Cricketing Nonsense #1

"If it were not for Virender Sehwag's astonishing innings of 201, India would have been in big trouble"

What kind of a nonsense statement is that ?? Made several times over in the media today by a whole spectrum of respected writers. I mean sure, that innings was the essence of India's batting but that came right at the top. It happened. It was a good solid unquestionable truth. What is the point in bringing in the conditionals and trying to compute the posterior probabilities of that event not occuring ???

OK, sorry if that was too heavy for some of you - but to put it in simple Sidhuistic terms, "If ifs and ands were pots and pans there would be no tinkers". How can one debate about what would have happened if such a big truth had not existed ?? This is pointless, inane debate. This is fit to be carried out by those mysitcs who do not believe that existence exists. Who do not believe that A is A.

Come to think of it, if Sehwag had scored a duck, we might have been bowled out for 200 !! Again, it could well have been that Dravid and Tendulkar would then have put their heads down more, carved a couple of big innings and we would have been say 300/4. The possibilities are almost uncountably infinte (which is what makes this game the great game it is). For precisely, this reason, it is pointless to keep wondering about what could have happened.

OK. If someone coming in at #7 or so had hit a quickfire hundred with the tail rescuing the team, the usage would be more acceptable. The fact is that a certain situation has occured. One that needs to be reacted to. One that can be reacted to in one of several possible ways. In this context it makes sense to say "If #7 had not scored, so and so would have happened".

But with openers they set the tone of the innings. They create the situation, not react to it. (except perhaps the opposition score). But with Sehwag Im sure he would have played the same way had the score been 170, 270, 370, 470 or even 670. It does not matter to him.