The recently held Asia Cup hasn’t been the most exciting of competitions – mainly due to the not so well thought out plan to hold it in Sri Lanka during the monsoons. Quite a few games were wiped out because of rains. But one match that I found very interesting was the Super Four’s match of India v/s Pakistan where India crushed Pakistan by 228 Runs. But this isn’t an analysis of the match.
Instead, there is a beautiful investing lesson that came out of it, and I would like to share it with you.
India’s Batting Scorecard
This is the score card of the Indian batting innings. It is evident that Kohli was the best player of the day.
Breaking down the scorecard even further.
Batting in an ODI or a T20 is a game of taking risks. While the outcomes like Total Runs scored and the Strike Rate can be similar between two batsmen, what’s really interesting is the way one crafts the innings.
Rohit Sharma scored 86% of his runs from riskier shots (i.e. boundaries). Out of his 56 runs, only 8 were scored by taking singles or twos which meant he played a lot of dot balls and to cover that backlog, he had to play riskier shots. Eventually, he got out playing trying to hit a big shot. As they say, ‘He lived by the sword and died by the sword!’.
Contrast this to the other approach, evidenced here by Virat Kohli who scored 122 runs but only 44% came from riskier shots (i.e. boundaries). Most of his runs (56%) came from running between the wickets. He kept, what the commentators love to call, the ‘Scoreboard Ticking’. The result of this is that the pressure to hit big shots went down, even on his partner. Kohli and KL Rahul could then cherry pick the balls on which they wanted to hit the big shots.
What’s more surprising is that Kohli had the highest strike rate amongst all the batsmen! He had a strike rate of 130 as compared to Rohit Sharma’s 114.
This ‘Portfolio approach’ to batting is what separates Kohli from the others and puts him in the league of GOATs. This style also enables him to adapt to different formats, conditions and scenarios with comparative ease.
If you think of it, isn’t this the same as investing? The simple ‘Singles’ are akin to investing in Debt Mutual Funds and FDs, and the quick ‘Doubles’ are like investing in Higher Yielding Corporate Bonds. Hitting ‘Fours’ are like investing in Large Cap Equities and ‘Sixes’ are like investing in Mid and Small Cap Equities.
A well-structured portfolio will have a significantly better result over a period rather than taking bets haphazardly. This also lets you stay in the game for longer. And when you stay in the game longer, the returns will automatically follow.
I hope you enjoyed reading this. Feel free to share your thoughts, and until next time,
Happy Investing,
Vijay
CEO – InCred Money