Dhoni most valuable player in England-India ODIs

Srinivas Bhogle and Purnendu Maji figure out the most valuable players in the just-concluded England-India ODI series.

It is curious that nobody is loudly criticizing M S Dhoni in spite of such a colossal loss in England; most other Indian captains would have immediately been sacked.

Dhoni's record as India's World Cup-winning captain helps; but even more important is the fact that Dhoni actually played rather well himself. He was the player of the series in the England-India ODIs and, as the table (Table 1) below shows, also the series' Most Valuable Player (MVP).

England's Graeme Swann, with eight wickets, at an economy rate of 4.5, was England's most valuable player.

The MVPI formula picks out batsmen who score a lot of runs at a high strike rate, and bowlers who take a lot of wickets at a low economy rate.

Table 1: Most valuable players in the England-India series (Sep 3-16, 2011)

Runs (scored) | Top score | Strike rate | W: Wickets taken | Eco: Economy rate | | M: Matches played | MVPI: Most valuable player index = sum of batting, bowling and fielding points |*Run outs are counted as 1 (wicket) for a direct hit, and 0.5 (wicket) if the fielder is an equal participant in a run out dismissal.

The cumulative list of India's most valuable ODI performers during the current 2011-12 season (Table 2) shows Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina claiming top honours. Rohit Sharma could have been up there too if he hadn't broken his finger the first ball he faced.

This list conveys the 'old order changeth' feeling with India's top ODI performers of the past like Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag and Zaheer Khan missing.

Rahul Dravid makes a surprising, and undistinguished, last reappearance – he might well go down as India's tragic ODI hero, who gave his heart to the team (he scored 10889 ODI runs, and his wicket-keeping helped India reach the 2003 WC final) but got little respect or acclaim in return.

Table 2: India's most valuable players in the 2011-12 ODI season (10 matches so far)

Runs (scored) | Sixes | Fours | Strike rate | Bat-pts: Batting points | W: Wickets taken | Eco: Economy rate | Bowl-pts: Bowling points | Field-pts: fielding points | M: Matches played | MVPI: Most valuable player index = sum of batting, bowling and fielding points | AvMVPI = MVPI/M | *Run outs are counted as 1 (wicket) for a direct hit, and 0.5 (wicket) if the fielder is an equal participant in a run out dismissal.