Good job Andy. You could also throw in a suggestion or two for the white-coated turtles on the field. Delay due to them would mean one of them would be sent off the field. Or they would have to take fielding practice from Yuvaraj or Pietersen after bad light sets in or both. In fact you could speed them up by offering batsman 6 runs if he can make the umpire jump.

HAHA good stuff! Try and push for this, it may actually work! Probably the best blog so far on cricinfo!

Perhaps the batting team should nominate who should bowl the overs bowled short (and they should be bowled at the end of the day) - and it need not be a player from the opposing team!

Help me! Is this supposed to be funny?

Andy you forget to count that the delay can increase when Steve Bucknor is the umpire. Considering he takes 30 seconds to raise a finger.
If there are 50 appeals in a day gone are a good 25 mins or 7 overs :). And they say the sides are bowling slowly, what a harsh world!!

goodness! made for an awesome read! that was 5 mins of my day i wont regret having lived. keep 'em coming!!

That's not a bad idea, Andy. Take it a step further and you might have something: should the over rate fall below the required 15/hr, suspend 2 of the bowlers who bowled in that slow hour from bowling in the subsequent hour. That way a captain could not just put in a part-timer for one over and suspend him for an hour while the real bowlers continue. He'd have to take out the part-timer and another bowler.
Or, how about this? If the over rate is slow, the bowler who bowled the most of the over in that hour could not bowl for the next 2 hours. That way the captain could not just rest his workhorse for an hour then bring him back on. He'd get an hour of rest, but he'd have to stew while his teammates get bashed around without him.

If the team is down 3 overs in an hour,runrate should be awarded. So suppose if team is scoring at 3 an over, then the team would
be awarded 9 runs [for loss of 3 overs] and this should happen at end of the day
and suppose if a rounded figure comes like 10.4 or 10.333 or anything, then the figure is
completed by postives [number of runs] so if runrate is 3.4 and 3 overs are missing
3.4 x 3 = 10.2 = 11 runs!

I like the idea of a fielder time out. Would make test cricket genuinely interesting! But what if they EXCEED the over rate? (i.e. Bangladesh with spinners)

How about remote controlled electrical devices attached to or inserted into players? Perhaps in the jockstrap? A team of match referees sits at a control desk and whenever the fielding team are dawdling or being too slow... ZAP!

There is much potential for motivation, especially if you think about where you place the electrodes...

Great stuff Andy! I love the point about the 4th umpire taking 6 minutes to decide if the fielder's shoe lace grazed the boundary rope!! Great.

You made my day Andy !!!!!

Love the idea of a fielder off. Would be worth counting over rates over each session rather than each hour. But don't agree to Mezba's comment indicating there should be some reward for exceeding over rates. We're not asking for over time - just 90 overs a day !!

You can penalize slow overrates in ODIs and T20s this way. Any overs bowled after the cut-off time should be made power play overs (after taking into account delays beyond the fielding teams control). This is fair to both teams batting first or second. For tests, if a team is guilty of slow over rate, the opposing captain should be allowed to suspend any player of his choice for the next test. For example if Australia was guilty of slow overrate, the England captain could suspend Michael Hussey (their star player) for the next test.

oh man, too jokes

along with the seriousness of some very nice ideas, the over-exaggeration really made sense. really good stuff, amazing blog

Oh god, THe best artice and great suggestions. One of the best blogs on cricinfo. Anyone agree?

I agree that way too much is being done about determining 4s etc. The suggested penalty of fielders is excellent - something like soccer or hockey. There should be a clock on the field and teams dont go to lunch or drinks until 30/15 overs are bowled in the session - ALL of these should be incorporated.

Huzzah sir!! why not introduce runners for the fielding team. this would cut down on boundaries, reduce wear and tear on their boots and allow bowlers to remain fresh from not fielding their own bowling. As a village cricketer of noted ability( I once smashed the windscreen of the opposing captains car)we also manage to have certain liquid refreshments at long on, long off and a suspiciously deep deep fine leg. Serious consideration should be given to the loss of a fielder for 5 overs. A sound suggestion that merits discussion at the next I.C.C. meeting

I'm all in favour of a sniper placed on the pavillion roof. If the over rate drops below the required rate (without good reason of course), then the sniper will have two overs in which to take potshots at the fielding side. He will not be allowed to aim at either bowler or wicketkeeper because they will be sitting ducks. However, all other fielders are fair game. Firstly, no-one likes to be shot, so I reckon this would solve the problem. Secondly, in the event of an infringement, wouldn't it be side-splittingly hilarious to watch 9 fielders duck and weave at random all around the outfield for two whole overs. In these dark times when the very essence of test cricket is at risk, this simple rule change would definitely put bums on seats. And let's face it, the ICC are a pack of self absorbed moronic puppets, so if I can get someone from the BCCI to propose this rule change, I am confident it will be implemented by summers end.

Interesting suggestions Andy. For some reason I expected this blog to be a load of crap but I found it to be quite humourous. The response from Shane Legge is a classic ... I think you've got the issue solved there, Shane. Good work all round!

Sad and pathetic; second blog that I have read of this said satirist. Correction, *last* blog I will be reading of this said satirist.

I don't have an inventive and entertaining response, and would not dare to attempt to a witty repartee for fear of falling well short of the mark.

My simple solution to the slow over rate is to fine the fielding team a number of runs at the end of each over based on the current run rate. So, if 13 overs are bowled in the first hour and the run rate is 2.5 (yes England batting and Australia bowling, unfortunately), then we simply multiply the number of overs short (2) by the run rate (2.5) and immediately add 5 runs to the total as extras. We could introduce a new type of extra called "fine". This would certainly make captains and team managers take notice if at the end of the day the bowling side is 8 overs short and an additional 24 odd runs have been added to the total. I suspect that this thought has been put forward before, not that i have seen it anywhere. Your thoughts please?

Cheers
Gary

Hmmm. Interesting, but wait a minute. How did ICC or whoever arrived at this magical 4 min/over formula? It should ideally be 5 min/over for Test matches and 14 overs/hour for ODIs and score/scores. We can speed up a bit by asking only the batsmen to change ends rather than all and sundry at the end of an over. The ends can be swapped every hour after the Drinks break. Third-umpire rulings should also be timed out. If the 3rd Ump can't decide in 4 replays. The batsman stays! (And the 3rd umpire loses 10% match fee).
Whatever happened to the good-old add 5 penalty runs/over to the batting side?

@ snehalnayan

if bucknor has to raise his finger 50 times a day the match would be over by a long margin. no one will have any complaints on over rate. ;)

This is a great idea Andy as failure to reach the required over rate must punish the bowlers. With this in mind, here's my suggestion:
All awarded wides and no-balls in a session where the required over-rate is not achieved are counted twice. Simple.

Absolutely delightful read!

I'll be waiting for the next one :)

Hope you just wrote a comic article. Why would you want to have players running from one side of the ground to the other just to prevent himself from getting ousted?
Why would you want the 4th umpire to see the time like Olympic officials?

I vote for adding runs. Why not make the bowling side really pay. If at the end of play for the day, why not penalized the fielding side by the number of balls left at the close of play. If there are 5 overs to be bowled, then automatically the batting side gets 30 runs. Off course the batting side will like to slow down the proceedings, so when they are responsible for the slow over rate, you give the fielding side a head start of 30 runs. And if the umpires are responsible, deduct twice the overs in percentage from their pay for that day, in this case 10%. Will be fun to see how confused non-cricket playing nations will NOW get. HieHieHie.

Seriously the most funny article on cricket yet. I nearly fell off my chair laughing.

Your suggestions are certainly innovative. You also include Steve Bucknor and Rudi 'slow death' Koertzen in the list of time saving mechanisms. One takes an age to make up his mind and then raises the finger and the other raises it so slowly that the bowling team has completed its celebrations of the dismissal by the time the hand comes up completely.

Sadly, for a professional "humorist", you're humor is labored. Maybe you should go back to warming toilet seats.

Over-rate still a worry for Australia... I think Hayden or Australia are not worried about Over rates.. after all they are playing NewZeland in a "Third World Country".

Good article.

Match should be won or lost based on skill, not by getting overs done in 2 hrs etc.

Everyone remember how i the past chasing teams came agonisingly close to winning games but couldn't as they had one over short for bowling with a slow over rate.

A bowler should not be allowed to take a run-up before bowling if he takes more time to bowl!
OR They can shorten the length of the pitch and field so that the ball reaches the batsman/boundary faster....

Thanks Andy, for a very enjoyable article. However, seriously, I do not understand why over rate become such a huge issue. I have watched tests in the past when playing time was 5.5 hours a day. And cricket was played at snail's pace; often less than 200 runs a day. Today's run rates are far greater; by and large there is a result at the end of 5 days and number of spectators is not greatly reduced. While I agree paying public needs to see as much cricket as possible and time wasting tactics must be punished, surely there is no complaint about the quality of test cricket today. To force players to stick to a regimental rate of 15 overs per hour or get penalised is ridiculous. We do not want test matches decided by calculators rather than by bat and ball. I believe there should be an incentive for meeting over rates rather than penalty and that could be by an extra point towards their Rating on the ladder. That will surely help.

if this was implemented, how long would it be before Ricky Ponting was running in to bowl a slow off break, and then dashing back down to the other end in the hope of making a quick stumping?

I'd pay to see it.

I smell the birth of a new cricketing cult hero...