangladesh.

View attachment 107345

It's clear from the stats that Australia have the best pace and overall bowling attack in world cricket in the T20 format.

I would say the batting talent on display has more to do with the low scores in the PSL than bowling quality. I mean, when you have plodders like Luke Ronchi and Ravi Bopara ruling the batting charts, surely that must send the alarm bells ringing. The other day I think I saw Samit Patel's name in the scorecard, I didn't even know the bloke was still playing cricket. PSL have some good overseas batsmen like Hales, Vince, Banton, Roussow, etc., but it must be remembered that a lot of hitters who make their name in the BBL or the English T20 tournaments tend to struggle in asia against the slow bowlers as they're used to hitting through the line with pace on the ball with minimal feet movement. So it's usually the domestic batters who make or break the batting quality of a T20 tournament as they grow up playing in these conditions against spinners day in day out and at the moment, the young domestic Pak batsmen need to up their game to make consistently high totals in the PSL.

I appreciate the effort but the selection of stats is a little misguided.

1. Why have you selected the stats of the national team to pass a judgement on the quality of domestic bowlers? Does a system of datapoints with a terribly low mean but extremely high standard deviation/variance (resulting in 5 anomalous points who form the national bowling attack) represent a higher quality system than another system with a 60% better mean where there is zero standard deviation, resulting in zero anomalous data-points? As a result, the top 5 bowlers are not as good as the top 5 bowlers in the other system, but it really says nothing at all about the overall system quality because the latter system has a much, much higher mean. Just something to consider.

2. Why have you chosen this specific time period? It is one with
[A] a lot of upheaval in our national team (new captain so not as good tactics and field placements)
the persistence of players at the international level who have been past their peak such as Amir, Wahab rather than some of the domestic bowlers that might perform better
[C] bad selection policies that have given T20 comebacks to Mohammad Irfan and debuts to Musa Khan
So some detailed reasoning on the selection of this time period, and why you believe it’s representative of domestic bowling quality, would be something that clarifies a lot of questions in my mind.

3. Bowling average does not matter in T20Is. You want to look at runs per over and economy as that determines the final score put up and that’s all that matters in a T20I game. Imad Wasim has made a career out of his economy rate and rightly so. -Taking 10 wickets and conceding 180 puts your average at 18 whereas taking 6 wickets and conceding 160 puts your average at 27. How crazy is that!!!!!

On this above list, Pakistan is 4th best in the world in terms of runs per over conceded by our bowling attack and 5th best in the world when considering the economy rate of just our fast bowling. Not 7th and 8th as you suggest. Add in the factors that I mentioned in points 1 and 2 above, respectively, and you’ll see why despite everything, having the 4th best bowling attack in the world (pace and spin combined) is actually a terrific stat.

With all due respect, I believe that your stats show the absolute opposite of what you want to say and affirm how resilient/good our bowling has been in one of its worst time periods.

 

[Stewie]

Perhaps one area everyone seems to ignore is the nature of the wickets. Has it occurred to anyone that the pitches are not totally conducive to big 200 plus totals either? It could be a combination of the quality of bowling, batting as well as pitches.

Bottom line is it’s ridiculous to make these comparisons on the basis of a few games. Let’s wait before we pass firm judgments.

 

[Anis10]

lack of local batting talent and sub par overseas players = substandard cricket

Maybe they need to make better pitches to help out the low quality batsmen on display

Having 50 to 60 meter boundaries will make the tournament even more substandard.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

My overall thoughts on PSL this year. It is only three games in and too early to pass judgment. I don’t understand how you can take it as representative of what the entire tournament will be like. I must also add that many of these batsmen haven’t played any professional cricket in a couple weeks so they are bound to be rusty. But let’s say we do take it as representative and deconstruct.

In the six innings that have occurred, only one overseas player has scored a 50 which is Ravi Bopara, but he did so at a SR of 113!!!! and there is one Pakistani, Rizwan, who has done so as well but made a 70 at a much better strike rate of 130 (which is still not great!) In terms of these absolute superstars, you really only have Hales and Gayle who did decently and were both restricted to scores in their 30s, whereas the baseline is you have people who are in the form of their lives like James Vince flopping terribly. Chris Lynn, Tom Banton, Colin Ingram, Ben Dunk, Sherfane Rutherford, Ben Cutting and Phil Salt all went missing haha and that says a LOT.

Now you might say, it’s only been one game and you can’t call the bowling good as a result or these batsmen bad. I agree!!! Then why are you passing judgements on how bad the standard of cricket is? No doubt qualitatively speaking, to my naked eye I have seen some very under par batting (but not bad) and I have also seen that there has been some very good bowling. I feel we will begin to see higher scores as the tournament progresses and batting units begin to click. If not, then I will be more than willing to take the entire tournament as representative.

It seems people these days are ready to pass judgments sitting on the couch without doing a detailed analysis themselves. Social media and twitter culture has catalyzed this attitude no doubt where you receive lots of likes and an according dopamine rush for little to no effort or content. However it is time we became more conscious and responsible.

 

[Bilal7]

People do whine about everything these days.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

Fact based and well analysed. Hopefully becomes POTW.

With all due respect, on an objective level it’s not well analyzed at all. Regardless of whether he is right or wrong.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

With all due respect, on an objective level it’s not well analyzed at all. Regardless of whether he is right or wrong.

For the record I agree with many of the points [MENTION=139664]street cricketer[/MENTION] made.

 

[street cricketer]

I appreciate the effort but the selection of stats is a little misguided.

1. Why have you selected the stats of the national team to pass a judgement on the quality of domestic bowlers? Does a system of datapoints with a terribly low mean but extremely high standard deviation/variance (resulting in 5 anomalous points who form the national bowling attack) represent a higher quality system than another system with a 60% better mean where there is zero standard deviation, resulting in zero anomalous data-points? As a result, the top 5 bowlers are not as good as the top 5 bowlers in the other system, but it really says nothing at all about the overall system quality because the latter system has a much, much higher mean. Just something to consider.

Sorry for the late reply, didn't notice my mentions.

Making a comparison based on international performance is perhaps not the most perfect way to compare the domestic stocks of different countries but it's atleast much better than making statements that one set of domestic bowlers are of a higher quality than the other based on zero factual basis. Atleast with international cricket, you can kinda assume that the cream always rises to the top and so the cream of the crop is somewhat indicative of the talent that's underneath more often than not than otherwise. Otherwise you're just dealing with intangibles like the "my country has better talent than your country" which is more to do with emotions and heart than evidence.

2. Why have you chosen this specific time period? It is one with
[A] a lot of upheaval in our national team (new captain so not as good tactics and field placements)
the persistence of players at the international level who have been past their peak such as Amir, Wahab rather than some of the domestic bowlers that might perform better
[C] bad selection policies that have given T20 comebacks to Mohammad Irfan and debuts to Musa Khan
So some detailed reasoning on the selection of this time period, and why you believe it’s representative of domestic bowling quality, would be something that clarifies a lot of questions in my mind.

When I was a regular poster here a few years back, we made a lot of stats based discussions and the general thumb rule was that you take a 2 or 3 year interval period for the recent past (I tend to gravitate towards the two year interval) and 5 year interval when you consider a significant period. All this is arbitrary of course, but you have to have some cut off period. You're talking about the events that happened with Pak cricket but every country has problems of their own, so we can't make a proper comparison if we take all these issues into account.

For the record, I did search for the past 3 year stats and Pakistan seem to be better than Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and West Indies based on average runs conceded per wicket. Based on purely ER though, their overall bowling attack seem to be doing well (2nd best) and have the 3rd best pace attack behind Australia and India.

3. Bowling average does not matter in T20Is. You want to look at runs per over and economy as that determines the final score put up and that’s all that matters in a T20I game. Imad Wasim has made a career out of his economy rate and rightly so. -Taking 10 wickets and conceding 180 puts your average at 18 whereas taking 6 wickets and conceding 160 puts your average at 27. How crazy is that!!!!!

On this above list, Pakistan is 4th best in the world in terms of runs per over conceded by our bowling attack and 5th best in the world when considering the economy rate of just our fast bowling. Not 7th and 8th as you suggest. Add in the factors that I mentioned in points 1 and 2 above, respectively, and you’ll see why despite everything, having the 4th best bowling attack in the world (pace and spin combined) is actually a terrific stat.

With all due respect, I believe that your stats show the absolute opposite of what you want to say and affirm how resilient/good our bowling has been in one of its worst time periods.

Here, I agree with your assertion that economy rate has more weightage in the T20 format. Generally the shorter the format, the higher the importance of the ER and longer the format, the higher the importance of SR. It's why the bowling strike rate is a very important criterion in the test format. That said, I think bowling average is a bit of a middle ground between the two and an ideal criterion for comparing bowlers across all formats. Some attacks like South Africa generally concede slightly more runs per over but have a killer strike rate even in test cricket because of the fact that they generally tend to play on raging green seamers (in test cricket) and so batsmen take a lot more chances per over to cash in before the inevitable wicket ball comes. Bangladesh is at the other end of the spectrum, their average runs conceded per wicket is among the highest while they have a lower ER than the South African pace attack.

I suppose it all boils down to which sort of bowler you'd rather have in your team - the containing bowler who rarely leaks runs or the strike bowler who can sometimes go for a few but can pick loads of wickets. Bhuvneshwar Kumar for example leaks 7.04 runs per over as opposed to Trent Boult's ER of 8.66 runs per over. But Boult picks up a wicket every 16 balls while Kumar picks up a wicket every 22.5 balls. Even though I love Kumar, I do think Boult is probably a more lethal option up front even in T20 format.

 

[Kroll]

What a match!

This is more like it.

 

[Hasan123]

I have enjoyed the PSL so far. Some of the cricket has been poor but I have really enjoyed what I have seen so far.

 

[Rana]

Last 3-4 matches have been great

Multan Sultans bringing the drama in these matches!

 

[Pacy with wisdom]

It is picking up now. It is clear now that the older generation of bowlers' time is up now. Wahab, irfan and tanvir are all hogging spots now. They need to be shown the door, especially the last two.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

What a chase! Some beautiful batting I have to say. First from Rizwan, Vince etc and then Imam set up a controlled chase with Tom Kohler Cadmore, with a beautiful finish by Haider Ali.

 

[Thunderbolt14]

It is picking up now. It is clear now that old generation of bowlers' time is up now. Wahab, irfan and tanvir are all hogging spots now.

And best part is, some good youngsters stepping up to take their place. 1-24 by Mohammad Imran in a 190-scoring game is no joke. Then you have someone like Dhani who looks fantastic.

 

[KingKhan12]

Brilliant last few games. And good to see decent young pacers.
Likes of Sohail Tanvir, Usman Shinwari and Irfan are past it and going to cost their franchises games. Better invest in young pacers who are showing the way.

 

[Titan24]

What a chase! Some beautiful batting I have to say. First from Rizwan, Vince etc and then Imam set up a controlled chase with Tom Kohler Cadmore, with a beautiful finish by Haider Ali.

Absolutely, some quality stuff.

 

[MesonK]

PSL is an extremely competitive league full of crazy quick fast bowlers.

 

[Saj]

Pleasing aspect today was seeing the 2 quicks Mohammad Imran and Shahnawaz Dhani showing that they have a bit about them and then Haider Ali's cameo at the end.

Great to watch.

 

[Square Drive]

It always starts off like this lol.

Soon enough we'll see the scores of 170-180+ that everyone wants to see.

Didn't take long, did it.

 

[shamaan]

Brillant last couple games.Good to see the youngesters are out performing the older players.

The bouncer from dahani to akmal and Haider hitting the winning runs is the highlight of the tournament so far

 

[Rana]

It’s picked up big time

The tournament is alive!

 

[Minnowbasher]

Rubbish fielding but excellent quality other than that.

 

[princeuk]

Brillant last couple games.Good to see the youngesters are out performing the older players.

The bouncer from dahani to akmal and Haider hitting the winning runs is the highlight of the tournament so far

This. The last few games have been superb and have really enjoyed it. My whole family was excited by the last few games.

 

[Adil_94]

Good to see teams scoring 180 nearly 200 now. Thats what u wanna see in t20 domestic franchise cricket. This is what attracts casual audience. Fours n sixes not those turning turgid tracks we had in the UAE

 

[Firebat]

2 nail-biting successful 190+ chases in a row! Really enjoying PSL6

 

[Kroll]

High quality stuff yet again.

 

[Hasan123]

Some great hitting today.

 

[Rana]

That 29 run Alex Hales over was brutal. KK lost the game in that one over

 

[Snowflake]

Great to see some good quality hitting! However, it's quite annoying to see the same guys, such as Iftikhar and Asif A, who have failed so many times at the international scene become match winners in the PSL!

 

[Kroll]

Been very entertaining so far.

Big hits, the execution of plans to chase down big totals, egos being smashed, what more do you want?