The best 50 cricketers Salamuddin has seen

[Richard]

There may not have been much in Australia, but there was a massive difference in England, as far as pitches were concerned.

 

[The Sean]

There may not have been much in Australia, but there was a massive difference in England, as far as pitches were concerned.

Fair enough. I'd still personally lean toward a no-holds barred "greatest ever" selection, but I'm happy to go with whatever people are comfortable with.

 

[Richard]

I'd be happy to draw a line at 1900 TBH (wouldn't be happy to include anything before then - as I say IMO it was incomparable) but I don't know a hell of a lot about anything before 1930.

From 1930 onwards, though - bring it on, every time. :h:

 

[The Sean]

Well if it's any criteria post-1900 you have to break the news to Archie and Neville that they can't vote for the good Doctor.

 

[Richard]

I'll happily do it.

 

[SJS]

Good list but we need you to list in order ala Warnie.

Thats very tough particu;arly comparingbatsmen with bowlers. How does one compare Gavaskar with Warne

Let me rank batsmen and bowlers separately first.
The batsmen in order of ranking. Sobers heads the list even as pure batsman.

1. Sobers
2. Richards
3. Lara
4. Tendulkar
5. Gavaskar
6. Greg Chappell
7. Ted Dexter
8. Zaheer Abbas
9. Kanhai
10. Vishwanath
11. Hunte
12. Colin Cowdrey
13. Barrington
14. S Waugh
15. Geoff Boycott
16. Dravid
17. Javed Miandad
18. Alan Border
19. Arvinda D'Silva
20. Sutcliffe
21. Doug Walters
22. Hanif
23. Simpson
24. Lloyd
25. Greenidge
26. Matthew hayden
27. Lawry

 

[SJS]

The Bowlers

1. Murali
2. Lillee
3. Imran Khan
4. Hadlee
5. Shane Warne
6. Prasanna
7. Marshall
8. Roberts
9. Bedi
10. Donald
11. Holding
12. Hall
13. Wasim Akram
14. Garner
15. Ambrose
16. Waqar
17. Glen McGrat
18. John Snow

Keepers

1. Bob Taylor
2. Alan Knott
3. Healy
4. Flower
5. Gilchrist

Keepers are listed on keeping ability. At the time of fitting in the final 50 I will take care of batting capability.

Openers

1. Botham
2. Kapil Dev

Now comes the tough part

 

[Matteh]

Top 10 i've seen?

Nick Knight
Dermot Reeve
Brian Lara
Allan Donald
Martin Bicknall
Ian Harvey
Courtney Walsh
Curtley Ambrose
Shane Warne
Michael Slater

 

[SJS]

Okay here is the complete list with rankings. I removed the last two, Hayden and Lawry (both left handed openers from Australia !) and ranked the rest 1 to 50. Its a tough job and I will never be able to give the same rankings again if I did the list even tomorrow. Just shows how little the rankings mean between great players over different disciplines and eras.

This is just for fun

Notr :Its based on test matches only and looks at each player at his peak.

1. Gary Sobers
2. Muralitharan
3. Viv Richards
4. Brian Lara
5. Sachin Tendulkar
6. Imran Khan
7. Dennis Lillee
8. Richard Hadlee
9. Shane Warne
10. Sunil Gavaskar
11. Greg Chappell
12. Erappalli Prasanna
13. Malcolm Marshall
14. Ricky Ponting
15. Andy Roberts
16. Ted Dexter
17. Zaheer Abbas
18. Rohan Kanhai
19. Gundappa Vishwanath
20. Ian Botham
21. Kapil Dev
22. Bishen Bedi
23. Alan Donald
24. Alan Knott
25. Andy Flower
26. Michael Holding
27. Conrad Hunte
28. Colin Cowdrey
29. Ken Barrington
30. S Waugh
31. Geoff Boycott
32. Rahul Dravid
33. Bob Taylor
34. Javed Miandad
35. Alan Border
36. Arvinda D'Silva
37. Wes Hall
38. Curtley Ambrose
39. Joe Garner
40. Wasim Akram
41. Adam Gilchrist
42. Waqar Younis
43. Bert Sutcliffe
44. Doug Walters
45. Hanif Mohammad
46. Glen McGrath
47. Bob Simpson
48. John Snow
49. Clive Lloyd
50. Gordon Greenidge

Edited : Ponting comes in and Healy drops off.

 

[SJS]

Oh hell. I forgot Ponting.