Assessing Australia and England Following the 2013-14 Ashes

Before the 2013-14 ‘Ashes’ series I wrote that I thought Australia had a fair chance of winning the series. This was due to the English cricket team being only about ‘8 per cent’ better than Australia, based on the Reliance ICC Player Rankings, which I thought may well be overcome by Australia having the home ground advantage.

Well, as we now know, Australia not only won the series, but won it easily (‘five-nil! fivenil fivenil fivenil…). So what changed? Let’s have a look at the line-ups as the ICC Player Rankings now assesses them.

Australia		England		% Advantage of Eng over Aus
Batting Ratings - Batsmen
Rogers	694	Cook	677
Warner	683	Carberry	394
Watson	605	Root	558
Clarke	817	Pietersen	674
Smith	626	Bell	682
Bailey	236	Stokes	441
Haddin	618	Prior	586
Total	4279		4012	-6.2
Batting Ratings - Bowlers
Johnson	331	Broad	399
Siddle	243	Swann	325
Harris	248	Bresnan	286
Lyon	201	Anderson	126
Total	1023		1136	11.0
Bowling Ratings - Bowlers
Johnson	743	Broad	729
Siddle	779	Swann	663
Harris	866	Bresnan	512
Lyon	618	Anderson	683
Total	3006		2587	-13.9
Bowling Ratings - Batsmen
Smith	107	Root	33
Watson	433	Stokes	311
Clarke	134	Pietersen	80
Total	674		424	-37.1
Total team rating	8220.8		7557	-8.1

Team rating = Batting rating – Batsmen + Bowling rating – Bowlers + ¾ * Batting rating – Bowlers + ¼ * Bowling rating - Batsmen

In contrast to before the series started, Australia is now assessed as being superior in every aspect except for the batting ability of their bowlers (though even that seems debatable given the batting averages for the series). Before the series, England’s main advantage was assessed to be its batting. However, for the Australians, Warner, Haddin, Rogers, and Smith are now assessed to be much better than they were before the series, while Cook, Bell and Prior are now assessed to be somewhat worse. The English team is also assessed to have suffered from Trott’s departure after the first Test, when he was replaced by new boy Ben Stokes, although looking at the Ashes alone Stokes’ batting average stacked up relatively well to his countrymen.

On the bowling side, man of the series Mitchell Johnson was much, much better than his pre-series rating suggested, and Ryan Harris was also better, while the now-retired Graeme Swann and James Anderson took steps back. The net result is that, while England’s bowling was assessed to be slightly better pre-series, now it is Australia that are assessed to have the somewhat stronger bowling line-up.

Overall then, England’s ‘8 per cent’ advantage has now turned into an ‘8 per cent’ deficit. Add to that the fact that Australia was playing on their home turf, and the eventual result becomes more explicable. Still, even then one might not have expected Australia to win quite so easily - the rest of the margin then might be able to put down to nebulous concepts such as ‘form’, ‘luck’ … or maybe ‘overcoaching’.