Player skills
Each player has seven main skills that determine their ability :
Stamina
IMPORTANT FOR: All players.
Stamina is not only used during matches, it is used in player personal fitness level recovery post-match too.
Stamina during matches
During a match, players get 'tired'. The lower the player's stamina level, the quicker the player gets tired. Even players with maximum level of stamina will be affected by the tiring effect.
Players with low stamina can still put in a good performance at times - the random effect sees to that. Over the course of time, however, things will balance out.
- No matter how high a player's stamina skill, he will experience some reduction in his performance during a match - the extent of which will depend totally on his stamina.
- There is a limit to how high a players stamina can be - Superb +6. This is displayed in-game as Superb*.
- Different bowler types tire at different rates. Faster bowlers will tire faster than slower bowlers.
- There is some personal fitness recovery during a match, when the player is not bowling or batting.
- Bowlers with insufficient stamina are likely to give away more runs if they are used in the last ten overs of a limited overs match.
- Stamina skill level can be increased by training via stamina nets.
Stamina skill level decay - due to old age
The player's level of stamina will start to decay due to old age - this process starts when the player is 33 years old. No other skills decay due to age.
*** For more info on stamina decay rates, go to the Age page. ***
Batting
Bowling
IMPORTANT FOR: Bowlers.
Bowling is only used during matches. This is the primary skill for determining a bowler's overall skill.
There are several types of bowler available:
- Spin
- Medium
- Fast-medium
- Fast
Some bowler types prefer specific pitch conditions.
Fielding
IMPORTANT FOR: All outfield players (including wicket-keeper).
Fielding is only used during matches. They do say that catches win matches, and if your team’s fielding is not up to scratch, then you will not catch those catches.
Catches don't always go to your strongest fielder. We don't see all catching chances (ie. dropped catches are not reported back to users specifically, although some pieces of commentary text may suggest this). Over time, most players would receive the same number of catching chances (not sure if this includes keepers).
During the IRC Q&A on 17 Oct 2006, Allan stated:
"Is fielding a factor for Wicket Keepers? Yes."
Wicket-keeping
IMPORTANT FOR: Keepers.
It will help to have a good wicket keeper as he will tend to hold on to a lot of chances for catches and make more stumpings.
He will also be responsible for keeping byes and leg-byes down to a minimum.
Wicket keepers will have a greater influnce on the game starting from next season (Sept 2007).
Make sure your keeper is a decent batsman, preferably with lots of fielding and stamina.
During the IRC Q&A on 17 Oct 2006, Allan stated:
"Is fielding a factor for Wicket Keepers? Yes."
During the IRC Q&A on 30 Jun 2006, Allan stated:
"Are you happy with the level of affect WK Keepers have, and the level of byes? Keepers do have a fairly big effect, although it is often not reported. Byes seem reasonable. There are one or two ideas in the pipeline that will see WK importance coming more and more to the front."
"Can elaborate on the causes of byes? It's a bit of poor bowling, but mostly poor wicket keeping and a slight factor of the pitch type."
Concentration
IMPORTANT FOR: Batsmen, Fielders, All players.
The importance of this will be larger for First Class games than for one day games, although it is valuable in both forms of the game. A batsman may be very well endowed in batting skill, but if he can't concentrate then he is likely to make a silly mistake and get out earlier than he would have otherwise.
It also has an effect on an individuals fielding and wicketkeeping ability; you need to stay alert in the field or risk missing that chance for a catch!
Consistency
IMPORTANT FOR: Bowlers, Fielders, All players.
The importance of this is larger for First Class games than for one day games, although it is valuable in both forms of the game. A bowler may have a great amount of bowling skill, but if he can't consistently put the ball in the same areas then he is likely to find himself disappearing to all areas of the park more often than he otherwise would.
It also has an effect on a players ability to field and wicketkeep; the more consistent the individual, the more likely they are to hold their catches and save runs.
Dual Nationality
A player can obtain dual nationality in two ways:
- some players are 'born' with it; or
- if a player spends 5 seasons in the same club in another country, he will become eligible to play for that country in International matches.
However, when a player has played an International match for either the U19 or full national sides of any of his eligible countries, from that point on he will only be eligible to play for that country.