GlossaryCricket
What is an over?
An over is a set of six legal deliveries bowled from one end; '35.2 overs' means 35 complete overs plus 2 balls of the next.
Overs are cricket's unit of time. A Twenty20 innings is 20 overs a side, a one-day innings 50. The decimal in an over count is balls, not tenths — so 35.2 is 35 overs and 2 balls, and the over completes at 35.6 (which rolls over to 36.0).
See it in the numbers
Open the spreadsheet and watch this appear in live scores and standings — disguised as work.
Related terms
What is net run rate (NRR)?
Net run rate is cricket's main league tie-breaker: a team's runs scored per over minus the runs it concedes per over, across the tournament.
How to read a cricket scorecard
A cricket score like '248/4 (35.2)' means 248 runs for the loss of 4 wickets, scored in 35.2 overs — so 6 wickets are still standing.
Run rate & required run rate
Run rate is runs scored per over; the required run rate is how many runs per over the chasing team still needs to win.
Strike rate (batting)
A batter's strike rate is runs scored per 100 balls faced — a measure of scoring speed that matters most in the shorter formats.