Historical statistical preview of the Second Test, Pakistan vs NZ

I've decided to put together a short summary of some of the historical trends at Dubai, before this match.

First, the probability of different results based on first innings scores. This suggests that a score of 300 is roughly the point where a team is more likely to win than lose, while the 50% winning score is roughly 370.

The next question is how important is the toss.

I've put together this little graph to show that:

Pakistan tend to win when they win the toss, but other teams win as much as they lose if they win the toss.

Interestingly, there isn't enough statistical evidence here to say that the toss actually makes a difference to the result. If it made no difference whatsoever, you would expect to see a result as skewed or more skewed to winning the toss about 12% of the time.

Next I looked at grounds that had similar characteristics over the past 5 years:

Here's where DSC sits in:

The most similar grounds to Dubai, based on the bowlers records are in order of most similar to least similar:
Kingstown
Kanpur
Chittagong (ZAC)
Bulawayo (QSC)
Harare
Abu Dhabi
Delhi
Dunedin (University)
Sharjah

Looking at the results of the players from this match in similar grounds, and weighting them by their similarity to Dubai, here are some key players from each side:

Player	Team	Batting
Imam-ul-Haq	PAK	43.41
Mohammad Hafeez	PAK	33.02
Azhar Ali	PAK	65.31
Haris Sohail	PAK	55.39
Asad Shafiq	PAK	55.42
Babar Azam	PAK	26.76
Sarfraz Ahmed	PAK	52.96
Bilal Asif	PAK	6.33
JA Raval	NZ	33.88
TWM Latham	NZ	67.06
KS Williamson	NZ	37.03
LRPL Taylor	NZ	66.36
HM Nicholls	NZ	24.68
BJ Watling	NZ	30.28
C de Grandhomme	NZ	1.50
IS Sodhi	NZ	74.98

Then the equivalent for the bowlers:

Player	Team	Bowling
Mohammad Abbas	PAK	18.78
Hasan Ali	PAK	19.20
Bilal Asif	PAK	20.74
Yasir Shah	PAK	27.24
Haris Sohail	PAK	17.21
TA Boult	NZ	22.86
C de Grandhomme	NZ	22.50
N Wagner	NZ	26.31
AY Patel	NZ	17.57
IS Sodhi	NZ	60.81

That suggests that this might not be the best test for the leggies, with the ball tending to keep a bit low at Dubai. Both Sodhi and Yasir Shah have the highest weighted averages in their teams.

The relatively high batting averages and low bowling averages for both sides in these conditions suggests that this could be a very difficult match to predict. Both teams are capable of putting together big partnerships and rapid collapses/quick bags of wickets.

It's shaping as another intriguing test.