Chris Gayle’s technique is a nifty homegrown one which he has honed over the years. (Source: PTI)
There is this incredible stat of Chris Gayle in the IPL over the years. In the years he has been successful — and there have been four such seasons 2011, ’12, ’13 and ’15 — he has hit at least one boundary every four balls. This hasn’t been the case in his bad years— ’14,’16 and ’17 — and there is a reason to it. In those three years, he was in and out of the playing XI. Most batsmen can be seen through the prism of technique, hand-eye coordination or age, but with Gayle, the most prominent traits are momentum and power. He isn’t a batsman you play every now and then; the more he plays, the more momentum he derives and thrives.
It isn’t that there’s no technique involved. It’s a nifty homegrown technique which he has honed over the years, but what stands out is his self-awareness and the ability to impose his style on the opposition so consistently.
Auto-pilot mode
There has been a perception that he is someone who used to take time in settling down. It’s not the case in the IPL as can be seen in the last column of the table below. His strike rate in the first 12 deliveries is more or less the same as he gets by the end of the innings. He isn’t like Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, or Kane Williamson who make up the strike rate as the innings goes on. Neither is he like Brendon McCullum who tries to go overboard in the first few deliveries. He has a measured way of doing things. On those occasions that he gets going, he seems to be an aeroplane on an auto-pilot mode: cruising pretty much on the same supersonic speed.
| CONSISTENT HITTING | ||||
| Season | Matches | Runs | S/R | S/R 1st 12 balls |
| 2011 | 12 | 608 | 183 | 205 |
| 2012 | 15 | 733 | 160 | 161 |
| 2013 | 16 | 708 | 156 | 158 |
| 2014 | 9 | 196 | 106 | 99 |
| 2015 | 14 | 491 | 147 | 142 |
| 2016 | 10 | 277 | 151 | 116 |
| 2017 | 9 | 200 | 122 | 112 |
| 2018 | 7 | 311 | 149 | 136 |
| * Strike-rate after first 12 balls. For knocks yielding over 30 runs. | ||||
What went wrong in the last two years?
As has been mentioned above, Gayle has had three bad IPL seasons: 2014, 2016 and 2017. This table below tells a story. While in 2014, he missed a few games due to injury, in 2016, RCB kept chopping and changing. His worst came in 2017 when the Chinnaswamy stadium, usually full of runs, was turned into a square turner, with average scores dipping to 143. There is a stunning stat from last year: the average turn in degrees for other venues was 1.6, but Bangalore track offered 3.1 degrees — Gayle was clearly unsuitable for that.
On the other hand, his new team Kings XI Punjab didn’t play him in the first game in Mohali, a 4 pm start at a venue where day games have thrown up slow tracks. Instead, they got him in against Chennai on a flat track, and he exploded in style. That said, Gayle is not someone whom you can swap and use the horses-for-courses theory. If you have him in your side, you need to give him a continuous run. He might fail a couple of games but will score big in every three games. Unfortunately, in 2016 and ’17, he was in and out of the team.
| PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS | |||||||
| Season | Matches | Runs | Avg | S/R | Avg score @ B’lore | Avg and S/R home | Avg and S/R away |
| 2011 | 12 | 608 | 67 | 183 | 160 | 413 runs @ 103.25, S/R-183 | 195 runs @3 2, 183 |
| 2012 | 15 | 733 | 61 | 160 | 168 | 194 @ 32.1, 141 | 539 @ 89.8, 168 |
| 2013 | 16 | 708 | 59 | 156 | 163 | 522 @ 130.1, 170 | 186 @ 23.3, 130 |
| 2014 | 9 | 196 | 21.7 | 106 | 177 | 72 @ 18, 97 | 124 @ 24.8, 112 |
| 2015 | 14 | 491 | 40.9 | 147 | 177 | 180 @ 36, S/R-160 | 311 @ 44.4, 142 |
| 2016 | 10 | 277 | 22.7 | 151 | 186 | 172 @ 24.5, 157 | 55 @ 18.3, 134 |
| 2017 | 9 | 200 | 22.2 | 122 | 143 | 36 @ 7.2, 73 | 164 @ 41, 143.8 |
| 2018 | 7 | 311 | 62.2 | 149 | – | 225 @ 75, 155* | 86 @ 43, 112 |
| * Gayle’s home venues this year are Mohali and Indore | |||||||
Wide stance, Shape Retention
It’s a technique that won’t be suitable for every batsman but Gayle has prospered with his wide stance and the stability it provides. This is the reason you don’t see him coming down the track — except for the match against RR where he did dance down only to get stumped. It can be seen as a deficiency in other batsmen, especially those who have the tendency to use the feet. The wider stance straitjackets them. Not with Gayle. It acts as a perfect swinging base for his bat-flow. And it also allows him to focus on the way he lifts his bat.
Most batsmen, between the time the bowler’s back foot hits the crease to when the front foot lands, begin to move around. Or at least take a small step or two. Not Gayle. In his good days, he is almost waiting to uncoil and lash out. But crucially, he has the control to wait.
The front shoulder and the down swing synchronise in straight lines — and all along he stays in the important upright position as it allows him a wider reach, and allows him get the maximum bat-speed and elevation that he seeks. The position from the back-foot strike to the front-foot strike hardly changes as he gets into a position where he wants to be.
He stays deep inside the crease, usually for the seamers, and allows the ball to come as close as possible before he gives it a full whack. When he is in his element, the bat comes down perfectly and with a lot of bottom-hand power, amplified by a smooth hip-swing.
This is why we also see him almost carve good-length deliveries square of the pitch. He doesn’t go back and across for the horizontal cut when the ball is closer to him, or get the feet closer together to punch it off the back foot. Instead, he just collapses the arms, and gets the bat down in an angle to carve length deliveries through the off side.
LEFT: Gayle stays absolutely still between the time the bowler hits the crease. RIGHT: His wide stance acts as a perfect swinging base for his bat-flow.
How to stop Gayle
Teams who have succeeded against Gayle try to do three things. 1) Start bowling the variations straightaway to unsettle him. 2) Try to bowl testing lengths to nick him off. 3) Have an off spinner open the bowling. This theory has worked in the recent two games. Even though he did manage a 50 against Mumbai, it took him 40 balls to get there.
Out of the 31 deliveries that MI pacers bowled at him, 22 were variations — slower ones, yorkers and bouncers. The more one tries the orthodox length balls in an effort to get him to edge, the more he is likely to take one to the cleaners. Jofra Archer bowled with speed but didn’t try to make him edge. Instead, he went round the stumps, and hurled three at the chest, which unsettled the big Jamaican. In the recent game against Rajasthan, Gayle lasted just two deliveries against the off-spinner Gowtham.
The point is to never allow him to settle down. Try all the variations that are usually reserved for the death overs at the start itself. And unsettle him. He isn’t a batsman who is going to use soft hands, drop the ball for a single.