Partnership and Run Contribution Calculator
Partnership and Run Contribution Calculator
A partnership’s runs include the extras conceded while the two batters were together, so their own scores do not add up to the partnership total. This page takes the extras as an input and refuses to answer until the three parts add to the total exactly.
Share of a partnership, with the extras accounted for
Share of the standBatter A 74, batter B 52, extras 9, partnership total 135
The identity, which is the whole page
- the identity
- every run added while two batters are together is credited either to one of them or to the batting side as an extra. There is no fourth destination, so the three add to the total exactly. This page asserts it and withholds the answer when it fails
- why it fails
- almost always a batter’s whole innings entered instead of their runs during this stand, or the extras left out. Both give a plausible-looking wrong share, which is why the page refuses
- the wrong share
- batter A ÷ (batter A + batter B), which almost every contribution calculator gives, is too high by exactly the extras — 58.73% against a true 54.81% on the stand below
- off the bat only
- Law 23.2.2.1 is the fiddly case: where the ball hits the body and then the bat, the runs can go to the striker rather than as leg byes, so use the scorer’s allocation, not a reconstruction
Worked example
Batter A 74, batter B 52, extras 9, partnership total 135
Check the identity first: 74 + 52 + 9 = 135, which is the partnership total, so the figures balance and the page will answer
Batter A's share = 74 × 100 ÷ 135 = 54.81%
Batter B's share = 52 × 100 ÷ 135 = 38.52%, and the extras are 9 × 100 ÷ 135 = 6.67%. The three add to 100.00% exactly
Ignore the extras and divide by the two batters' 126 instead: 74 × 100 ÷ 126 = 58.73%, which is 3.92 percentage points too high
Double every figure and nothing moves: 148 and 104 and 18 out of 270 is 54.81% again, because a share does not care about scale
Change the extras to 10 while leaving the total at 135 and the page returns nothing at all: 74 + 52 + 10 is 136, the parts exceed the total, and that scorebook cannot be right
The same 135-run stand, with the extras moved
| Batter A | Batter B | Extras | Total | A’s true share | A’s share ignoring extras |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 74 | 61 | 0 | 135 | 54.81% | 54.81% |
| 74 | 52 | 9 | 135 | 54.81% | 58.73% |
| 74 | 41 | 20 | 135 | 54.81% | 64.35% |
| 74 | 26 | 35 | 135 | 54.81% | 74.00% |
| 60 | 60 | 15 | 135 | 44.44% | 50.00% |
What the three parts are, and where each is credited
| Runs | Credited to | In a batter’s score? | In the partnership? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Off batter A’s bat | batter A | yes | yes |
| Off batter B’s bat | batter B | yes | yes |
| Byes | the batting side (Law 23.1) | no | yes |
| Leg byes | the batting side (Law 23.2.3) | no | yes |
| No ball penalty | the batting side (Law 21.15) | no | yes |
| Wide penalty | the batting side (Law 22.6) | no | yes |
| Penalty runs (5) | the batting side | no | yes |
Why two batters’ runs do not add up to their partnership
A scoreboard says a partnership was worth 135. The two batters made 74 and 52, which comes to 126. The nine missing runs are extras — wides, no balls, byes, leg byes, penalty runs — that went to the batting side while those two were together, and they are in the partnership and in neither batter’s score. That is not an accounting quirk; it is what a partnership is. Every run added to the team total while a pair is batting is credited either to one of them or to the side, and there is no third place for it to go.
The consequence is that dividing a batter’s runs by the two batters’ runs added together does not give their share of the partnership. It gives something larger, by exactly the extras: 58.73% where the true share is 54.81%, on nine extras in a 135-run stand. The first table above pushes the extras further and the wrong figure reaches 74.00% on the same true 54.81%. The two agree only when there were no extras at all, which is why a calculator that gets this wrong passes every casual test.
So this page takes the extras as an input and asserts the identity: batter A plus batter B plus extras must equal the partnership total, exactly. If they do not, it returns nothing rather than a share. That refusal is the most useful thing on the page, because the two ways the identity fails are the two ways a contribution figure gets computed wrongly. Either a batter’s number is their whole innings rather than their runs during this particular stand — a batter who was 40 not out when the partnership began brings 40 runs that belong to an earlier one — or the extras have been left out. Both give a plausible answer, and a plausible wrong answer is worse than no answer.
Where each run goes is settled by the Laws even though the partnership is not, and the table above gives the clause for each destination. One case is genuinely fiddly and worth knowing rather than reconstructing: under Law 23.2.2.1, where the ball strikes the striker’s body and then makes contact with the bat, the runs can be credited to the striker rather than scored as leg byes. Use the scorer’s allocation, not your own reading of the replay.
None of this tells you whether a share is good, and nothing here pretends to: a 55% share of a 40-run stand and of a 250-run stand are not comparable achievements, and no governing body publishes a threshold for either. For the individual figures the same scorebook supports, the batting strike rate and average calculator works out the batting average and the strike rate, and the bowling figures and maiden overs calculator does the bowling side of this same split.
One thing worth being straight about: the central figure on this page is not defined by anybody with authority over cricket. The ICC publishes how run rate and net run rate are computed because results and qualification turn on them, and the MCC’s Laws govern where each run goes. Neither defines this. The closest thing to an authority is an official scorers’ manual — the New South Wales Cricket Umpires’ and Scorers’ Association’s, September 2022 revision — which is the practice of the people who keep the book rather than a rule of the game. Where it supplies a definition this page quotes it; where it does not, the page says so rather than filling the gap. That is not a reason to distrust the convention; it is the reason no clause number appears beside it.
Frequently asked questions
Why don’t the two batters’ scores add up to the partnership?
Because extras conceded while they were together are in the partnership and in neither batter’s score. Wides, no balls, byes, leg byes and penalty runs all go to the batting side rather than to a batter, so the three parts — batter A, batter B and extras — are what add to the total.
How do you work out a batter’s share of a partnership?
Divide their runs during the stand by the partnership total, not by the two batters’ runs added together. For 74 out of a 135-run stand that is 54.81%. Dividing by the batters’ 126 instead gives 58.73%, which is too high by exactly the extras.
Why does this page refuse to answer sometimes?
Because batter A plus batter B plus extras did not come to the partnership total. That means one of the four figures is wrong — usually a batter’s whole innings has been entered instead of their runs during this stand, or the extras have been left out — and any share worked out from them would be wrong by the difference.
What counts as a batter’s runs during a partnership?
Runs off their own bat while the two were together. A batter already in when the stand began brings earlier runs that belong to an earlier partnership. Under Law 23.2.2.1 runs after the ball has hit the body and then the bat can go to the striker rather than as leg byes, so use the scorer’s allocation.
Who defines a partnership?
Nobody with authority over cricket, as far as the sources read for this page go. No Law and no ICC playing condition defines a partnership or a share of one. The official scorers’ manual consulted records partnership times and partnership balls but gives no method for allocating the runs. The arithmetic here follows from where the Laws put each run, not from a rule about partnerships.
Related calculators
References
- Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 23 – Bye and Leg bye, individual Law page — 23.1 (a Bye is a delivery, not a Wide, that passes the striker untouched, and the runs are credited as Byes to the batting side), 23.2.1 (leg byes count only if the umpire is satisfied the striker tried to play the ball or to avoid being hit), 23.2.2.1 and 23.2.3 (runs not credited to the striker are scored as Leg byes), 23.3 (Leg byes not to be awarded). lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). The Law does not say whether byes or leg byes are debited against the bowler.
- Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 22 – Wide ball, individual Law page — 22.1.1–22.1.2 (judging a Wide), 22.3.1–22.3.2 (revoking), 22.4.1–22.4.2 (not a Wide), 22.6 (one run awarded instantly), 22.7 “Apart from any 5 Penalty runs, all runs from a Wide are debited against the bowler”, 22.8 (“A Wide shall not count as one of the over”), 22.9 (out off a Wide only under Laws 35, 37, 38 and 39). lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). This page does not mention head height anywhere, which is how the staleness of the individual Law pages was established rather than assumed.
- Marylebone Cricket Club. Law 21 – No ball, individual Law page — headings 21.1 to 21.18, including 21.10 “Ball bouncing over head height of striker” as a No ball; 21.15 (one run awarded instantly), 21.16 (the penalty is a No ball extra debited against the bowler), 21.17 (“A No ball shall not count as one of the over”), 21.18 (out off a No ball only under Laws 34, 37 and 38). The Law does not mention a free hit. lords.org (read 12 Oct 2026). This page prints 3rd-Edition (2022) text: the 4th Edition moves the head-height delivery to Law 22.1.3 as a Wide.
- New South Wales Cricket Umpires’ and Scorers’ Association. Cricket Scoring: The Basics and Beyond, September 2022 revision — “Maiden over – when a bowler bowls an over that does not have any runs scored off it”, and immediately after it “It can have byes and leg byes and still be a maiden as these are not scored against the bowler”. The Byes and Leg byes sections both say “These runs do not count as runs against the bowler”; penalty runs are not debited either. The Table of Dismissals lists ten methods, with the bowler credited for bowled, caught, hit wicket, LBW and stumped and not for hit the ball twice, obstructing the field, run out, timed out or a batter retiring. nswcusa.cricketnsw.com.au (read 12 Oct 2026). Every scoresheet and symbol table in it is an IMAGE and was not read, and its Table of Dismissals numbers Timed Out as Law 31, which is Appeals in the 2017 Code.