It doesn't take any
number crunching
to figure out that
Chris Gayle has
been the most
valuable player
(MVP) of the
league stage of IPL
4, but would you
have guessed that
the next most
valuable are MS
Dhoni and Kumar
Sangakkara or
that Paul Valthaty
is the only one in
the top 10 on the
list who is not an
international
player?
Gayle's fireworks may have lit up
the second half of the league
stage, but Valthaty remains the
most value for money (VFM)
player, ahead of S Aravind and
Rahul Sharma. Interestingly, the
bulk of the top 10 in the VFM list
are not out of the tournament
yet.
Behind Gayle, Dhoni and Sanga in
the MVP list are Lasith Malinga,
the tournament's top wicket-
taker by some distance, Virender
Sehwag, Yusuf Pathan, Shane
Watson, Valthaty, Johan Botha
and Shaun Marsh.
With the obvious exception of
Valthaty, none of these names
comes close to making it to the
top of the VFM list. Considering
that most of them rake in annual
fees in excess of a million dollars
while uncapped Indian players
have to make do with $50,000,
that should caused no surprise.
As before, therefore, the rest of
the top 10 on the VFM list are
also local players who have more
than pulled their weight for their
squads. After the top three come
Ambatti Rayudu, Iqbal Abdullah,
Manish Pandey, Amit Singh,
Sunny Sohal, Rajat Bhatia and B A
Bhatt, the King XI bowler, in that
order.
We aren't just pulling these
names out of a hat. Some serious
number crunching is behind
these assertions. Here's what we
did. Batting points were
calculated on the principle that
both the quantity of runs scored
and how fast they are scored
should count. So we took a strike
rate of 130 as a par value. The
total runs scored by each
batsman was multiplied by his
actual strike rate and divided by
this par figure. Thus, a batsman
who has scored, say, 300 runs in
the tournament so far would get
batting points equal to 300 if he
has scored at a strike rate of 130,
fewer points if he has
accumulated them slower and
more if he has got them at a
better clip.
For bowlers, we used the
principle that both economy and
wicket-taking should count. An
economy rate of 7.5 runs per
over was used as the benchmark.
Bowlers with a better economy
rate than this were regarded as
having saved runs for their team.
For instance, if a bowler has
been going at 6 runs per over
and has bowled 40 overs, he
would actually have conceded
240 runs. At the average rate he
would have conceded 300. So he
is given 60 points for saving
those many runs. Every wicket
gets him 25 points.
Fielding points are given for
catches, run outs and stumpings.
Catches count for 10 points, run
outs for 15. In the case of
wicket-keepers, however,
catches and stumpings fetch 25
points each, since they are in the
side mainly for fielding.
Finally, captains are given points
for the performance of their
teams, 25 points for each win
and minus 25 for each loss.
Adding all of these points
together gives us the total points
accumulated by each player.
Since it would be unfair to
compare someone who has
played, say, ten matches with
another who has played all 14,
we then divided the total points
by the number of matches played
by each player to get the points
per match. This was the basis for
the MVP rankings. The VFM
rankings were obtained by
dividing the points per match by
the fees payable to each player
per match to get a figure for the
number of points per $100,000.
To ensure that a couple of
outstanding performances don't
unduly skew the results, we took
only those who had played at
least nine matches. What is
interesting is that the MVP list is
dominated by multi-skilled
players with the exception of
Malinga who has accumulated
points almost entirely from his
bowling alone.
In contrast, the VFM list has a
preponderance of those who
have got points mainly from their
bowling, like Aravind, Rahul
Sharma and Iqbal Abdullah, and a
couple who have contributed
mainly with the bat like Sunny
Sohal and Manish Pandey. This is
a departure from the past when
both indices tended to yield
predominantly all-rounders at the
top.*@Player Team M Batting
Pts Bowling
Pts Fielding
Pts Captaincy
Pts Total
Pts Pts/
Match
CH Gayle RCB 9 797 158 20 975 108
MS Dhoni CSK 14 451 0 285 100 836 60
KSangakkara DC 13 365 0 475 -75 765 59
SL Malinga MI 14 0 756 60 816 58
V Sehwag DD 11 624 0 90 -75 639 58
YK Pathan KKR 14 311 383 65 758 54
SR Watson RR 11 359 179 40 578 53
PC Valthaty KXIP 14 529 167 20 716 51
J Botha RR 10 223 206 75 504 50
SE Marsh KXIP 14 615 0 60 675 48
Minimum qualification: 9
matches
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