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The toss decision

rentaghost

rentaghost

Striker
Historically there has always been a belief that in 90% of situations you bat first. Even more so if the pitch is flat and the weather is sunny. This has stood the test of time I suppose, if it was the right thing to do always in the past then why is it now? My personal view is that most of the time in test cricket it isn’t a huge deal anymore. Of course if you are going to India and you can see that the pitch is going to break up early it will make sense to get some runs on the board. However most of the time in England, the WI, Aus, NZ, Pak, SA etc the pitches don’t deteriorate massively. Players now have so many different strategies when batting in the 4th innings on slightly wearing pitches that the opposition don’t put loads of players around the bat which in turn helps the team batting last. Also it avoids that difficult 3rd innings in tight games where the batting team at times doesn’t know whether to stick or twist. This doesn’t mean batting second is always the right thing to do but the ‘fury’ you get from many when Stokes chooses to field first is based on ignorance a lot if the time imo.
 
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The odd thing is when he puts them in, and we win, it's apparently despite his decision. So only when we lose is it put at the decisions door.

He's been slated for it throughout this series, and we are 2-1 up. He was slated for it again this test after a few hours of day 1. Turns out we've had the better of the batting conditions.

I'd be interested in what the stats show though, as I imagine it still shows batting first yields more victories overall.
 
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dangermows said:
The odd thing is when he puts them in, and we win, it's apparently despite his decision. So only when we lose is it put at the decisions door.

He's been slated for it throughout this series, and we are 2-1 up. He was slated for it again this test after a few hours of day 1. Turns out we've had the better of the batting conditions.

I'd be interested in what the stats show though, as I imagine it still shows batting first yields more victories overall.
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In general it probably does because there are still some times in India for example when batting first is the only thing to do. I think it’s probably closer in the last 5 years than ever before. Stokes has only ever chosen to bat first twice 🤣 with one win and one loss.
 
dangermows said:
The odd thing is when he puts them in, and we win, it's apparently despite his decision. So only when we lose is it put at the decisions door.

He's been slated for it throughout this series, and we are 2-1 up. He was slated for it again this test after a few hours of day 1. Turns out we've had the better of the batting conditions.

I'd be interested in what the stats show though, as I imagine it still shows batting first yields more victories overall.
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This test I would agree it’s proven to be a good decision.

The first test however was definitely a win despite of the decision. India were 430-3 in their first innings before imploding and then something like 350-6 in the second. As good as chasing 370 was in the final innings of the game we should have never been in that position to begin with.
 
Dexter said:
This test I would agree it’s proven to be a good decision.

The first test however was definitely a win despite of the decision. India were 430-3 in their first innings before imploding and then something like 350-6 in the second. As good as chasing 370 was in the final innings of the game we should have never been in that position to begin with.
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Whilst I can see that angle that is concluding Indias good start was down to conditions rather poor bowling/good batting. From memory I don't recall conditions changing that much throughout.
 
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Dexter said:
This test I would agree it’s proven to be a good decision.

The first test however was definitely a win despite of the decision. India were 430-3 in their first innings before imploding and then something like 350-6 in the second. As good as chasing 370 was in the final innings of the game we should have never been in that position to begin with.
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We won. There is no guarantee we would have done batting first. Again that’s not to say choosing to bat would have been the right or wrong decision just simply that neither choice was a blatantly wrong one. At Headingley the pitch stayed relatively flat and suited the way we chase.
 
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