Let's talk about genuine all-rounders

Vital for the success of T20 teams

Do you remember the kid at school who was so good at football that they used to do everything? Take goal kicks, free kicks, corners, penalties, you name it, they did it.

They were a dominant all-rounder with what I’d describe as huge match involvement because they literally did everything. That’s what you want from your best players - huge match involvement because you want your best players influencing the match as much as possible.

In T20 cricket, there’s a lack of what I’d call genuine, high quality all-rounders. By this I’d describe a genuine, high-quality all-rounder quite simply:-

Able to contribute at an above average level in a specific role batting in the top 7

Regular 12+ ball above-average contributors with the ball

Reasonable balance between the two skillsets (e.g. not a huge batting/bowling bias)

These players would have what I previously described the kid at school was was so good at football as - high match involvement.

Essentially, as you’ll find out, there aren’t many players who fit the bill for the above, and the players who do, generally are in high demand in drafts and auctions with greater demand than supply, which ensures they are priced at a high level. It’s also very easy to categorise a batter who bowls a bit - maybe they’ll try and get a cheap middle over in, or some match-up spin, and a bowler who can hit (at, say number 8/9) as a genuine all-rounder, but they’re much less likely to have as high match involvement as a genuine all-rounder.

Categorising Players

So, who does fit the bill as a genuine all-rounder? Let’s run some numbers to find out…

First of all, I filtered out any potential all-rounder who had batted or bowled 200 balls or fewer (for each discipline) from the start of January 2021 to 4th November 2022, across T20 internationals, IPL, PSL, CPL, Big Bash, Blast and Hundred combined. This enabled me to whittle down the list of potentials significantly, and start to categorise players easily:-

Batting All-Rounders - In theory, picked primarily as a batter but can bowl the occasional over of pace-off/medium pace/match-up spin etc when required (no ability level considered):-

Shivam Dube, Moisés Henriques, Daryl Mitchell (NZ), Steven Croft, Aiden Markram, Abhishek Sharma, Mahmudullah, Shoaib Malik, Venkatesh Iyer, Deepak Honda, Ashton Turner, Luis Reece, Chandrapaul Hemraj, Arron Lilley, Rakheem Cornwall, Tristan Stubbs, Tom Lammonby, Soumya Sarkar, Raymon Reifer, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leaning, Hussain Talat, Will Rhodes, Dan Mousley.

Some useful batters here who went for reasonable money in the last IPL auction (Aiden Markram, Abhishek Sharma, Shivam Dube) plus at least one who might in the near future (Tristan Stubbs). It’s also just my view but I’d rather have a match-up spinner out of this group in my squad than an occasional medium-pacer who has to be hidden in the middle overs - the upside is just much higher for a match-up spinner in my opinion, and smart teams could possibly also improve their match involvement by assigning them better than average match-ups.

Seemingly balanced between batting and bowling ability but small sample sizes of data - These players haven’t played a great deal of T20 in the sample leagues that I deemed important in the last couple of years, and this could be down to a lack of ability, exposure, or injury (no ability level considered):-

Jacob Bethell, Mark Deyal, Colin de Grandhomme, Gulbadin Naib, Vijay Shankar, Lalit Yadav, Karim Janat, Wiaan Mulder, Cameron Green, Jack Prestige, Azmatullah Omarzai, Andile Phehlukwayo, Lewis Goldsworthy, Luke Wells, Jamie Overton, Keemo Paul, Mosaddek Hossain, Fynn Hudson-Prentice, Chris Greaves, Michael Leask.

Two names stand out to me here - Wiaan Mulder and Cameron Green. I would give these two a very solid chance of moving into the genuine all-rounder bracket at a high level in the future with more T20 game-time. Jacob Bethell is an interesting prospect too - still young and pretty raw but there’s a lot to like about a top order batter who bowls left-arm orthodox spin. Jamie Overton has also attracted some franchise attention with his ultra-aggressive hitting as well.

Bowling All-Rounders - In theory, picked primarily as a bowler but can bat either as a lower order hitter when required or offer extra batting depth (no ability level considered):-

Wanindu Hasaranga, Mohammad Wasim, Wahab Riaz, Hasan Ali, Shardul Thakur, Harshal Patel, Rahul Chahar, Matt Carter, Matt McKiernan, Dominic Drakes, Pat Cummins, Ben Dwarshuis, Mitchell Santner, Akeal Hosein, Grant Stewart, Tom Taylor, Simon Harmer, Rehan Ahmed, Calvin Harrison, Sean Abbott, Liam Trevaskis, Dwayne Pretorius, Tim Pringle, Washington Sundar, Martin Andersson, Faheem Ashraf, Scott Borthwick, Wayne Parnell, James Weighell, Brydon Carse, Alex Hughes, Ben Green, Paul Coughlin, Aaron Hardie.

These players above are highly unlikely to be picked purely as a result of their batting. A few names might surprise readers here too, with Dwayne Pretorius, Brydon Carse and Washington Sundar perhaps expected to be classified as genuine all-rounders - however all three faced fewer than 200 balls with the bat in the sample and had a balls bowled to balls batted ratio well in excess of 2, suggesting they were bowling all-rounders. I would expect Rehan Ahmed to move into genuine all-rounder category in time.

I would also suggest that some of the players in the bowling all-rounder list above who possess a high boundary percentage could potentially do a job as a pinch-hitter. The value on their wickets is usually low, and the upside could be very nice indeed.

This leaves 82 players still to be categorised, and in the running to be classified as currently genuine all-rounders, and here we start to bring in the concept of match involvement to the assessment.

To start with, a basic one - which players in the sample have contributed the most involvement to their various teams?