USA Cricket is on it’s way to the Super 8. Not the motel, but instead the next round of the Men’s T20 Cricket World Cup. They finished second in their group with wins over Canada and Pakistan, a close loss to India, and a washout game against Ireland. This granted them 5 points and a berth into the next round. They’ll go on to face South Africa, West Indies (Known as the Windies), and England. Two wins in this round-robin group would likely be enough to see them through to the semi-finals.

Definitions

Let’s say you’ve never seen a game of cricket before, where do you even start to understand this cousin of baseball? Here are a few terms to start:

  • Runs: Like in baseball, the goal of the game is to score the most runs possible. In baseball, you have to round all 4 bases to score a run. In cricket, you merely have to run 20 meters to the other side of the Pitch to score a run. If you hit the ball out of the field, it’s 4 runs if it bounced on the way out, 6 runs if it clears the boundary before landing.
  • Wicket: This when is when the batter is out. In baseball, a batter would get to go again after getting out. In cricket, once you get out, you are done for the match. You get 10 wickets before your team is done playing offense. You can get out if the ball is caught before bouncing, the ball hits the stumps (also called a wicket) on delivery, or hits the stump before you reach the other side of the pitch.
  • Overs: This divides up the innings. The bowling team delivers (pitches) 6 balls per Over. There are 20 Overs per side in T20 cricket (hence the name). ODI - One Day International - has 50 Overs per side. Once you’ve exhausted all the overs, your team is done batting.
  • Innings: Each team gets 1 of these in T20 cricket. (Why is it plural then? Who can say.)

So, to bring it all together, when your team bats first, you want them to score as many runs as possible in 20 Overs before you have 10 Wickets.

If your team is batting second, your team is chasing the target set by the first team. Once you achieve the target, have lost 10 wickets, or used 20 overs, the match is over.

Scorelines

Let’s break down a few scorelines to understand why there are fractions.

Canada Vs USA - T20 World Cup

Canada batted first. They scored 194 runs, with 5 of their batters going out in 20 overs. USA batted second, and needed to hit a target of 195. They successfully did so by scoring 197 runs in 17.4 Overs. (17 full overs, and 4 of the 6 balls delivered in the 18th over). They only had 3 batters go out. (197/3)

In a bit of parlance that I believe is left over from Test Cricket, this is denoted with “winning by 7 wickets” - but more importantly is “winning by 14 balls”. Given the 120 balls available to score the points, it lets us know how many resources they had left.

Pakistan Vs USA - T20 World Cup In one of the most tense matches for this newer cricket fans, USA had to chase again. Pakistan had 7 batters go out as they scored 159 runs. USA needed to score 160 runs to win. However, they only tied at 159 runs. Even though they only had 3 batters to go out, that’s not used as a tie breaker.

The teams went to a Super Over, which is a single over for both teams. USA batted first and scored 18 runs with 1 out (18/1), setting a target of 19 for Pakistan. If they scored 18, it would be a second Super Over. However, Pakistan only scored 13, and the USA won their second match.

India vs USA - T20 World Cup

I’ll leave this to the reader! Can you answer the following:

  • Who batted first and who batted second?
  • How many runs did each team score?
  • How many overs did each team play?

Lastly, there was supposed to be a match against Ireland, but it got rained out. Rain Outs give a point (wins 2 points) and the USA scored 5 points in the group, enough to get second and advance to the next round. This result also guarantees the US a spot in the 2026 T20 World Cup!

tl;dr: hit dingers, don’t get out, and win international acclaim. (And more PTO from Oracle)

More Resources

  • ESPN CricInfo - The best cricket scoreboard with lots of live commentary and stats.
  • Netflix “Explained” on Cricket - A great short video that explains the overall history of Cricket and some of the rules.
  • Willow TV - $10 a month to stream cricket. You can watch the whole World Cup here, and next month is Major League Cricket, the US’s domestic T20 Cricket league.