The ill effects of dew on the game of cricket

Ground staff wipe the dew from the grounds during the ICC World Twenty20

The day-night encounters in the sub-continent provides teams with a completely new challenge. A challenge to base the entire game plan to counter one effect of nature rather than the opponent’s weaknesses. A challenge called the ‘dew’ factor.

Every cricket team today has an entire army of support staff. The coaches, analysts, technicians, doctors, physios, mentors, mascots apart from a host of managers, selectors and administrators accompany the team on their tours. It wouldn’t be very long before meteorologists too joined them who could help predict the extent of dew.

The reasons for dew formation can be explained by elementary physics. During the day, the earth’s surface heats up much faster than the air around it by absorbing the solar radiations. Similarly in the evenings, the earth’s surface loses heat by emitting radiations while the air around it is still warm. Moisture held in the warm air condenses when it comes in contact with the cold ground hence forming a layer of dew across the entire outfield in the evenings.

Effect of dew on-

1. Pitch - The pitch which is usually expected to get slower and crumble in the second innings, freshens up, thanks to the dew settling on the surface. The ball comes on the bat much better and the surface appears to have no hidden demons.
2. Fast bowlers - In order to generate swing, the seamers rub one side of the ball and keep the other side dry. But it becomes impossible to maintain the ball in this condition as every hit along the ground leads to the ball getting drenched. The seam is made up of cloth and hence any amount of wiping the ball will not lead to it becoming completely dry. Bowling with an upright seam and swinging the ball no longer seems a viable option and the bowlers have to resort to bowling cross seam deliveries. Since the ball tends to skid off the pitch, the batsmen can trust the surface and hit through the line of the delivery.
3. Spinners - By the time the spinners come on to bowl, the ball is wet and it is impossible to get a firm grip, without which it is impossible to get revolutions on the ball to make it turn. The fingers tend to slip across the seam and hence all variations go out of the window and all the spinners can look to do is fire the ball on the pads to prevent the batsman from freeing his arms.
4. Fielders - A wet ball is often compared to a wet bar of soap as it slips out of the fielders’ hands faster than it gets in. One requires extremely soft palms with fingers pointing in the conventional upwards position to grab these catches. This is certainly tougher than it sounds else why would eight catches be put down during the second innings of the England versus Sri Lanka game in the World T20.
5. Captains - In such conditions, the fielding captain certainly has the toughest job. Not only does he need to worry about field settings and bowling changes, he also needs to constantly keep up with the over rate. Since it is mandatory for the bowlers to vigorously wipe the ball dry after every delivery to get a decent grip, precious time is wasted which eventually leads to the captain being fined or even banned as Faf du Plessis and Dinesh Chandimal would know better.

In such situations, the team bowling second is at a stark disadvantage, for the winner of the toss wins 80 percent of the battle. A total of more than 300 is a cake walk against bowlers who are no more than bowling machines in such conditions with no swing or spin on offer.

The ICC has been contemplating day-night Test matches, but without a solution to counter the dew effect in sight, Kevin Pietersen seems to have a valid point when he says, “If they want to play it, then it can be a new form of cricket, but they have to use new statistics for it for sure. I am not a fan of it at all.”

On day five, when spinners are expected to torment the batsmen on crumbling tracks and the quicks reverse swinging the old ball, we might see them struggling to even grip the ball. This certainly isn’t the brand of cricket we would like to see the traditional format turning into.