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Post by nompere on Jul 2, 2006 11:32:14 GMT
was umpiring in a match recently in which tea was taken at a fixed time – and fortunately scheduled for 30 mins. The telegraph had some malfunctions and there were two 12 year old scorers, who did acknowledge all signals, sometimes tardily. In the first over, I had to explain that, if the batsman took a run off a No Ball, then two were added to the total!
Consequently, we decided to check the scorebooks at tea. We were horrified to find that Score A’s Batting Sheet added to 178 (including 15 leg&byes) whilst his Bowling Analysis came to 215. Scorer B’s Batting was 182 and his Bowling was 195. There was no obvious pattern of errors. My own tally counter showed 184, but I have no way of proving that I had clicked every run or that I had not accidentally counted extra.
We spent the whole tea interval trying to unravel this without success – not easy when you have two captains and several players all making suggestions. I have no doubt that had I been able to sit down quietly with one competent assistant, we could have resolve the accurate score with about two hours work!
The captains agreed to accept my 184, and, fortunately the batting captain felt he needed more runs before he could declare and went on to make what appeared to be a well balanced declaration (220-5 after 52 overs leaving 48 overs for the other side). Even more fortunately, that side were all out for less than 100.
Has anyone got any better suggestions for quickly resolving the situation at teatime?
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Post by harleysmum on Jul 2, 2006 21:25:10 GMT
You have highlighted one of the major problems when you have young scorers! Although there are many around that are extremely competent, there are a lot more who are only doing it because they've been pressured into it by their dad (or someone else on the team) and are promised a bit of money. Unfortunately, they possess neither the knowledge nor the concentration levels required to be able to score a full length match.
In the situation you were in you did the only thing that could have been done!
This just highlights the fact that more scorers need proper training rather than just sticking someone in the box who doesn't really know what they're doing. Unfortunately, until clubs (and dare I say it, even umpires) start to encourage them, it won't happen.
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Post by tippexii on Jul 3, 2006 7:41:42 GMT
The only thing I'd have changed would be to ensure that I sat down at tea with only my colleague and the scorers for company, and not allow any of the players or captains to intervene at the initial stage. It was fortunate that the 184 on the clicker was in the middle of the 4 totals suggested by the scorebook.
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Post by nompere on Jul 7, 2006 18:43:28 GMT
Assuming the four of us had sat in isolation (myself fairly numerate, my colleague disinterested and two inexperienced 12 year olds) - how would you have tackled it?
If there had been no time pressure, I would have worked in isolation or, preferably with one competent (and patient) friend and gone through the bowling analysis ball by ball. BUT I guess this would have taken the best part of two hours and would probably have involved a number of intelligent guesses.
Is there any better / faster way?
Reluctantly, in the second innings, one of the late order batsmen supervised them.
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Post by jedwards on Jul 7, 2006 23:27:31 GMT
There are a few things you can try quickly to at least get the totals closer together. I'll assume that you re-checked the math before determining all four totals.
Were they marking off a cumulative tally, and if so what did it say? Were they filling in an Over Details column? If those totals agree (and seem reasonable), then that might be your answer. If they were filling in FoW totals, and those agree, then that might give you an idea of what the total is (since you would only have to figure out the current partnership).
I would start by running on the assumption that 184 is likely the minimum score that was put up. I suspect it is more likely that you would have missed clicking a run, rather than adding an extra one.
By the same token, it is more likely that the scorers would have missed things than dreamed them up out of thin air. That doesn't necessarily mean that you would automatically go with the higher totals in this case, but they would be more likely to be the one you'd take.
I would start by taking anything that agrees between the two books as read. It's possible the two books have made different errors in certain places to get to the same total for something, but you haven't the time to figure that out.
Then you would try to find out how the two of them were counting extras. Did they count fielding extras against the bowlers? For the batsmen? What about bowling extras? Were they giving one or two runs for no balls? If they were counting fielding extras against the bowlers, then you know that they have 15 too many (assuming A's total of 15 is accurate).
Then you would look for the biggest individual discrepancies and look into those.
The answer is likely found in the bowling summaries, since my suspicion would be that they would have probably missed adding totals to the batsmen's score. With limited time, you can't go back and reconstruct the entire innings, so the batsmen will have to wait.
The first place to look would be the individual bowlers' totals, to see if any totals seem out of place. There may be an addition error, and an extra one or two (or ten) could show up somewhere. Your sense of which bowlers had been doing better than others may help here, as well.
You could also scan the bowling summary to see if any over totals (assuming they were being done) don't mesh what's shown in the over. If time permits, you may be able to quickly look through each over, determine totals, and get yourself to a cumulative number. (If the teams want individual summaries, they can find someone older than 12 to keep track!)
If the errors are related to concentration, then I would focus my efforts on the later stages of the innings, when the young minds would have started to wander.
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Post by rlsiam on Aug 6, 2006 23:15:31 GMT
Well these things happen when you get young inexperienced scorers.
The captains of both teams in my option where responsible for this mess. They should not have put these boys in charge of scoring & not kept an eye on them.
What you did at tea was the only course of action you could have taken. But it should have only been the umpires. It doesn't help if you have several people trying to give advice.
A thought for the next match you umpire & you find that you have young scorers. Talk to the captains before the start of the match, see if they can get a team member to check on scorers every 30minutes to make sure things are on track.
Talk to the scorers, suggest they compare scores every 10 overs, get them to balance at drink breaks.
Tell them if they are having problems to get help from one of the players.
Nip the problem in the bud before it becomes a problem.
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Post by jedwards on Aug 9, 2006 3:08:42 GMT
I would actually have them comparing scores after every over, and immediately sorting out any discrepancies. By 10 overs, you could have some major issues.
I agree that someone from both teams (preferably) or the batting side (at least) also needs to be keeping an eye on them, to ensure that they stay on track. A quiet scorebox is a sign of trouble. The scorers need to be talking to each other, ensuring that they agree on what they see. If they can agree on the cumulative total, then you can worry about how they got there later on.
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Post by aussiefox on Aug 14, 2006 19:15:17 GMT
G'day , I think you did the only thing you could given the time constraints. i normally use a pen and paper to keep a running tally after each over. But since 2003 i have found the absolute best way to deal with it. As the main umpire for our team and the captain in a USA cricket league in KANSAS of all places , it was hard enough getting an XI let alone a Scorer of decent quality. I lucked on to this Palm software called palm cricket. (you can find it at our club site http://www.wwxicc.org) i spent $45 for it in 2003 and it hasn't cost me a penny since. It's like a 21st century counter. Takes me about 10 minutes to set it up for each game and tracks the score WITHOUT effecting my umpiring duties. In Fact 1 time i forgot to bring it to a game and all the players were upset because it tells them targets and shows a Manhattan graph and balls faced. One big problem we have here is everyone goes off for drinks and instead of a 5 min break it's 10 -15 min , this program tracks time of breaks and helps me get THEM back on the field at the right time also. (tapping a watch does not seem to have the same effect for some reason. You can export the file to a HTML or Excel file and email it to where it needs to go. Check out some score sheets at www.WWXICC.org under schedule social games. Regards Edward Fox Wichita World XI Cricket Club www.KansasCricket.org |
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Post by rlsiam on Aug 15, 2006 7:42:25 GMT
I did not mean that they only talked to each other after every 10 overs.
Any scorer will know that at least one person should be calling the score as events happen.
The non caller should say if they don't agree with the bowlers figures or the running total at the end of each & every over.
A quick tally of everything at least after 10 overs is better than getting to the end of the match or at a break & finding that the scorers don't agree.
I seems that neither of the boys should have been put in the situation of scoring.
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