Greatest Ever Test XI

Scallywag said:

I only pointed out the stats because it would be easy to make an argument for saying Gilly is the better test player, you have stated that Flower is better than Gilly so I have asked the question as to why you made this statement. Gilly is reconised as a match winner and one of the best players in cricket at the moment, I have not heard as much praise for Flower even though he has proven to be a fantastic player.

I'm not saying Gilly is better but simply asking why you rate Flower a better test player than Gilchrist.

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I did ask you a lot earlier but it was you who bombarded me with statistics.

I understand what you are saying its just I never thought a player would be downgraded for being more likely to win a match. Usually its the other way, like with Richards he was agressive and had good players around him but that is never taken into account when comparing him to other players, its a phenomum that only arises when discussing Australians.

I bid you a good night.

SJS said:

By the way, who is Bill Bates ?

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http://www.howstat.com/cricket/Statistics/Players/PlayerOverview.asp?PlayerID=0154

Don't know much about him personally, looks like a handy all-rounder though. Averaged 27 with the bat with five test 50s, which is pretty good for the era in which he played. Only just scraped into my minimum qualification of 50 wickets, getting... 50, at 16.42 runs per wicket.

Scallywag said:

I it was you who bombarded me with statistics.
I.

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Wish to go back and check !

FaaipDeOiad said:

http://www.howstat.com/cricket/Statistics/Players/PlayerOverview.asp?PlayerID=0154

Don't know much about him personally, looks like a handy all-rounder though. Averaged 27 with the bat with five test 50s, which is pretty good for the era in which he played. Only just scraped into my minimum qualification of 50 wickets, getting... 50, at 16.42 runs per wicket.

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Okay. Saw that.

Actually when i did a similar excercise, I found that minimum wickets or minimum tests (say 20) was sometimes likely to throw up such a vague name. So I use a combination of tests and instead of average use wickets per test. Only the best in the business have a high wicket per test ratio (Barnes leads with 7 with his 189 wickets in 27 tests) The best in the business, of course have good averages too. Another advantage is that it removes the advantage of bowlers of earlier times when teams got out for very low scores most of the time and bowling averages were much lower. But the best bowlers have always hovered around 5 wickets per test while the averages have varied depending upon the condition of the wickets etc.

SJS said:

Okay. Saw that.

Actually when i did a similar excercise, I found that minimum wickets or minimum tests (say 20) was sometimes likely to throw up such a vague name. So I use a combination of tests and instead of average use wickets per test. Only the best in the business have a high wicket per test ratio (Barnes leads with 7 with his 189 wickets in 27 tests) The best in the business, of course have good averages too. Another advantage is that it removes the advantage of bowlers of earlier times when teams got out for very low scores most of the time and bowling averages were much lower. But the best bowlers have always hovered around 5 wickets per test while the averages have varied depending upon the condition of the wickets etc.

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SJS..just wondering about this

Do you have figures readily available on the average runs per wicket for a given era..say broken down into 5 year periods....it would be interesting to see the %age below the periods average players like Barnes,Spofforth,Marshall, mcGrath etc perform at

SJS said:

Wish to go back and check !

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And you will find this after I asked "I'm not saying Gilly is better but simply asking why you rate Flower a better test player than Gilchrist."

SJS said:

I know my dear. But he batted 18 at six and 82 times at 5 and you can see that even at these positions his average is better than at 3 and 4.

Even for Gilchrist the averages are higher when he goes lower down. You should try and look at the argument rather than just go after the figures. The logic stands. Here are their figures in perspective.

Position.....Gilchrist.........Flowers
At 1-4............41.3(7).............27.6(8)
A7 5-8...........57.0(90).............55.8(99)

Figures in bracket are innings

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SJS said:

Batting at number 7 isnt necessarily bad for your averages.

Here are Flowers averages at lower orders

At 5...54.9
At 6...58.4
At 7...70.0

It is higher up that the average drops.

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I only responded to you quoting statistics.

Never mind we just agree to disagree.

Swervy said:

SJS..just wondering about this

Do you have figures readily available on the average runs per wicket for a given era..say broken down into 5 year periods....it would be interesting to see the %age below the periods average players like Barnes,Spofforth,Marshall, mcGrath etc perform at

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I have the batting averages, countrywise. and overall. Which really can be used for overall bowling averages. But you can get the figures if you want from the site howstatDOTcom

There in the left hand menu column, click on countries. In countries, click on team analysis. when you are there, enter a period (maximum 20 years) and you will get the batting and bowling averages of all the players who played for that country in that time frame.

I had posted figuires or maybe charts whit graphs on such info a very long time ago while discussing how standards have changed over time and what should be taken into account when comparing stats of two different eras.

Dont rmember the thread. It was a very long time ago

Swervy said:

SJS..just wondering about this

Do you have figures readily available on the average runs per wicket for a given era..say broken down into 5 year periods....it would be interesting to see the %age below the periods average players like Barnes,Spofforth,Marshall, mcGrath etc perform at

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I might have a go at making something like this, perhaps slightly more detailed taking into account only the exact time frame in which a bowler played, to avoid era overlap. We'll see if I have enough free time.

Should be interesting anyway.

FaaipDeOiad said:

I might have a go at making something like this, perhaps slightly more detailed taking into account only the exact time frame in which a bowler played, to avoid era overlap. We'll see if I have enough free time.

Should be interesting anyway.

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yeah I was going to see if I could squeeze in a bit of time doing that as well...although I shouldnt really, I have my accounts to do this weekend

NZ XI
CS Dempster
GM Turner
MP Donnelly
MD Crowe
B Sutcliffe
JR Reid*
CL Cairns
ID Smith+
RJ Hadlee
DL Vettori
J Cowie

Scallywag said:

I only pointed out the stats because it would be easy to make an argument for saying Gilly is the better test player, you have stated that Flower is better than Gilly so I have asked the question as to why you made this statement. Gilly is reconised as a match winner and one of the best players in cricket at the moment, I have not heard as much praise for Flower even though he has proven to be a fantastic player.

I'm not saying Gilly is better but simply asking why you rate Flower a better test player than Gilchrist.

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I wouldn't necessarily say Flower was a better test bat than Gilly. But I'd imagine one of SJS's considerations would have been the fact Gilly has played his test career in the Best team in the world whereas Flower played in the worst (apart from Bang recently).

Thus , It would be much more difficult maintaining a test average over 50 for Flower as opposed to Gilly.

FaaipDeOiad said:

I might have a go at making something like this, perhaps slightly more detailed taking into account only the exact time frame in which a bowler played, to avoid era overlap. We'll see if I have enough free time.

Should be interesting anyway.

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In have done something like that for the batsmen's eras.

Grace Era
Hobbs Era
Bradman Era
Sobers Era
Richards Era
Tendulkar Era

These virtually cover the entire test cricket period with negligible overlap.

It may be better, as well as convenient to have.
19th century
1900-!st WW
Between Wars
2nd WW to Packer Era
Packer Era to date.

I think the late division is better in a few respects.

1. The wars always brought a massive change in all stats. Batting boomed after both wards. I think it is because the top bowlers of the world aged during the five odd years the WW's lasted. Batsmen with longer career spans survived and made merry with weaker bowling. This is particularly true for the faster bowlers who have even shorter career peaks.

Secondly, I think, the wickets may have become better with no use for so long and may have been better prepared. This needs verification though.

Thirdly, there are naturally fewer bowlers than batsmen in cricket so there was greater "bench strength" as it were amongst batsmen.

2. It divides careers a bit better and many players like George Headley for example, should really be judged on his career between the wars rather than what he played after the war. West Indies played only in 1946 and then in 1948. Thus virtually no cricket for a decade. The performance of an ageing Headley after the war in these few tests do no credit to the collassus that he was before the war. For someone who played only 20 tests in all, these few tests unnecessarily bring down his figures which are still magnificient , by the way.

3. It removes the individualist slant given to eras by naming them after cricketers and , of course, there may be some disputes (why Tendulkar) for more recent eras

I have figures for these eras and could share them if anyone wants.

zinzan12 said:

I wouldn't necessarily say Flower was a better test bat than Gilly. But I'd imagine one of SJS's considerations would have been the fact Gilly has played his test career in the Best team in the world whereas Flower played in the worst (apart from Bang recently).

Thus , It would be much more difficult maintaining a test average over 50 for Flower as opposed to Gilly.

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Yes it is a also consideration.

Lets look at it this way. How much do we talk of pressure. How much do we praise someone like , say, Steve Waugh or Dravid, for their capacity to perform under pressure.

Now clearly the pressure situations when you come in to bat for a side like Australia are not the same as for weaker sides.

SJS said:

Yes it is a also consideration.

Lets look at it this way. How much do we talk of pressure. How much do we praise someone like , say, Steve Waugh or Dravid, for their capacity to perform under pressure.

Now clearly the pressure situations when you come in to bat for a side like Australia are not the same as for weaker sides.

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Whenever I hear an inteview from players playing against a top team they allways say there is no pressure on them because they are expected to lose and nobody expects them to win so its no big deal for them. Then they allways say the pressure is on the top team to perform because its expected they will win.

In fact every played I heard interviewed on the subject thinks there is more pressure on the better team to keep winning and players from teams not expected to win can just go out and play thier game and hope for the best.

How players of the past would fare in modern conditions has always been a perennial problem. One solution is to the categorize the players into Era's and have them competing against players of their own generation. I have identified five different Era's and have teams and World XI's for each.

Era1: 1877 (or so) -1914
Era2: 1918-1939
Era3: 1945-1970
Era4: 1970-1999
Era5: 2000-Present

In the event that a player has played in two Era's he would represent the Era that he played more tests for. Eg. Sobers played in the 70's but he belongs to Era 3.

Era 1 World XI

W.G.Grace
V.T.Trumper
C.Hill(vc)
K.S.Ranjitsinghi
F.S.Jackson(c)
W.Rhodes
A.F.A.Lilley(wk)
G.A.Lohmann
S.F.Barnes
T.Richardson
F.R.Spofforth

12th Man: C.T.B.Turner

Era 2 World XI

J.B.Hobbs
H.Sutcliffe
D.G.Bradman(c)
W.R.Hammond(vc)
G.A.Headley
H.W.Taylor
L.E.G.Ames(w.k)
M.W.Tate
H.Larwood
W.J.O'Reilly
C.V.Grimmett

12th Man: H.Verity

Era 3 World XI

L.Hutton(c)
A.R.Morris
E.D.Weekes
R.G.Pollock
K.F.Barrington
G.S.Sobers(vc)
K.R.Miller
T.G.Evans(wk)
R.R.Lindwall
F.S.Trueman
J.C.Laker

12th Man: A.V.Bedser

Era 4 World XI

S.M.Gavaskar
G.Boycott
I.V.A.Richards(vc)
S.R.Tendulkar
G.S.Chappell
A.P.E.Knott(wk)
Imran Khan(c)
R.J.Hadlee
M.D.Marshall
D.K.Lillee
S.K.Warne

12th Man: B.C.Lara

Era 5 World XI

M.L.Hayden
V.Sehwag
R.Dravid(vc)
R.T.Ponting(c)
Inzamam-ul-Haq
J.H.Kallis
A.C.Gilchrist(wk)
S.M.Pollock
Shoaib Akhtar
M.Muralitharan
G.D.McGrath

12th Man: D.R.Martyn

cric_manic said:

NZ XI
CS Dempster
GM Turner
MP Donnelly
MD Crowe
B Sutcliffe
JR Reid*
CL Cairns
ID Smith+
RJ Hadlee
DL Vettori
J Cowie

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Good selection. The only change I would make is to drop Reid for Bruce Taylor. The bowling could do with some firepower, you already have a fine allrounder in Cairns, and Reid was mediocre with both bat and ball.

Yes I know he is a New Zealand legend and was your star player during a period in which you were the Bangladesh of the time, but he would have struggled to make many other test sides, and few would consider Habibul Bashar or Mohammad Rafique among the greatest cricketers, despite their relatively proficient performances in the circumstances.

On the contrary, I oppose technology only in cases where it can NOT be proven that it is superior to the eye in coming up with a conclusive decision. Because technology removes the human element from the decision making, it must be conclusive (eg in run outs) or it is of no use at all. At least an umpire can make an educated assessment based on his initial opinions when it comes to a lineball decision, if a technological device comes back with an inconclusive reading it can't do anything of the sort. And of course predictive technology has no place in cricket, and the whole idea is ludicrous on the face of it. I do however think that once technology that can be used to assist the umpires can be certain to provide a conclusive result say 90-95% of the time like video replays on run-outs do, it should be implemented. Starting with a cyclops type machine for no-balls.

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You are chatting pure rubbish here mate.
Technology CAN and HAS been proven to be superior to the human eye in cases of lbws, catches, run outs etc. The margin of error of the hawkeye is 1mm. That is A FAR SMALLER margin of error than the human eye.
Decisionmaking in sports is supposed to be accurate and there is no place for the human element there, unless you are a proponent of underhanded tactics and unequal playing fields.
And gathering from your above post, you seem to not understand the technology or human mind. ANY claims to what would've happened is predictive. Period. The ball didnt hit the stumps and the umpires ARE predicting in their head whether it would've hit the ball or not.
Except that the human mind is going by the 'feel' of the situation whereas the computer is using quantified numbers and accurate precise mathematical formulas to calculate trajectory.
It is extremely foolish to think that the educated guesses of an umpire is more accurate than mathematical modelling of a computer. If that was so, humans would be taking guesses instead of getting computers to simulate a scenario for them.
Why dont the generals just 'predict' the coordinates of the incomming missiles but use computer projections for guidance systems ?
because the computer is FAR MORE ACCURATE.
The technology is using the same principles of prediction as the human mind is using, except that it is FAR FAR more accurate. Do not contest this, for that is categorically proven, tried and tested in professional fields.

The only reason i think you wanna hold on to human umpires in lbws/catches etc. scenarios is simply because of tradition. Since logically, you are standing on the losing ground here.
Technology is my expertise. Unless you want a categoric lesson in predictive technology and how it is using the exact same simulation as the human brain is doing-except it is doing it far more accurately by real time application of precise mathematical formulae.

It is proven categorically that the hawkeye is more accurate than the human eye. Period.
And if you are resitive to techonolgy, like i said, quit being a hypocrite and sell yer computer and start living like they did in 10,000 BCE, wearing animal skins and eating uncooked berries and meat.
Afterall, it is technology that has put you where you are now.

Interesting to see how this thread went.

mofo123 said:

i think its impossible to have a world all time XI so many players would b left out it would b an imense tragedy...although may i suggest a pakistan XI which i think would give any XI a run for their money:
Saeed Anwar
Hanif Mohammad
Zaheer Abbas
Javed Miandad
Inzamam-ul-Haq
Yousuf Youhana/Mushtaq Mohammad
Imran Khan
Moin Khan
Wasim Akram
Waqar Younis
Saqlain Mushtaq/Abdul Qadar

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I would have one of Fazal Mahmood and Khan mohammad in there, most probably Fazal.

bhai where is Imran khan?? ... allll time great allrounder