How England won the Cricket World Cup

By M.J.

LORD’S, THE venerable home of cricket, had never seen anything like it. Neither had the 30,000 spectators inside the stadium, nor the 8m Britons watching in homes, pubs and cricket clubs around the country. On July 14th England won the World Cup for the first time, in the most extraordinary conclusion imaginable. The winners had spent four years revamping their game, to focus mainly on the one-day international (ODI) format used in the World Cup, rather than five-day Test matches or quick-fire T20 fixtures. They had risen to first place in the ODI rankings. But nothing could have prepared them for Sunday’s final, which twice ended with the scores level.

Ties are rare in ODIs, because it is unlikely that each team will accumulate exactly the same number of runs in its 300-ball innings. Before Sunday, there had only been four instances in World Cup history, out of 436 completed fixtures. A stalemate still seemed unlikely as England neared the end of their innings, having struggled to chase New Zealand’s total of 241 runs on a treacherous pitch. With nine balls left and 22 runs required, the hosts’ chance of victory fell to 9%, according to CricViz, a cricket data firm, with the tie at 10%. England somehow bludgeoned their way to 241.

This improbable deadlock led to a “super over”, a tiebreaker never previously used in an ODI, which gives each team six extra balls. But this led to yet another tie, with England blasting 15 runs and then conceding the same tally to New Zealand. Eventually the match was decided by a method no fan had ever heard of: the number of boundaries scored. The Kiwis had only managed 17 to England’s 26, and therefore needed a 16th run on the final ball of the super over. They fell just short—causing pandemonium inside the genteel arena.

That this remarkable game was settled in such an obscure manner seemed harsh to New Zealand (who also lost the final in 2015 to Australia). For English fans, however, there was a certain aptness to counting boundaries. As Game Theory noted before the tournament, the team’s ascent from World Cup failures in 2015 to favourites in 2019 was thanks to more aggressive batting tactics. Where once English players wielded the willow almost as conservatively in ODIs as in Tests, now they regularly swing for the boundary rope. The opening batsmen, Jason Roy and Jonny Bairstow, typify this approach. Neither was selected in 2015, but now they have become the fastest-scoring opening pair in ODI history. This riskier strategy occasionally fails disastrously. England’s two biggest defeats ever have come in the last year. But more often than not, the big hitters prevail.

This World Cup was supposed to deliver lots of high-scoring matches, with other teams emulating England’s tactics. Some pundits predicted a record ODI score of 500. But such expectations soon proved unrealistic. The average score in the first innings was 271, little different to the average in matches between World Cup teams over the past 18 months. (Cricket statisticians often exclude the second team’s innings when making such calculations, since that total is limited to the first team’s score.). Indeed, no team even passed 400. The first-innings scores in the semi-finals and final were 223, 239 and 241.

Pundits and players have put forward several explanations for the middling scores, including difficult pitches, some excellent bowling and the pressure of competing in the tournament. CricViz’s number-crunchers have found some evidence for the first two theories. In only one of the past five seasons in England have pitches offered more assistance to ODI bowlers (judging by a ball’s change in trajectory after it bounces). It seems likely that the weather contributed to this. June was Britain’s wettest on record, and “sticky wickets” famously make the ball skid unpredictably off the ground. A cool atmosphere also causes cricket balls to swerve more sharply, thanks to fewer disruptive convection currents.

This contributed to the effectiveness of the bowlers. The “expected average” during the World Cup of 32.2 runs—a figure that estimates how costly each wicket ought to be, given the quality of the balls delivered—has been lower than in any ODI series in England since 2014. How, then, did big-hitting England win a bowler-friendly tournament?

Pitch perfect

Four factors stood out. First, the hosts learned to be tactically flexible. In the two years before the World Cup, in matches in which they had won the coin toss, England opted to bowl in the first innings 89% of the time. This decision was backed by data: between 2010 and the eve of the World Cup, CricViz found that the team bowling first won around 55% of ODI matches. The main reason seems to be that pitches often become easier to bat on as the day progresses, perhaps because they get drier, flatter and more predictable. In 56% of ODIs between 2015 and 2019, the surface offered more assistance to bowlers in the first innings than the second. That figure rose to 64% in England, where overcast, dewy mornings are especially tricky for batsmen.

However, something weird happened at the World Cup: the pitches only favoured the side bowling first 41% of the time. A lack of sunny afternoons might have allowed the turf to soften, rather than firming up. Of the 43 matches that were completed, only 15 (35%) were won by the side bowling first. In the pool stages of the World Cup, England persisted with this approach, and failed to chase totals of 349 against Pakistan, 286 against Australia, and, most shockingly of all, 233 against a mediocre Sri Lanka side, on a minefield of a pitch. On the brink of a humiliating elimination, the hosts changed tack. They opted to bat first against heavyweights India and New Zealand, and successfully defended 337 and 305.

A second explanation of England’s success was a handful of outstanding performances, even relative to the team’s previously high standards (see chart). Four stalwarts made significant improvements. Mr Roy batted for an average of 22 balls more per dismissal at the World Cup than in the four years before, and scored at a faster rate in these longer innings. All-rounder Ben Stokes also occupied the crease for more balls than usual. The improvements in bowling were even greater, perhaps aided by the pitches. Mr Stokes, Mark Wood and Liam Plunkett, three seam bowlers, conceded fewer runs than they normally do.

A third, related factor was England’s decision to select Jofra Archer. The 24-year-old Barbadian has a British father, and had demonstrated his talent in foreign T20 leagues, but only qualified for the team via British residency shortly before the tournament. (The English Cricket Board had changed the eligibility criteria in late 2018, from a seven-year period to three.) Only two players at the World Cup took more wickets. Among those who bowled at least 300 deliveries, only four conceded runs at a more miserly rate. His performance was far superior to the historical track record of the other English bowlers who might have appeared instead. And he delivered the “super over” which brought the trophy home.

Yet even the most jubilant English fan would have acknowledged the importance of a fourth factor: luck. Cricket includes many events that neither team can control, such as injuries, the weather, unpredictable bounces or umpiring decisions. Sometimes these random fluctuations balance themselves out during a tournament. But two fortunate moments went England’s way during the World Cup’s climax. The first came with three balls of England’s innings left and nine runs required. Mr Stokes slapped a delivery along the ground. As he dived into his crease to complete a second run, the ball (which had been thrown by Martin Guptill, New Zealand’s best fielder) ricocheted off his bat, and flew to the boundary. These freakish “overthrows”, which are very rare, gave England a crucial six runs: two which the batsmen gained by sprinting between the wickets, and four for the fielding error.

However, the second stroke of luck was only discovered the morning after England’s raucous celebrations. A former umpire spotted that when Mr Guptill had thrown the ball, Mr Stokes and his batting partner had not yet crossed while attempting their second run. Therefore, only the first run should have counted, along with the four from overthrows. England would have been stranded on 240. That sub-clause of an obscure rule, like the boundary count that gifted England the title, will haunt New Zealanders for decades.

For most fans, however, the defining memory of the tournament will be the drama of its last hour. Other moments will fade quickly. Beyond the two finalists (and India, who lost to New Zealand in the semi-finals), there was a dearth of consistently good teams. South Africa were desperate, the West Indies disappointing, Sri Lanka a pale imitation of themselves and Pakistan as wildly inconsistent as ever. Afghanistan hobbled themselves with internal politics and strange on-field decisions. The format was unbalanced, with 45 pool matches generating just three knockout games. The rain and uneven pitches made the batting less spectacular. But the English don’t care. At last they can add their name to a list that already includes the West Indies, India, Australia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka: world champions.