The Blind Ashes is taking place on the Gold Coast, Australia currently as England were aiming to retain the trophy they won back in 2018 after 2020’s series was cancelled due to Covid-19. A rain-spoiled tour this year has resulted in three games cancelled and with only two T20’s left on Tuesday, Australia are out of reach for the tourists after winning the ODI at Tambourine Mountain by 45 runs and back-to-back T20’s over the weekend by seven wickets each.
England Lead Performance Analyst, James Tomson said that having a game so soon after arriving down-under hindered the side:
“We got into the first ODI a little bit tired, little bit unfresh from the plane journey and having three training days on the bounce. So I think we were just a little bit cautious in our approach.”
Tomson, who also works with Kent Spitfires and Birmingham Phoenix as an analyst couldn’t speak highly enough of the quality in the Visually Impaired squad:
“These guys are massively, massively overshadowed in the media and what they can do. Let me put it simply, the skill level of these guys is so, so high. It is unbelievable, they’re so determined to succeed that their standards of training and what they produce is exceptional. I have nothing but respect for them.
“I think it lacks a little bit of publicity, but I think that’s also disability cricket as a whole. You know, let’s not pigeonhole VI cricket as this whole life changing concept. There are some amazingly talented deaf cricketers that represent England cricket. There’s some amazingly talented learning disability cricketers that represent England and the same for the physical disability sites.”
A lot is being done by the ECB to cover disability cricket with the introduction of the Disability Premier League in 2021 and more games happening year on year for visually impaired cricketers,
“The Disability Premier League, which happens every year now, which is a pan Disability tournament, obviously, that the VI aren’t included in that, but you’ve got your your deaf cricketers, your learning disability cricketers, and your physical disability cricketers that take part in in the DPL. Obviously, this year we had the exhibition games at Lords where there was the intra-squad VI game at Lords, which was the first visually impaired game ever played there. And then there was the 40 over exhibition Pan Disability side against the MCC exhibition game also.”
On the international stage, however it is a completely different story on the international stage with all the players having full time jobs to accomodate for. This also makes Tomson’s job as an analyst that bit more difficult than his work for Kent and Birmingham:
“In VI cricket you’ve got three or four international games between two sides once a year. So the sample size of games for me to collect is very small. So that means that the data isn’t necessarily as meaningful around opposition or trends as it perhaps is in the mainstream game.
We try and look for trends in the game. I’ve got data from a series played between Australia and New Zealand, from the T20 World Cup a few years ago. We use the data from around the world to benchmark and to generate conclusions of what it takes to win but, it’s very much trying to use that data to impact our performance.”
The series is now decided after three successive Aussie wins; Steffan Nero has been at the heart of all three, scoring 336 runs across three innings, including two centuries. The final two T20’s take place on Tuesday 26th November and are livestreamed on the Cricket Australia YouTube.
Our @hcltech Ashes stars 🤩
— Cricket Australia (@CricketAus) November 25, 2024
Congratulations Steffan Nero, with his scores of 75 (1st T20I) and 135 (2nd T20I), and Lincoln Muddle, with 3-29 (1st T20I), on leading the Aussies to victory over the weekend ✨ pic.twitter.com/w907LXPLHc
