Bipin Dani
With the evolution of T20 and ODI cricket, we have seen the role of the performance analyst plays a bigger role. England (& Andy Flower) were one of the first teams to identify this when they hired Nathan Leamon, an ex-mathematician to be their lead analyst to enhance the team performance. During one of the recent LPL matches, the TV commentators discussed the role of an analyst and Sri Lanka’s head coach and now the commentator Mickey Arthur revealed how the Sri Lankan team team can reach great heights.
“In white ball cricket the analyst is becoming such an important part of your management team now in terms of match ups, selections, etc. It’s something that any team needs to have because you might not want to be filtering all that information to your players but if you find 1 or 2 gold nuggets then it
could be the difference in terms of your selection or your match ups in giving you a positive result”, Arthur said on air. “We have just employed a guy in our Brain Centre at Sri Lanka Cricket, Prad Navaratnam who is top drawer and our analytics has gone to another level now”.
“In T20 cricket, analytics are so crucial in guiding decision making, in terms of strategies, in terms of match ups. Those are things that coaches, players & captains rely on to help them have winning outcomes on the field”, another commentator Darren Ganga added to the conversation.