The Cricketer's People of 2021: Nathan Leamon

JAMES COYNE: In the ongoing tension between data and gut-feel in cricket, Nathan Leamon continues to wield considerable influence with England and in the IPL

It might seem strange for me to choose Nathan Leamon for this, given that England were knocked out of the T20 World Cup semi-final, and his IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders were beaten by Chennai Super Kings in their final.

I do have my own selfish reasons. For starters, 'Numbers' and I have something in common, other than a love of cricket: we both released cricket books this year through the publishers Constable. His book, co-written with Ben Jones of CricViz, Hitting Against the Spin: How Cricket Really Works, is a data-driven dissection of the modern game.

Mine, co-written with Timothy Abraham, Evita Burned Down our Pavilion: a cricket odyssey through Latin America, has barely a shred of data in it, and is based almost entirely on old-school journalistic reportage and historical research. (Leamon's and Jones' will sell more, I imagine.)

And this, in a way, sums up the broad church of cricket journalism, encompassing old-school 'colour' reporting (of which I wouldn't claim to be at the vanguard), and the hip, data-conversant brigade embodied by Jones, also well represented by Tim Wigmore, Freddie Wilde and Jarrod Kimber. The lines between cricket journalism and cricket analytics seem increasingly blurred.

Need there be any tension between the two schools of thought? For the most part, no. I'm sure the analysts could say something interesting about how Percy Fender got on when the left-arm spinners were on from the Vauxhall End before the end of June, but I doubt the ball-by-ball data exists.

But, when it comes to analysing present-day top-level cricket, that's where the two philosophies do rub up against each other.

It's no bad thing to have a cold dose of rationale injected into cricket reportage, which through history has sometimes veered between flighty high-mindedness and wilful misinterpretation of the facts for the sake of a good line. Witness the deliberate twirling of Peter Moores' quotes after the 2015 World Cup debacle, when he was quoted as saying "data" instead of "later". (Moores later revealed that Leamon actually considered returning home, such was England's relative lack of data usage in that World Cup.)

^{Eoin Morgan and Nathan Leamon have forged an excellent relationship as captain and analyst (Indranil Mukherjee/Getty Images)}

The arrival of Leamon and his kind is hardly a new thing – he's been working with England since 2009. But the analysts have surely never held as much sway as they do now. That's partly due to the never-ending proliferation of T20: a format which rests on the finest margins. 

You also suspect that the more franchise tournaments that are organised, throwing together more and more random collections of cricketers into new teams, the more you need analysts to make sense of it all. In Test cricket – which is on the wane, much to my regret – it's still more about hitting the top of off stump.

And it no dount helps Leamon that Eoin Morgan – who clearly trusts his input – is the most powerful England captain in living memory, if ever.

So it was great to get the chance to interview Leamon in the spring. He's a bright and very interesting bloke, and it was a thought-provoking conversation (for me and my co-interviewer Huw Turbervill anyway).

"Hopefully we're now approaching a place where cricket is at ease with data"

That said, I did try to ask Leamon a couple of fairly searching questions about the limits of what data can tell you. Don't get me wrong: I'm no data refusenik. (Mind you, I interviewed both Andy Roberts and Curtly Ambrose later in the year, and I can well imagine how they would have responded to a data analyst telling them the length to bowl.)

But, still – and maybe it's the casual sci-fi fan in me; Huw is a proper sci-fi fan – I do have reservations of handing all decision-making over to the computers. What's been the point of acquiring all the intuitive understanding you have from playing and watching cricket over the years, if you're just going to accept everything an algorithm tells you?

And, in my mind, there are limits to what an algorithm can tell you about average scores on a certain ground, if suddenly it rains at the ground for the first time in five years, the groundstaff underprepare the pitch, or the ICC have just voted through another ODI rule-change.

^{England opted not to bowl Moeen Ali against New Zealand in the T20 World Cup semi-final (Aamer Qureshi/Getty Images)}

In fairness, Leamon has never argued for surrendering prostrate to the data; only for data to better inform off and on-field human decision-making.

But, as with any revolution in any form of human affairs, there will always be flashpoints. And as more and more data comes into the game, this isn't going to disappear.

It was actually late in 2020, during the aborted trip to South Africa, where Leamon first displayed numbered signals from the balcony to England captain Morgan, though he had done it before in the Pakistan Super League. There's no point pretending that it doesn't offend against the longstanding assumption that a captain captains on the field. Bob Woolmer's earpiece was banned for a reason.

But, as Leamon argued, surely it's more honest than the 12th man running on with a coded message disguised as a bottle of water? 

And no doubt Leamon would have played his role in persuading Morgan not to bowl Moeen Ali in that T20 World Cup semi-final in Abu Dhabi.

A traditional insight might have been: 'Surely it's no bad thing to have the off-spinner bowling to the left-handers Devon Conway and Jimmy Neesham, challenging both the outside edge and the pads, especially when he’s bowled so well up to now?' The analysts seemed to be saying: 'For Pete's sake, don't expose Moeen to Daryl Mitchell or Devon Conway, as they murder off-spin.'

And who knows, the analysts may well be right. By throwing on Liam Livingstone (who took 2 for 22) instead, England could have leggies or offies depending on who was on strike. Had Moeen bowled, maybe New Zealand might have needed even fewer than the 57 they plundered off Chris Jordan, Adil Rashid and Chris Woakes off the last four overs (with no need for the last six balls). 

And Leamon was fascinating in the Telegraph dispelling some myths about the 2019 World Cup campaign and Morgan's supposed simplification of England's modus operandi.

One last reminder that ‘Hitting Against The Spin’ comes out today.
Huge thanks to all those who pre-ordered, hope you enjoy it.
You can order here https://t.co/YzaKM482L7 pic.twitter.com/nOCCcqLfS6

— Nathan Leamon 💙 (@Numb3z) June 10, 2021

"Morgs pulled back on team meetings, both in length and frequency, but there was just as much data and information flowing from us, it just went direct to him and the coach. He took control of that process.

“We were conscious more from the India series [in 2016/17] to then reintroduce more data to the playing group. Discussions became more detailed, more nuanced and individually tailored. Morgs would have one-on-one chats with bowlers and batters, as individually as possible."

And most crucially, on turning around all aspects of England's cricket from that mid-tournament stutter: "We needed to be busier at the wicket. We were trying to rely on boundary hitting when rotation of the strike had become more important than it was.

"When we came to bowl, we were going to our variations and defensive bowling too soon, as if we were still on flat pitches. Plus our attack had changed a bit. As of the World Cup we now had three bowlers – Archer, Wood and Stokes – all capable of hitting 90mph, and consequently they were getting hit to different parts of the field."

"Analysts have surely never held as much sway as they do now"

That piece of analysis was sparked by a hunch – assistant coach Paul Collingwood spotting the cricketer's tell-tale sign of third man and fine leg getting beaten on the inside – but confirmed through deep dives into the data.

And surely that is the best way to use data in cricket – not an implacable distrust of the numbers-men; nor the new wave’s dismissal of all gut-feel expressed by knowledgeable cricket people as hopelessly antediluvian.

I suspect – and I know Leamon agrees – that when proper data first came into cricket there were probably cases of overreach, algorithms misapplied, which were picked up on by the press and used as a stick to beat the whole movement with.

Hopefully we're now approaching a place where cricket is at ease with data, and the number-crunchers are at ease with ideas formed before the flood.

THE CRICKETER'S PEOPLE OF 2021 (links open in external window in app)

Alice Capsey

Azeem Rafiq

Ben Stokes

Ian Watmore

Joe Root