Worcestershire Rapids emerged as champions at the end of a gripping Vitality Blast in 2018. Here, The Cricketer runs the numbers...
Aaron Finch was in tremendous form in the 2018 Vitality Blast, as the above graphic shows. Surrey's combative right-hander crashed 589 runs from just 324 deliveries to come second in the runscoring charts behind Laurie Evans of Sussex, despite only playing nine matches. On the bowling front, Pat Brown of Worcestershire Rapids excelled with his fast bouncers and knuckle balls, taking 31 wickets at, on average, one every 10.5 deliveries
Wham, bam, thank you ma’am.
Hurricane Finch ripped through South Group bowling attacks with ferocious disdain in 2018, collecting a frankly ridiculous 589 runs from just nine innings at an average of 147.25. As if that wasn’t enough, the Australian clobberer-in-chief rang up a strike rate of 182.35 at the same time.
He wasn’t quite stand-out in that area - of the batsmen with more than 200 runs to their names in this year’s competition three others scored faster, with Somerset’s Lewis Gregory tipping the scales with 328 at 202.46 - but it was pretty darn close.
And regardless, when someone ends a nine-innings campaign with two centuries and three fifties in their back pocket, it would be pretty petty to try to find fault.
Finch combined with Jason Roy at the top of the Surrey order to produce one of the most devastating partnerships in Blast history against Middlesex in early August - the pair racking up 194 in just 13.5 overs (yes, 13.5 overs!). Finch ended that evening with 117 at almost two runs per minute - that’s the sort of premium rate usually reserved for overseas collect calls; Middlesex went home trying to unwedge their tails from between their legs.
It was not quite the record Blast opening stand - that is still held by Joe Denly and Daniel Bell-Drummond, who put on 207 for Kent against Essex in 2017 - but it was the second highest for any wicket in the competition's history.
There was one new all-time best set in the partnership department this year.
The evergreen Ian Bell doubled up with Adam Hose to smash Northants’ bowlers all over Edgbaston, the pair’s third-wicket combination producing 171 runs.
The above charts show the top runscorers and wicket-takers of the 2018 Vitality Blast. For the batsmen, the speed at which they accumulated their runs is also shown - for instance, Laurie Evans racked up the most in the competition but, in playing the anchor role at No.3, did so much more slowly than the likes of Dan Christian, Corey Anderson and Colin Ingram. On the bowling front, Brown's wickets also came pretty cheaply, Rashid Khan was by far the most miserly of the leading wicket-takers and, while Jamie Overton returned the third best haul, he was particularly expensive
Northampton’s Wantage Road was the place to be for runs in 2018.
The Steelbacks’ home comfortably topped the list of venues when it came to average first-innings scores, with 194 runs for each non rain-affected knock.
No other ground exceeded an average of 190 runs during the competition, with the exception of Beckenham (199.5) - but that came from just a single matchday.
Other stadiums where supporters got plenty of bang for their buck included Bristol’s County Ground (189.8), the Oval (188.6) and Trent Bridge (186).
Edgbaston, fifth on the list with an average of 182.8 per innings, witnessed more than a 1,000 runs on Finals Day for the second time in as many years.
At the other end of the scale, the Riverside in Durham was the most miserly ground. On average, just 145.6 runs were scored in each Blast first innings there in 2018.
Other more conservative venues included the Ageas Bowl (153.7), Derby’s County Ground (154) and Grace Road (155.6). Every other stadium clocked up averages in excess of 165.
ATTENDANCES ON THE RISE
The 2018 Vitality Blast drew an aggregate attendance of 931,000, up three per cent year-on-year, while Finals Day was watched by a full house of 24,426 at Edgbaston
While we’re on the subject of first-innings scores, the overall average for the competition continued to rise this year.
Back in 2013, teams averaged 152 batting first in the Blast but there has been a steady upwards curve since and in 2018 that figure had increased to 173.
That consistent increase was helped by a whopping overall total of 40,976 runs in the tournament, of which 38,989 (4.85 per cent) came off the bat.
Of all the runs in the competition, more than a fifth (8,712) came in sixes.
Corey Anderson was the king pin in that respect, Somerset’s New Zealand international clubbing 34 maximums during his side’s run to the semi-finals. That represented a massive 39.7 per cent of Anderson’s total run tally in 2018.
A further 14,132 runs came in fours in 2018, meaning that 59 per cent of runs off the bat came in the form of boundaries.
No wonder, then, that run rates were at record-breaking levels. In fact, during the group stages the overall scoring rate of 8.88 across both North and South Groups was higher than any other T20 competition on earth. Ever.
Here, the improvement or decline of each county is broken down into a handy chart. As you can see, Worcestershire and Durham both increased their group-stage points hauls substantially in 2018, while Northants Steelbacks lost plenty of ground, ending up 10 points worse off than a year previously
Worcestershire found a new Bucket Hands in the shape of Ed Barnard on their way to Blast glory in 2018.
Barnard set a new competition record for most catches by a fielder, his total of 15 coming in one ahead of the previous best - set by Aaron Finch (for Yorkshire in 2014) and Steven Croft (for Lancashire in 2015).
His average of 0.937 catches per innings was some way down on Finch’s effort in 2014, however. Back then, the Aussie star made his grabs from just 10 matches at a remarkable rate of 1.4 per game.
Barnard did, however, add five run outs to his catch tally, taking his overall contribution to 20 dismissals. Throw into the mix 12 wickets with the ball and 115 runs with the bat and it’s not hard to see what all the fuss was about over the 22-year-old.
On the subject of dismissal records, Dane Vilas of Lancashire equalled a seven-year-old competition best for wicketkeepers with 18 victims in 2018.
Vilas returned 12 catches and six stumpings to draw level with former Lightning player Gareth Cross, who completed the same haul in 2011.
Worcestershire Rapids' victory is detailed in the above graphic, which shows the spread of runs between several key players, four of whom scored in excess of 300 (only one other county - Somerset - had more batsmen go beyond that barrier). Brown led from the front with the ball, taking 17 more wickets than his nearest team-mate, Wayne Parnell
Worcestershire’s surprise victory was built on a bed of youth and inspired by the significant impact of one or two star names.
Pat Brown stole the show with the ball. The business studies student perplexed many a batting line-up with his zippy bounces and clever knuckle balls, mixing his varieties intelligently and showing tremendous courage in the face of some seriously big-hitting batsmen.
Brown finished the campaign with 31 wickets at an average of 13.35 and a frankly absurd strike rate of 10.48.
Only one man - Alfonso Thomas for Somerset in 2010 - has managed more wickets in a Blast season. Of those to have taken 22 or more wickets in a single campaign, only two others - Durham’s Usman Arshad in 2015 and Azharullah for Northants in 2013 - can lay claim to better strike rates in the history of the tournament.
Wicketkeeper Ben Cox, the man of the match in both the semi-final and the final, enjoyed a prolific season with bat and gloves.
Cox contributed 274 runs, culminating in his excellent half-century against Sussex Sharks to see the Rapids to victory, while he also equalled the club record for dismissals in a Blast campaign - his collection of 14 victims matching Ben Scott’s effort in 2011.
Then there were the big guns.
Moeen Ali, Joe Clarke, Callum Ferguson and Ross Whiteley all passed 300 runs - of all the counties only Somerset had more batsmen exceed that landmark in 2018 - while Moeen, Ferguson and Martin Guptill each hit a century (no other side had three separate hundred-makers).
Guptill’s 35-ball ton against Northants Steelbacks was the fastest of the summer, and the second-fastest in Blast history.
It really was a team effort.
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