Cricket News: The flaws in Dom Sibley’s technique that saw him dropped | Looking at Dom Sibley’s technical flaws in a difficult 2021
All the speculations about Dom Sibley’s place came to an end after he was dropped from the Test team for the third Test against India due to his poor run with the bat in 2021.
He has finally paid the price for a prolonged spell of poor form with the bat, since he scored a 300-odd ball 120 against West Indies at Old Trafford, Manchester in 2020. Last summer, his average, stood at 44.33 in eight matches. It has since fallen to 28.94.
The fall of a patient Sibley has caught the attention of many fans and pundits because at one point it seemed like he had cemented his spot at the top for England. But after enjoying a solid run with the bat in 2020, his graph as a batsman has gone downwards, and as many believe that the opposition teams have repeatedly exploited his technical failings.
Ever since Sibley started his professional career, his unorthodox technique has been under the radar of his critics. The same technique got him two hundreds in his first 10 Tests. However, the same technique got him three ducks, five single-figure scores, and a single half-century in his past 15 Test innings.
The flaws in Dom Sibley’s technique exposed at Test level
A front-on, leg-side dominant stance that, so far, hasn’t been able to stand up to the extra demands of international cricket after bringing him so much success for Warwickshire. He can pull, but it’s not his first thought. He nudges through midwicket, but even then it’s a shot laced with a fair bit of risk.
For Sibley, it is not exactly an easy-on-the-eye approach to his game and due to his flawed technique, he’s finding it tough to score runs at the Test level.
For his county, Warwickshire, Sibley scored six consecutive tons to earn a Test debut. The method of scoring runs was the same back then and it’s the same now. The only difference is now Test-quality opponents have found the flaws in his technique and that’s denying him a repeat of 2020 in the year 2021.
Yes, there are few minor tweaks but that’s really not enough for him to get away with his major weaknesses.
The tall Englishman can frustrate any bowling group with his ability to eat balls and bat for hours. Being disciplined outside off stump has been his strength and he also defends well when the line is outside or if it’s just a tad short. The problem for Dom Sibley is not being able to transfer his body weight on the planted front leg; the balance is not quite there and this results in awkward dismissals where he balloons the ball up while playing off his pads.
For Sibley, it has always been about scoring most of his runs in the backward square leg and square leg area, but nowadays the pacers have come with a plan of targeting his middle off stump and asking tough questions.
And then there’s one delivery at which he pokes while playing behind the line of the ball to gift his wicket away. And all this happens due to the unconventional technique as he’s very limited with his scoring shots. There’s a lot he can learn from his skipper Joe Root who himself used to get out routinely to deliveries nipping back in. If he can take a leaf out of Root’s book he’ll be in a much better space than where he’s right now.
The Warwickshire opener is an old-school opener of the type we don’t see much of in modern Test cricket. And that attracts attention. There’s something like Sir Alastair Cook, something like Cheteshwar Pujara. He has the patience and determination to play the longest version of the game, he only needs some tweaks in his technique to get back amongst runs.
Sibley isn’t an elegant batsman or a thrilling one. In fact, he must have one of the ugliest techniques in recent memory. His stance, squat, square-on, bow-legged, makes him look very ugly, but his patience, resistance is something which can be admired by the viewers of Test cricket.
At 25, he still has a lot of time to reconstruct his career as he belongs to a special set of players who can play out the tough hours and stand like a rock for their team. Few minor tweaks and Sibley will once again reestablish himself as England’s reliable option at the top. One may not like a batter like Sibley but he can frustrate the bowling, something which is lacking in most of the modern Test batsman.
As of now he just needs to go back to the drawing board and work out new things in his game with coaches which will make him progress well in his career.
Written by Vaibhav Tripathi. Follow Vaibhav on Twitter today.
