Ponting's streak of 16 vs Waugh's streak of 16

[Craig]

Steve Waugh's 16.

 

[tooextracool]

I'm about as big a critic of Harmison as you could find, but if you seriously think he's no better than Marlon Black, you're on another planet.

If you seriously think Harmison bowled better than Marlon Black in the respective series then you are on another planet. Harmison, as i said during the series at the time, put in the worst performance I have ever witnessed in 15 years of watching on a cricket field at Brisbane and no not Marlon Black or Nixon McLean has come close to reproducing that. Its one thing to bowl without penetration as Marlon Black and Courteney Walsh did in said series. Its another to be incapable of maintaining any sort of line or length for an entire game or bowling deliveries that were too wide for any batsman to play.England's bowling on the whole in that series, while possible not as bad as the WI in 2000, was ABSOLUTE garbage and i cannot understand how anyone can argue otherwise.

 

[weldone]

How to win Matches? New guide book for Australians
Sure, Australia is a good team and they have some of the best players there and are having some great run of victories under their belt. But does it make them really invincible?

Yes, a 100 times yes. See how...

Ever since Steve Waugh became their captain, a new secret guide book on how to win matches is strictly enforced by the Australian Cricket Board. It is some what like this.

1. Always play to your full potential
2. Play most of your matches in Australia
3. Draw maximum advantage of pitches, no matter how dubious it could get
4. Use sledging tactics while bowling
5. Don't hesitate to spit on players, if it comes to
6. Humble the opponents with non cricketing tricks
7. Fix up matches and fix up Umpires
8. Play on, you are not out even if clean bowled to a clean ball
9. while feilding don't hesitate to pick catches off the turf and appeal
10. Slow down the over rate if threatened by good showing by opponents
11. Bowl all six deliveries on the leg side so as to avoid getting hit
12. If Umpires don't rule opponents out use your descretion- declare him yourself
13. Don't forget, you have the full backing by board


What if you loose despite all this?
Naaaaaaaaah! this will never happen at all. The formula here is a fool proofed one.
Still, if you loose, call it a match fixed by the opposite party and the teams did not play in the spirit of the game.

Good luck.
Watch the nicest moments in Australian Cricket here @
http://***************.*************/

You are bang on in points numbered 2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12 and 13. Although the other points are slightly exaggerated.........

 

[tooextracool]

The reason I rate the former streak over the latter one is because the former was composed almost exclusively of convincing victories, there were any number in the latter one that were very far from convincing.

and could it be because.....drumroll please.....the opposition from 1999-2001 were all bar a couple absolutely rubbish? Its one thing to convincingly thrash zimbabwe. Its another thing to do the same against SA away from home.

 

[biased indian]

You are bang on in points numbered 2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12 and 13. Although the other points are slightly exaggerated.........

r u the same guy ??????

 

[Craig]

I don't know why, I just enjoyed watching Steve Waugh's lot a lot more then Ricky Ponting's team.

 

[Richard]

and could it be because.....drumroll please.....the opposition from 1999-2001 were all bar a couple absolutely rubbish? Its one thing to convincingly thrash zimbabwe. Its another thing to do the same against SA away from home.

The only opposition I'd classify as absolutely rubbish were Zimbabwe (in 1 Test) and West Indies. Pakistan, New Zealand and India were all inferior to Australia but still possessed plenty of good players. Pretty much comparable to the likes of South Africa, Sri Lanka and India in the more recent streak.

 

[Johnners]

Actually India were involved in 4 of the tests in Waughs streak. The NZ team wasn't "rubbish" but imo still didn't contain players of the same Calbire as the Indian, SL, SA or English (take just the 1st 2 test of the series if you must) teams boasted.

 

[Richard]

Richard, you have a hilariously overblown and rose tinted view of all cricket before 2001. It's quite ridiculous. Do you seem to think that conceeding the fact that Ponting's streak was better means you're admitting in some way shape or form that the current era isn't as bad as you say it is?

I definitely think that factored into Richard's argument. I knew what his answer was going to be before I started the thread.

Well it's easy to know what many people's answer to a question is going to be before you ask it, I could say the same about half, nay probably three-quarters, of the posters on this forum (including your good self I ordain to suggest).

I think that "conceding the fact" (or the non-fact) that the latter streak was a more impressive one would have no impact on assessing the quality of cricket circa 1990-2001 compared to 2001-2008. The two issues are only loosely related. If the latter streak had contained more convincing and less could-easily-have-gone-the-other-way matches I'd certainly consider rating the latter one better. But it didn't. The former streak was far, far more convincing.

 

[Richard]

So...let me get this straight, the performances are relevant when it's players who aren't performing at their best. but when it comes to Bangladesh performing extremely well (i.e. losing by only 2 wickets) it doesn't matter. There's so many holes in your argument it's not funny.

The argument about whether Bangladesh are Test-class is one completely unrelated to assessing the performance of a Test-class team in a Test-match. Therefore, one cannot cause holes in the other. Naturally, though, people will try to manufacture holes if it suits their own argument, we see this over and over.

 

[tooextracool]

The only opposition I'd classify as absolutely rubbish were Zimbabwe (in 1 Test) and West Indies. Pakistan, New Zealand and India were all inferior to Australia but still possessed plenty of good players. Pretty much comparable to the likes of South Africa, Sri Lanka and India in the more recent streak.

Surely this is some sort of joke? India of 99? GOOD? Come of it, the team couldnt win a game abroad in Zimbabwe. They were filled from tip to toe with rubbish players: right from Debang Gandhi, Sadagopan Ramesh, Hrishikesh Kanitkar, MSK Prasad, Ajit Agarkar, Vijay Bharadwaj and VVS Laxman(who was batting out of position and was at that time clearly an inestablished and had a wholly ordinary career until then). The only player worthy of mention as anything better than good was Tendulkar given that Dravid was having an absolute nightmare adjusting to the bounce on his first tour of Australia. Its fairly obvious in my book that you are passing judgement on a series that you never watched and know absolutely nothing about.
Beating Pakistan at home or NZ away is equivalent IMO to beating SA in Australia. Neither of them come close to matching the accomplishment of beating SA in SA given that only one other team has managed to do so in the last 15 years, let alone accomplishing a whitewash.

 

[Richard]

Was actually initially referring to the India Test in 2000\01, had initially had a (1 Test) in brackets but then had it pointed-out that they played another series in 1999\2000. I don't indeed know that much about that series. The team were certainly less good than Pakistan or New Zealand, and of course promptly went home and lost a home series - for the first time in 15 years or something - to South Africa.

Of course winning the series in South Africa was noteworthy, but better Australian teams have beaten better South African teams before 2005\06.

 

[tooextracool]

Was actually initially referring to the India Test in 2000\01, had initially had a (1 Test) in brackets but then had it pointed-out that they played another series in 1999\2000. I don't indeed know that much about that series. The team were certainly less good than Pakistan or New Zealand, and of course promptly went home and lost a home series - for the first time in 15 years or something - to South Africa.

Of course winning the series in South Africa was noteworthy, but better Australian teams have beaten better South African teams before 2005\06.

No team has managed a whitewash in SA since readmission, and that includes the team at their supposed peak of their powers in 2001/02 against a SA side one would argue was even worse than the one today.
As far as the comment about better Australian teams have beaten better SA teams are concerned the point is that those better Australian teams didnt do so and win 16 games in a row and has no relevance to the streaks in question
AFAIC, beating SA in SA is more of an accomplishment than anything that the side between 1999-2001 accomplished. I'd go further and say that no side was anywhere near as bad the WI side that arrived in 2000. My problem with Steve Waugh's streak was that 9 tests at least out of 16 were against rubbish opposition(zim, India, WI). Given that Pakistan has always been woefully inconsistent i have no reason to rate beating them as a major accomplishment either. So i'd only really give those 4 tests, against NZ who surprisingly had a fairly strong side at the time, and the one game in India any consideration.

 

[Richard]

They at least managed to beat the rubbish teams convincingly, though. Were there any of those matches which ever even looked like going the other way.

All it would take would have been one tiny tweak and there's any number of games in the current streak which would almost beyond doubt have gone differently. Equally, Australia between March 2004 and August 2005 could very easily have won 18 in a row, as they could very easily have won at Cairns against SL, could possibly have won at Chennai against India, should have won against India at Mumbai, were almost certainly only denied by the weather in New Zealand (can't remember which ground it was) and obviously the 2-run loss at Edgbaston could have gone the other way.

On tiny matters can massive long winning streaks like this hinge. Mostly, it'll take the stars aligning for you for it to come-off, as it has in the ongoing streak. But in 1999\2000-2000\01, it didn't. Pretty much every win was completely convincing. And but for the rain at Galle it'd probably have been 1 Test longer, too.

 

[tooextracool]

They at least managed to beat the rubbish teams convincingly, though. Were there any of those matches which ever even looked like going the other way.

The point though, is that you dont measure a team's success based upon which side beat the rubbish side most convincingly which is equivalent to comparing the quality of 2 batsmen by seeing who scored more runs against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. The current Australian team has beaten better quality sides than the one from 2000/01

All it would take would have been one tiny tweak and there's any number of games in the current streak which would almost beyond doubt have gone differently. Equally, Australia between March 2004 and August 2005 could very easily have won 18 in a row, as they could very easily have won at Cairns against SL, could possibly have won at Chennai against India, should have won against India at Mumbai, were almost certainly only denied by the weather in New Zealand (can't remember which ground it was) and obviously the 2-run loss at Edgbaston could have gone the other way.

The bottom line is that said victories didnt happen and theres no point manufacturing these victories. I firmly believe that good teams manage to win the initiative in situations 'that could have gone another way'. The same could be said of the quality England side during the period from 2004-late 2005. There were several points in the games in every one of those series during that period that could have gone either way. The point is that good teams will always come out trumps. Heck if NZ had bowled a bit better at Lords they might have won, Had Harmison not bowled miraculously for those handful of test matches England might have had a woeful summer, the point is that it didnt happen.

I have little doubt that the Australian team from 04-05(With Lehmann, Katich, Gillespie, Kaspa and Martyn) is better than the current one, which IMO is extremely ordinary especially with the ball. However, considering that this is supposed to be a comparison between the side from 1999-2001(Which i have always thought to be extremely overrated anyways) i think that is besides the point.

 

[Mister Wright]

I don't know why, I just enjoyed watching Steve Waugh's lot a lot more then Ricky Ponting's team.

Tend to agree.

 

[NUFAN]

How many players have been a part of Pontings 16 test match streak?

The team now is definitely not as good as it was at the start of the streak.

 

[Ikki]

I don't know why, I just enjoyed watching Steve Waugh's lot a lot more then Ricky Ponting's team.

Possibly because the team wasn't as dominating and the games seemed more competitive.

 

[tooextracool]

How many players have been a part of Pontings 16 test match streak?

The team now is definitely not as good as it was at the start of the streak.

maybe but the team at the start of the streak including Brad Hodge, Nathan Bracken and Stuart Macgill was probably not as great either. The side was probably at their peak only after S. Clark came into it.

 

[Jono]

Any team which has a streak of 16 tests will have decisions go their way. It's the law of averages surely.
Mate, don't forget the 2001 series, is all I'm saying. Who was that umpire when HB Singh got his hat-trick? His finger was in the air before the ball was caught! Gold.

I didn't know third umpires even raised their fingers.