Before each exciting cricket match, team captains gather on the field 30 minutes beforehand to exchange squad selection sheets. It is crucial that they seize this excellent opportunity to catch up and discuss their plans for the upcoming game. The home captain can toss the coin, assigning heads or tails to each side. Typically, the away captain gets to choose which side of the cash they prefer. The team captain who wins the toss decides whether to bowl or bat.

"The art of cricket betting is not just a game of chance but a science that can be mastered. You can gain a crucial advantage by incorporating toss prediction models into your betting strategy. Every toss result holds valuable information to help you adjust your betting plan for the match. With careful research and analysis of team captains' behavior, you can become a successful cricket bettor and make accurate and profitable predictions."

The best captains will adapt their strategy depending on various match factors, so let's examine the process by looking at components in choosing whether to bat or bowl:

Exchanging Team Selection Sheets

This is the first time captains have seen their opponent's line-ups, and how the team is composed should make a big decision on whether to bat or bowl.

If the pitch feels wet, it may be advantageous to bowl first and use the conditions to your advantage.

Regarding whether to bat or bowl first in cricket, some teams make the same choice regardless of the prevailing conditions. However, whether these teams make the right decisions is still being determined. The coin toss before the match determines which team makes the decision, and each captain has an equal 50% chance of winning the toss.

Despite the randomness of the coin toss, some experts believe that the winning captain should take advantage of their position and make the 'right' decision. But what is the right decision, and is winning the toss enough of a gift?

Our data can show which captains have a better record of winning the toss than their rivals and shed light on whether winning the toss does provide an advantage. The data is taken from the IPL. Regarding whether to bat or bowl first in cricket, some teams continually make the choice regardless of the prevailing conditions. However, whether these teams make the right decisions is still being determined. The coin toss before the match determines which team makes the decision, and each captain has an equal 50% chance of winning the toss.

Despite the randomness of the coin toss, some experts believe that the winning captain should take advantage of their position and make the 'right' decision. But what is the right decision, and is winning the toss enough of a gift?

Our data can show which captains have a better record of winning the toss than their rivals and shed light on whether winning the toss does provide an advantage. The data is taken from the IPL.

Here, we dig into the data from the 2019 IPL fixtures and look at home. The coin toss win percentage varies massively from captain to captain. Remember, the probability should, on average, be 50% for each captain. As you can see, some teams have a more significant edge at the coin toss than others. Rohit Sharma wins, on average, four out of every five tosses, while superstar Virat Kohli wins less than one in five!

Now for the disclaimers. Of course, this data has drawbacks. Even though it's over an entire IPL season, it's still, statistically speaking, a small sample size with 17 match tosses, the most a captain can participate in; some teams will only play 14 games.

Ideally, we want at least ten years of data to account for anomalies and blips, but it is all interesting.

Secondly, winning the toss does not guarantee the captain's team will go on and win the match.

But now we will take the data further and determine whether the typical IPL strategy has been to bat or bowl first.

ALSO READ: How do you predict match toss?

Is batting first the right choice?

In the 2019 season, teams that won the toss only chose to bat first in 22.5% of the games—less than one in four. That figure is far lower than most of us would reasonably expect.

Our data shows that most teams choose to bowl first; we have just published data for the six teams with the highest percentage in determining to bowl first.

Why is this? In the quickfire T20 format, batting second is a comfort in knowing the exact number of runs you need to win. Batting first can be viewed as a negative as the team's total becomes a target to hunt down.

But whether there is much of an advantage to IPL teams batting first or second is debatable. Indeed, previous analysis shows little statistical evidence that whether a team bats first or second makes a difference.

A separate international T20 study showed a slight advantage for the team batting second in a night game, but in a day-night match (where the first team bats with some natural light), the team that bats first wins 60% of the time. In a day game, there is no real difference.

However, we can assume that winning the toss and choosing gives us a psychological advantage. And in elite sports, any gift is worth something, no matter how small.

How can we apply our data on what captains do when they win the toss to betting?

If the bookies set up a market on 'who will bat first?', we can reasonably assume the prices to be close to this: Team A 10/11 (1.90) and Team B 10/11 (1.90).

The actual odds would be 1/1 (2.00) for each team, but bookmakers will always have their margin.

If you ever got to bet on a match with the Chennai Super Kings involved, the smart bet would be to bet on their rivals in the 'who will bat first?' market.

Not only do the Super Kings elect to bowl 75% of the time, but their captain, MS Dhoni, wins 75% of his tosses. Therefore, we can claim a positive expected value: Dhoni is likely to win the toss and elect to bowl first, meaning the price on their rivals to bat first should be much shorter than the hypothetical 10/11 (1.90).

          Get Daily updates, Live score, Accurate betting tips on all cricket tournaments only         on Cricketclues.com

Optimizing Toss Prediction in Making Cricket Match Predictions

We can take this further. Now that we have a rough idea of how leading captains fare in the toss and their choice of action let's apply it to match predictions.

Cricket traders are on record (Sports Spread Betting: An Insider's Guide by Daniel Townend) saying top-class matches are getting harder and harder to price up until they know who has won the toss.

Previous studies on the influence of winning the toss showed a slight improvement in the winning chances of a team, although they were based on Test cricket and ODI matches.

So, if we can second-guess which team will win the toss, we will have an advantage over the bookmakers in securing a better price than we should have.

Let us use the Mumbai Indians as an example. Rohit Sharma won 80% of his tosses during the 2019 season.

Suppose we subscribe to the view that cricket traders are shortening the price of the team that wins the toss immediately after the news is made public. In that case, we can reasonably expect Mumbai Indians to be underpriced.

If Sharma wins 80% of the tosses, are the bookies forced to shorten the price on Mumbai Indians 80% of the time? Maybe not; this was an emerging trend, but the figure is not so high. But there is certainly an argument that there is a betting edge here.

And we can apply it to other teams, too. Virat Kohli is a great cricketer, but his toss-win rate is meagre. Again, there may be opportunities where Royal Challengers Bangalore is a 'bad price.'

Not only do the team start favourites more often than their overall record probably entitles them to, but their opponents got the advantage of deciding over 80% of the time in the 2019 season.

IPL matches often start late at night, and a benefit of batting second is that the ball collects more dew the later the game goes on at some venues. The moisture results in a poorer grip for the bowlers and, therefore, more bad deliveries that a batter can hit.

Consequently, if we calculate that batting second may be the best option, matches involving any of these four teams will be of significant interest: Sunrises Hyderabad, Kolkata Knight Riders, Kings XI Punjab, and Royal Challengers Bangalore. Each side chose to bowl first in 80% of their 2019 matches.

Toss Prediction Conclusions

Betting on or winning money Betting on cricket is all about finding an edge, no matter how tiny.

If we can make reasonable predictions using data, we can gain a slight advantage over bookmakers who may not have this data, and thus, we can produce superior match predictions.

We know two critical things. Firstly, winning the toss is important, and teams that win the toss have a slight advantage regardless of their captain's decision.

Secondly, bookmakers agree with this and have stated that they adjust prices depending on which team wins the toss.

And for whatever reason, some captains have an extraordinary record of winning the toss. We should be cautious when using this data to make broad assertions or firm predictions, but it is still noteworthy to consider it.

What is extremely interesting and valuable are the captains of IPL teams that choose to bowl first up to 80% of the time. Suppose we're confident in assessing pre-game whether there is an advantage in batting first or second. In that case, we can second-guess the captains, particularly those with a strong record of consistently bowling first, and try to secure an edge in betting.

Seeing how the toss data stands up during the delayed and under-threat 2020 IPL season will be interesting.

Bettors should note who won the toss and what the captain chose to do throughout the season as part of their cricket betting research.

More suggestions:

Today's toss prediction: Who will win the toss today?

IPL prediction 2023 telegram channel