The FTI MVP rankings have become an integral part of the English season over recent years, but what do they actually mean? We asked Vikram Solanki, Chairman of The Professional Cricketers’ Association, to explain how they work.
Cricket is a game that lends itself to statistical analysis. Everyone who has played the game knows their career top-score and best bowling figures, and can probably tell you (possibly in greater detail than you want to know) when and where they were achieved.
Batting and bowling averages are routinely published at all levels of the game. They tell us much, but by definition they don’t allow the performances of batters and bowlers to be compared, nor do they give greater credit for capturing a key wicket rather than a tailender or scoring runs quickly and selflessly.
The Professional Cricketers Association therefore took up the challenge of developing a rankings system which would allow the performances of players to be assessed in a way which more completely reflects their value to their team – and thus were born the MVP (Most Valuable Player) Rankings, now sponsored by FTI Consulting.
These allow batters, bowlers, wicketkeepers and allrounders to be compared. They give more credit for dismissing a top-order batsman than a lower-order one; for scoring runs quickly, or for scoring a high percentage of a side’s runs; and they reward aspects of play – winning, captaincy, catches and run-outs – which don’t feature in averages tables.
The FTI MVP Rankings have become a matter for debate, pride and argument in dressing rooms throughout first-class cricket, and there can be no greater endorsement than that for the last four years the player topping these rankings was chosen by the players as their Player of the Year.
But to use the FTI MVP Rankings simply to choose a winner sells them short. They can also fuel cricketing debate, allowing comparison of the performances of spinners and seamers; of dashing middle-order batsmen and solid openers; and of left and right-handers. As with any statistical measure, the rankings are most meaningful when considered across a series of matches, but they also lend themselves to consideration of the relative merits of individual performances.
But all that aside, who topped the tables in 2011? Click on the video and find out…
