Assumptive Determinism

The refrain is likely familiar to the ears of sports followers. If the referee / umpire hadn’t made a certain decision / disallowed a goal / try / not given the batsman / woman out then one’s chosen team would have won / not lost the match. The refrain is a rationalisation that one moment or decision has influenced a contest to the point that if that decision or moment hadn’t taken place then the result of the contest would have remained the same aside from the cause celebre. Such a line of thinking is most prevalent amongst Football supporters but one imagines that the phenomenon is prevalent amongst all sports.

   Nevertheless, the notion is surely at least flawed if not completely erroneous. The assumption that a match’s course of events would remain the same after one has carefully extracted a controversial moment of one’s choice likely proves fallacious for the simple reason that each decision, episode, occurrence or incident will directly affect the decisions, tactics and resultant consequences from that juncture onward. For instance, if Team A does not concede a goal, try or wicket then the whole fabric of the contest will alter significantly. The tactics and style of play of both teams are likely to be different in the absence of said goal, try or wicket.

   During the first Ashes test at Edgbaston a cricketing equivalent developed. After Usman Khawaja was dropped by Jonny Bairstow during Australia’s first innings the opener scored a further 78 runs. Thus, comments regarding how Bairstow’s error has cost England 78 runs began to surface. Such assertions fail to take into account that had Bairstow completed the dismissal then the whole narrative of the Australian innings, and, consequently, the match would have changed completely. The remainder of Australia’s batting order would likely have batted differently in light of the dismissal whilst England’s bowling would likely have undertaken an altered course. To simply cherry-pick one isolated moment in a contest, extract it from the contest and assume that everything else would remain the same thereafter seems a rather flawed notion. Each moment, each run, boundary, decision and dismissal changes the course of a contest irrevocably to the point where viewing one moment in isolation fails to take into account the context and circumstances either side of that moment.

   Of a more opaque nature are the discussions regarding Ben Stokes’ first evening declaration. Many assertions claimed that had England batted on into the second morning then they would have scored enough runs to avoid defeat. Such an assertion assumes that Australia would not have taken the final two wickets quickly, either on the first evening or second morning. Unlike the Bairstow scenario though, there is no guarantee either way, nothing that can be definitively quantified, thus making any assumptions ever more difficult. Nevertheless, had England continued batting and had they scored a further forty or fifty runs as prescribed, then this scenario would also have altered the fabric of the contest irrevocably. Just as the presence of an unused fifth day of a test match affects tactics and modi operandi on the previous three or four days so England batting another dozen overs or so would potentially change the course of the match thereafter, particularly when one takes into account the rain delays and the resultant period when England batted in tricky conditions. Hence why taking time out of a match is a legitimate tactic in red ball cricket.

   Both scenarios highlight that incidents in a particular match do not occur in isolation and that extracting or changing a particular moment is likely to lead to a much altered narrative. Just as if that disallowed goal doesn’t necessarily lead on to the match ending in a draw or a victory for one’s favoured team, so a dropped catch or poor decision from an umpire cost a team the exact number of runs that a batter scores from that juncture onward. In essence, there is always a sort of sporting cause and effect in existence.