*Official* (only joking) Stephen Harmison thread

Did you watch it?

India-West Indies? Nope. I just read match-reports, and I looked at my assesments of the players concerned...
Assesments I had made before the series, I add.

Richard said:

No, it fits my theory to a teed - that series was marred by some of the worst bowling ever to grace ODIs - Drakes, Yadav, Kartik, Balaji, Collymore, Collins, Cuffy, Harbhajan Singh, Nehra and a load of useless part-timers.
Dillon and Nagamootoo were as terrible as the Indian three; one bowler (Sarandeep, who played one game) went for less than 4-an-over, and, incredibly, 3 others went for less than 5-an-over (Kartik and the part-timers Hooper and Samuels).
The conditions were nice for batting (shame they can't have been mirrored in those in the TVS Cup, then maybe Bracken and co. would have had less of an easy ride) but the bowling was, as I say, abonimable.

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Having actually seen the series :rolleyes: I'll start off by saying that those pitches were as dead as Hitler.

Drakes - from what I've seen, he's certainly not been a poor bowler in Tests or ODI's. He wasn't poor in that series and suffered alot from cross-batted shots to length and fullish balls, which the pitch allowed.

Yadav - barely got a chance.

Kartik - for the most part, bowled very well in that series.

Balaji - bowled 4 (?) overs against Gayle and Hinds on a rampage!

Collymore - has always been a good ODI bowler and that series was no exception. He took 6 wickets at 27podd, which is good for a seamer in 4 games on the subcontinent.

Collins - can't recall how he bowled.

Cuffy - was always a good ODI bowler and bowled a whole 6 overs in that series. :rolleyes:

Harbhajan - he wasn't very sharp, but was 'abominable' either.

Nehra - can't remember.

Dillon - tried his best, but his style of bowling isn't suited to Indian conditions.

Nagamootoo - a rubbish bowler at international level.

In summation, you have absolutely no right to say the bowling was abominable, as you did not see it! The stats may have been poor, but the batting and condition were very good rather than the bowling being poor.

Mr Mxyzptlk said:

In summation, you have absolutely no right to say the bowling was abominable, as you did not see it! The stats may have been poor, but the batting and condition were very good rather than the bowling being poor.

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My point exactly...

Mr Mxyzptlk said:

Having actually seen the series :rolleyes: I'll start off by saying that those pitches were as dead as Hitler.

Drakes - from what I've seen, he's certainly not been a poor bowler in Tests or ODI's. He wasn't poor in that series and suffered alot from cross-batted shots to length and fullish balls, which the pitch allowed.

Yadav - barely got a chance.

Kartik - for the most part, bowled very well in that series.

Balaji - bowled 4 (?) overs against Gayle and Hinds on a rampage!

Collymore - has always been a good ODI bowler and that series was no exception. He took 6 wickets at 27podd, which is good for a seamer in 4 games on the subcontinent.

Collins - can't recall how he bowled.

Cuffy - was always a good ODI bowler and bowled a whole 6 overs in that series. :rolleyes:

Harbhajan - he wasn't very sharp, but was 'abominable' either.

Nehra - can't remember.

Dillon - tried his best, but his style of bowling isn't suited to Indian conditions.

Nagamootoo - a rubbish bowler at international level.

In summation, you have absolutely no right to say the bowling was abominable, as you did not see it! The stats may have been poor, but the batting and condition were very good rather than the bowling being poor.

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"Dead" pitches are generally quite good for bowling in ODIs, because they're slow and low and if you get the ball on a decent line and length batsmen don't have much of a chance trying to play shots they've no right to play.
I will assume, hence, that most of the pitches were instead rather featherbed-style - just the right amount of pace and bounce to whack most bowling around.
As regards Drakes I can't argue with you if you watched the games and you say he was hit from balls that didn't really deserve hitting, and you're quite right about Yadav, Balaji and Cuffy bowling minimally.
However, Kartik may have got good figures in most but overall he went for 4.84-an-over. No arguing with that. Collins and Collymore might have got good averages but their economy-rates were very poor and wickets only compensate to a small degree, and not at all if they're with poor deliveries. I don't rate either as ODI bowlers. Neither do I rate any of the part-timers used that series, and if you look at the number of overs bowled by p-ters it's rather above normal.

Richard said:

Collins and Collymore might have got good averages but their economy-rates were very poor and wickets only compensate to a small degree, and not at all if they're with poor deliveries.

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So if Joe Bloggs takes 8-60 in 10 overs (8 long hops), the wickets won't compensate for the economy rate?

Richard said:

"Dead" pitches are generally quite good for bowling in ODIs, because they're slow and low and if you get the ball on a decent line and length batsmen don't have much of a chance trying to play shots they've no right to play.

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Dead meaning absolutely no assistence for the bowler.

I don't rate either as ODI bowlers. Neither do I rate any of the part-timers used that series, and if you look at the number of overs bowled by p-ters it's rather above normal.

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Part-timers such as Hooper and Samuels do the job asked of them. I don't have any problem with that. I expect my part-timers to bowl 10 overs (or thereabout) between them and go for less tha 50 runs.

Collymore is probably the best current WI ODI bowler and is a good one at that. For most of his career, he was around 4RPO and generally goes for less than 45 runs every game, with a couple of wickets. He can swing the ball and bowl yorkers when required.

Loads of part-timers played because teams needed batting as any bowler was going to get hit at 5.5+ so they might as well have had the batting to do more of it.

marc71178 said:

So if Joe Bloggs takes 8-60 in 10 overs (8 long hops), the wickets won't compensate for the economy rate?

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Nope - how do 8 Long-Hops deserve 8 wickets?
How has he bowled even close to well?

Does it matter if he's played well?

For crying out loud, what player wouldn't take 8-60 in an ODI, no matter if the wickets came to long hops?

This really does beggar belief - if someone takes 8 wickets, of course it matters if he has played well.
That is the essence of cricket - playing it well.
Who cares whether something makes you look like you've played well? What matters is whether or not you have.

I was under the impression that cricket was about scoring more runs than the opposition.

Not just scoring runs - taking wickets and not conceding runs, too. And the pace you do and don't do these things at counts for something, especially in one form of the game, too.

Richard said:

Not just scoring runs - taking wickets and not conceding runs

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So scoring more runs when the game's finished then?

Neil Pickup said:

Loads of part-timers played because teams needed batting as any bowler was going to get hit at 5.5+ so they might as well have had the batting to do more of it.

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Perfectly fair, but my argument is that the bowling was rubbish, not that it was unjustifiably rubbish.
I have often wondered why that isn't done more on decent batting pitches - pick 8 or 9 batsmen of whom 3 can bowl a bit.

Richard said:

This really does beggar belief - if someone takes 8 wickets, of course it matters if he has played well.
That is the essence of cricket - playing it well.
Who cares whether something makes you look like you've played well? What matters is whether or not you have.

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That matters nothing.

A bowler would not turn down 8-60 in an ODI because he didn't "play well"

The game is about taking wickets and scoring runs, and if one man gets 8 wickets, there's only 2 left to get.

What does it matter if he got 8 wickets with tripe, the fact is, he got the wickets, and nothing you will say will ever change that.

If I bowled in an ODI and got 8 wickets with garbage I'd point that out to anyone who mentioned it. I'd be positively embarrased not to.
I wouldn't turn it down, of course I wouldn't, but I'd consider it my duty to not take it as though I deserved it.
The fact is, he got the wickets against his name; he didn't "get" them unless he deserved them in my book.
Nothing you ever say will change the fact that bad balls don't deserve wickets and as much as you may celebrate them, wicket hauls aren't worth much unless they were got on merit.

Thought it'd be interesting to bring the thing back in the present environment.
Interestingly, since the 4\33 he's still got 81 wickets at 22.86.
What on Earth's all the fuss about, you might ask, I suppose.

I stick my middle finger up at you: BAN THE THREAD DIGGER!

Like I say, I've brought this up for a perfectly good reason.