Cricket is a game of fine margins; a wide here and a missed field there could make one team go from a winning position to a losing one in quick time. The shortest format of the game is even less forgiving for small mistakes. One such punishment that is laid upon bowling teams is the over-rate penalty.
The Apex Cricket Body has an 85-minute limit for 20 overs which is often breached by the bowling team, given innumerable, sponsorship breaks, sixes, DRS delays and other such interruptions in the game. The bowling team is levied a huge penalty for breaching the 85-minute mark in which they’re restricted to just four players outside of the 30-yard circle. Oftentimes, teams lose the game due to this heavy punishment.
Naturally, all teams have laid huge emphasis on not going over the 85-minute mark and coming up with unique solutions to their over-rate woes. It looks like Australia has the most effective of them.
In the recent match against England, Australian squad players were seen collecting the balls from the boundary line and giving it back quickly to save as much time as possible. Australian bowler Ashton Agar has explained the rationale behind this unique solution to over-rate penalties.
Here’s Australia’s solution to slow-over rate penalties.
A clever ploy from the Aussies who are keen to avoid the fielding restriction penalty if overs aren't bowled in time during this #T20WorldCup pic.twitter.com/5e73KABQcd
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) October 19, 2022
It just makes sense- Ashton Agar
“In the powerplay, obviously the ball flies around and you lose time when players have to go and fetch the ball, which is part of cricket, said the Spinner.
“So, stationing guys, who are on the bench, around the ground…does it save you 10 seconds here and there? Potentially. And that all adds up at the end of the day,” revealed Agar. Adding on, Agar says: “It’s not really giving you an advantage. It just makes sense. I think it’s common sense in the powerplay to do that because you don’t have guys out there fielding on the fence.”
Australia start their 20-20 World Cup campaign with their first match against New Zealand on October 22nd.
