The Duckworth Lewis method of calculating what a team batting second needs to score in a rain affected limited overs match is a farce.
More often than not the team batting second ends up having to score more than one run more than was scored by the team batting first.
E.g. In a 50 overs match the team batting first because of rain or bad light can only play for say 35 overs and scores say 200 runs. The team batting second will also have 35 overs but the Duckworth Lewis method can decree that they need 210 runs to win or even 193.
Now surely that just doesn’t make any sense as everyone knows that in a cricket match the team which scores the most runs is the winner and if both teams have the same number of overs what’s the problem? One run more than the other team scored is more than they scored.
Seems to me that Messrs. Duckworth and Lewis, with good marketing, have convinced the cricket authorities that their method is the right one to adjudicate in rain affected limited over matches. It takes into account a variety of factors like which batsmen are batting and what they MIGHT score and bowlers bowling and how well they MIGHT bowl. No doubt they SOLD the system to the cricket authorities for a handsome fee.
Why bother playing a match at all. Let all limited overs matches be decided using the D/L method.
The old method was much fairer. If the team batting first batted for the allotted number of overs and the team batting second could only bat some of those overs then surely it is much fairer if the match was decided on what the scores were when each team had batted for the same number of overs. Or as they also did in the past the first team’s score was converted into runs per over and multiplied by the number of overs the team batting second received. This total, plus one, was then the score needed to win. And these methods were free.
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If proof be needed that the Duckworth Lewis method doesn’t work you need look no further than the final match between England and Zimbabwe at Lords on 22nd July 2000.
During the Radio 4 commentary the commentators kept referring to the DL method when trying to predict what total Zimbabwe would make.
With five overs still to be bowled it was emphatically stated that Zimbabwe would score 160 runs. In fact Zimbabwe scored 169. Need more be said?