Anil Kumble - Indian Cricket's MVP

Last month, I was at an event at the Mumbai Literary Fest where Ramachandra Guha made 2 strong (and mildly controversial) assertions

1. Anil Kumble won India more matches than Sachin Tendulkar
2. Anil Kumble would have made a better captain than Sourav Ganguly

He put this down to cricket’s caste system whereby bowlers are generally less celebrated than batsmen. While Guha’s statement drew hushed whispers from Sachin’s home audience, I was quite happy with this endorsement of my childhood hero. Growing up, there was just something about Jumbo that drew me to pick this Sportstar poster (left image) to adorn my bedroom wall over the plethora of great Indian batsmen. 

Maybe it was because he came from my home state, Karnataka. Maybe it was because he held a degree in Mechanical Engineering from one of Karnataka’s best engineering colleges, RVCE. Maybe it was because he acted and bowled like a tear-away fast bowler (something Indian cricket fans sorely missed) – glaring at the batsmen and wiping out tails. Maybe it was because he once bowled with a broken jaw.

While the second assertion made above is tougher to verify, I decided to spend some time digging through the data to verify the first assertion.

Methodology

I looked at all of India’s test victories in the period 1993-2008 in which both Sachin and Kumble played. For each game, I identified the top 3 batsmen and top 3 bowlers in the team who contributed to the victory. For rank-ordering the batsmen, I simply looked at the total number of runs scored in the game (first + second innings). For rank-ordering the bowlers, I assigned 3 points for each top order wicket, 2 points for each wicket-keeper’s/all-rounder’s wicket and 1 point for each tail-ender’s wicket.

I then calculated a cumulative score to assess each player’s value by assigning 3 points for games in which they were the best batsman/bowler, 2 points for games in which they were second-best and 1 point for games in which they were third-best. The assumption made for this scoring system is that scoring runs and taking wickets are both equally critical to success in test cricket (hence the same scale). While one could argue that the 3-2-1 scale itself is arbitrary (i.e the relative importance of a player’s performance is not always linear), I believe it is at least indicative of the importance of a player to the team.

Results

Sachin and Kumble played together in 40 Indian victories – 28 at home and 12 away. Their contribution to the team in these victories is given in the tables below. As per my cumulative score scale, Kumble beats Sachin 90 to 50. Surprisingly, Kumble’s contribution in Away wins is also superior. 

I also did the same analyses for Sachin, Dravid and Kumble. They played together in 29 Test wins. Shockingly, Kumble’s contribution (63) equals that of Sachin and Dravid combined (64)!

I am convinced that Anil Kumble was India’s MVP in the ‘90s and ‘00s. This is not to say that Kumble was a greater player than Sachin. Sachin was the world’s best batsman in his time and would have been the first to be picked in any World XI. Kumble would probably not even make it to a World XI above Warne and Murali.

However, in a country gifted with abundant batting riches but a paucity of quality bowlers, our test team misses King Kumble more than we miss God Sachin. And it is time we recognize his contribution to Indian cricket. 

PS: One could argue that batsmen only get one chance for a mistake while bowlers can make several leading to greater variability in performance, but maybe that only goes to reinforce the importance of good bowlers in tests. Furthermore, one could argue that India’s poor bowling resources gave Kumble more opportunities to pick up wickets. But again, that only reinforces how critical he was to our success.

PPS: In a future blogpost, I will analyse drawn games in which Sachin performed well, but India failed to close out the win due to a poor performance by Kumble and the bowlers.

Backup data and analysis: https://www.dropbox.com/s/r6d369yzydqz0va/Sachin%20vs%20Kumble%20vs%20Dravid.xlsx?dl=0