Tail-ender

A tail-ender is a lower-order batter, typically at nine, ten or eleven, who is in the side for their bowling and whose runs are a bonus.

The tail is the last three or four wickets of an innings. A "long tail" means the specialist batting ends early, at six or seven, and the side is vulnerable to a collapse; a side with a batting all-rounder at eight is said to bat deep. When the tail scores, it "wags", and a fifty from number nine has turned more Tests than most people realise, partly because bowling sides relax and partly because a set batter at the other end can farm the strike.

A manager thinks about the tail in two directions. Batting, the question is how to protect it: whether to send a nightwatchman to shield a top-order batter, and how a set batter shares the strike with a number ten. Bowling, the question is how to finish it off quickly. Tails that hang around cost time, tire the bowlers and turn a first-innings lead into something less, and a captain deciding whether to enforce the follow-on will remember how long it took.

In Masterstroke: a number eleven told to slog is the same decision as a gun striker told to slog, badly made, and the commentary will say so.