World News – UK – Eoin Morgan: « Nothing unusual » over coded signals from the dressing room

Eoin Morgan defended the English analyst’s use of real-time signals in his T20I series against South Africa with « 100% » in the spirit of the game « and that » there is nothing unpleasant about it « .

Nathan Leamon, the lead analyst for England’s White Ball teams, has placed two clipboards – one with a number on a piece of paper and the other with a letter – on the dressing room balcony to help Morgan do his work help decision-making throughout the series, hosted by the host broadcaster SuperSport during 3rd. T20I was highlighted on Tuesday.

While England cleared its plan with umpire Andy Pycroft, the use of signals has drawn some criticism in the UK press – notably from Michael Vaughan, who wrote in his Daily Telegraph column that he had « absolutely no chance » got engaged to an analyst who wanted to send him information during a game while he was captain.

« Captains are different, » Morgan said Thursday, the eve of the three-game ODI series that opens in Newlands, in response to criticism. « You get captains who really enjoy the title, the power and the awards that come with it, and then you have other captains who are pushed further and want to learn for the good of the team.

« For me, this is a system we’re going to try to help myself and the other executives on the side take the emotions of decision making on the field and compare that to the hard data that continues to feed data into us and the guys from the field. « 

It should be understood that the signals related to a suggestion of who should roll next and a possible field setting. For example, in the ‘2C’ signal, the ‘2’ could have been a suggestion that Chris Jordan should bowl, the ‘C’ referring to a field set for wide Yorkers.

Morgan added that his plans were largely in line with Leamon’s suggestions throughout the series and that he had no doubts about the ethics of receiving live data from outside the field.

« There weren’t many decisions that were different: I think there were three in the first game, two in the second game, and a pair in the third. It’s nice to know that most of the decisions that me, Jos and the bowlers made on the pitch actually repeat what we think is right.

« 100%, [it’s] in the spirit of the game. There is nothing uncomfortable about that. It’s about maximizing the information we ingest and measuring it against the trainers’ recommendations, the data, and the operations. We’ll definitely go ahead and provide a sample size sufficient to determine if this affects or improves our decision making in the field or our performance. « 

While the focus on coded signals has sparked a debate this week, getting information from support staff during games is nothing new to Captains. Most T20 tournaments around the world have strategic innings timeouts that allow coaches to interact with players on the field. During dating, messages were passed on during drink breaks or during a glove change.

Morgan, who had previously used small pieces of paper to aid him with his plans during the Games, reiterated that using data and interacting with the dressing room was a constant trait throughout his time as captain.

« There was always constant verbal or physical communication from the locker room to us on the field to improve my decisions as captain and Jos’ decisions as vice captain, trying to correlate the feeling of the flow of the game and what we are thinking , are the right choices [with] the data we’ve already explored to come into play, « he said.

« It’s something that we used a lot before the game and that we’re now experimenting with in-game to see if we can improve our performance on the field. We are always looking to improve our performance as a team and of course, as captain, I want to get the best out of our players in order to get the best out of our team. « 

Charl Langeveldt, South Africa’s bowling coach, suggested that his team didn’t know England was using signals until they were shown during the airing of the third T20I.

« We didn’t know they were using it, » he admitted. « A guy like Corrie [van Zyl] used it when he was training with the Knights. I do not know how it works. It may be something we can investigate. Maybe it could be when you bowl to death, or when you start bowling certain balls at certain batsmen . . . I am not sure what this is about. « 

Eoin Morgan, English cricket team, Cricket, South African national cricket team, Michael Vaughan