Is Flintoff Overrated?

[superwills]

hes still chubby too!

 

[Richard]

So getting behind the wheel when you're two times over the limit is a minor indiscretion? Plunkett going on a bender after being arrested for drink-driving shows he is an irresponsible drinker. Obviously this guy learnt nothing from his rehabilitation course, if he even attended it. I doubt the courts would be as forgiving as you.

So you think the courts want to or can ban someone from drinking? You think the rehab courses (which I've actually studied, with view to chairing them of occasions) seriously suggest people stop drinking, or that people are accused of being irresponsible drinkers?

No.

No-one in their right mind will tell a drink-driver to stop drinking or having binge sessions - it's the worst possible idea, in fact. The trick is to separate the two things.

It has affected his career. He was stripped of the vice-captaincy.

Which was a good excuse - most people wanted that ages ago.

Stop equating a drinking problem with alcoholism.

I'm not. Both have similar traits.

 

[Richard]

It's 'open knowledge' that there were drinking problems on the Ashes tour.

It's been 'kept quiet' as to the nature of the problems.

I can't find the exact quote about the Ashes, all I could find was this from Fletcher:

""Andrew Flintoff has been given warnings about his conduct and disciplined for previous incidents of this nature."

But that could be referring to the stuff of 6 or 7 years ago, which everyone knew about.

It's a bit of a shame if there was "drinking problems" but even that's still fairly vague. I mean, fair enough if they were going out during games or whatever, but it could quite possibly be just some stupid sensationalist journalist trying to find another ridiculous way around the simple fact that Australia were better than England. There's nothing whatsoever wrong with having a good few nights out when there are no games on in the near future. Most people enjoy such things.

 

[Richard]

Talent and skillwise Flintoff is definitely not over rated. But the really great cricketers have invariably been individuals with very sound cricketing brains. One has always had dobts in this regard about Freddie.

Not sure. Flintoff was a chess champion at the age of 11. He's always struck me as a pretty smart chap all things considered. His captaincy might leave more than a bit to be desired, but as a player I think there are far less astute than him.

 

[open365]

Talent and skillwise Flintoff is definitely not over rated. But the really great cricketers have invariably been individuals with very sound cricketing brains. One has always had dobts in this regard about Freddie.

Opposite way round for me, i think some of the stuff he's done in the past bely his real level of skill, especialy in his batting.

 

[cric_manic]

Actually we say one player is the best by comparing him.You tell me who in the world can equally deliver with bat and ball than flintoff.Kallis is one of the best batsmen in the world but not so good with the ball.Pollock is one of the best with the ball but what abt his batting?

Mabye not with the ball but Oram is better with the bat

 

[Athlai]

Scott Styris.

 

[Prince EWS]

Opposite way round for me, i think some of the stuff he's done in the past bely his real level of skill, especialy in his batting.

Agreed. Flintoff has bugger all batting talent IMO, other than his strength and power. He's very limited in his batting but he works to his strengths and operates at maximum capacity with it.

 

[SJS]

Not sure. Flintoff was a chess champion at the age of 11. He's always struck me as a pretty smart chap all things considered. His captaincy might leave more than a bit to be desired, but as a player I think there are far less astute than him.

I did not mean his intellect or IQ. I meant 'cricketing brain'. Srinath was a first class engineer and supposed to be a very bright chap but with the cricketing brain of a 'duh' like Harbhajan.

 

[Gloucefan]

I think 'where a player stands today respective to his contemporaries' is a flawed and meaningless point unless you happen to outshine your contemporaries by a few orders of magnitude like Bradman did. For eg, top 5 pacers in the 80s would've been Marshall, Imran, Hadlee,Holding,Garner probably. The top 5 pacers today are : McGrath, Pollock, Vaas, Ntini, Asif.

Without some sort of comparisons across the eras, its very hard to tell how good the current folks are empirically rather than relatively.

comparing only how a player is by where they stand today or with their contemporaries is basically assuming that the quality of cricket remains more or less constant over time. Which it clearly isn't so.

I don't think 'where a player stands today respective to his contemporaries' is a flawed or meaningless point at all. Where they stand against players of the past is however. What difference does it make? It's only useful for when you're having a chat with your mates about 'who's the greatest all-rounder of all time' etc. He's never going to play against those players, he will however quite naturally play against his contemporaries. It is those he has to outshine in order to help win matches, and he has done that often enough in both forms of the game for me to rate him very highly.

 

[Gloucefan]

hes still chubby too!

Does anyone agree with this?

I remember seeing him walking out for the first test at Brisbane thinking he looked bloody slim.

 

[pasag]

I don't think 'where a player stands today respective to his contemporaries' is a flawed or meaningless point at all. Where they stand against players of the past is however. What difference does it make? It's only useful for when you're having a chat with your mates about 'who's the greatest all-rounder of all time' etc. He's never going to play against those players, he will however quite naturally play against his contemporaries. It is those he has to outshine in order to help win matches, and he has done that often enough in both forms of the game for me to rate him very highly.

Spot on.

 

[pup11]

For me Flintoff is a victim of over-ambitious expectations of English fans and supporters (and probably even of his own team-mates).


Once he did well in The Ashes 05 everyone just expected him to do no wrong, he was loaded with the burden of making England do well, and as a result he has wilted under this pressure.

Thats where Tendulkar is (was) great as he performed even under pressure of expectations of 1 billion people.

 

[Richard]

I honestly don't see Flintoff as the type to be weighed down by such expectations.

The simple fact of the matter is, The Ashes 2005 was the series of a lifetime - no-one can possibly ever expect him to be as good again as he was in that series. Anyone who does expect that is wholly over-ambitious.

 

[Richard]

I did not mean his intellect or IQ. I meant 'cricketing brain'. Srinath was a first class engineer and supposed to be a very bright chap but with the cricketing brain of a 'duh' like Harbhajan.

Oh, yeah, I realised what you meant. As I say - as a bowler Flintoff has always stuck me as a perfectly smart operative. As a batsman, obviously, his instincts play far more of a part than brain.

 

[Burgey]

Agreed. Flintoff has bugger all batting talent IMO, other than his strength and power. He's very limited in his batting but he works to his strengths and operates at maximum capacity with it.

Mate, Isee you're a Baulko fella. Just moved to back Castle Hill myself - small forum, isn't it?

 

[Prince EWS]

Mate, Isee you're a Baulko fella. Just moved to back Castle Hill myself - small forum, isn't it?

Haha, sure is. Given the wide range of people from different countries, it is a bit of a coincidence that you live 5 minutes up the road.

 

[Tom Halsey]

Flintoff is, for me, among the best seamers in the world in both forms of the game.

Batting hasn't been up to much at all since the 2005 Ashes, though - even if up to and including that series, he'd been pretty consistently averaging around 40 since SA 2003, with the odd blip.

Conclusion - overrated batsman these days, not an overrated bowler at all.

 

[maheshprasad]

Mabye not with the ball but Oram is better with the bat[/QUOTYeah I accept that but not in tests and a player should be rated on his test playing ability

 

[Prince EWS]

Yeah I accept that but not in tests and a player should be rated on his test playing ability

Oram is an infinitely better test batsman than Flintoff.