Vivian Richards vs Sachin Tendulkar

[pasag]

Oh, I know that there are...which is why I made references to his country of origin or descent.

Let's face it, though, it is unusual for a cricket fan to be living in the US of A. It's just not a cricketing centre. That's why they're such a relative minority over there and when compared to actual cricketing centres (save for maybe the West Indies and New Zealand, who would proportionally have a more significant amount of cricket fans - we hope - anyway).

Yeah, for sure they're a tiny minority in terms of the US population but in total figues they're quite large and growing. Heard some figures a while back that currently escape me but it's really much much larger than I ever imagined.

 

[Sanz]

Oh, I know that there are...which is why I made references to his country of origin or descent.

Let's face it, though, it is unusual for a cricket fan to be living in the US of A. It's just not a cricketing centre. That's why they're such a relative minority over there and when compared to actual cricketing centres (save for maybe the West Indies and New Zealand, who would proportionally have a more significant amount of cricket fans - we hope - anyway).

No, It is not unusual at all. Even in a smaller town where I live, it is a popular sport among the immigrants from cricket playing countries. We have started our own league and the no. of teams keeps growing every year. We have players in our league from almost every test playing nation. Not only that we have also found quiet a few sponsors for our league. Agreed it is not as big or structured as one would see in Australia/England etc. But I must say our grounds beat out the maidans and Gullies of Subcontinents any day., although we can't say the same about our players.

Also watching cricket isn't a problem either. For major series (World Cup etc) we pool in money and buy the entire package so that we can watch it in a group. Otherwise for regular series, there are legal (and illegal) live streaming if you really want to watch it.

 

[DaRick]

No, It is not unusual at all. Even in a smaller town where I live, it is a popular sport among the immigrants from cricket playing countries. We have started our own league and the no. of teams keeps growing every year. We have players in our league from almost every test playing nation. Not only that we have also found quiet a few sponsors for our league. Agreed it is not as big or structured as one would see in Australia/England etc. But I must say our grounds beat out the maidans and Gullies of Subcontinents any day., although we can't say the same about our players.

I'll take your word for it.

I should have made this clearer, but I also meant a relative minority in relation to other sports like baseball, basketball and other rubbish. Cricket almost never gets a mention in America (the USA team during the 2004 Champions Trophy got almost none, IIRC).

Also watching cricket isn't a problem either. For major series (World Cup etc) we pool in money and buy the entire package so that we can watch it in a group. Otherwise for regular series, there are legal (and illegal) live streaming if you really want to watch it.

Oh, I know about this, don't worry.

 

[ret]

no, but it doesn't make their batting styles similar........ which I gather you are failing to understand.

in that respect every batsman is 'unique' *winks*

 

[honestbharani]

in that respect every batsman is 'unique' *winks*

yeah, everyone who ISN'T a copybook style player which is what Sachin, Dravid, Kallis and some others are, to an extent.



And again, absolutely nothing wrong with that.


To make it clearer, Sachin has a very clear and defined style of batting in ODIs... Something which can be considered his own...

 

[Anil]

I'll take your word for it.

I should have made this clearer, but I also meant a relative minority in relation to other sports like baseball, basketball and other rubbish.

basketball is certainly not rubbish, far from it... , baseball i totally agree, a pale imitation of cricket...

 

[neville cardus]

You know, if you are both so very keen on pitying each other but do not want to be pitied yourselves, you quite easily just pity me. (Hard week, etcetera.)

Oh dear. Today the incoherence; tomorrow the first of the salad word days.

 

[archie mac]

We're talking comparable batsmen. With all due respect to May, he wasn't in the same class as Tendulkar or Richards. Tate needs to step up his game and play more than the one solitary test.

He was a bloody good batsman though

OK lets try the Gov. Gen. players of his period (and fans) were still rating him greater than Bradman

 

[Burgey]

Quentin Bryce > Bradman ?

 

[archie mac]

Quentin Bryce > Bradman ?

I think he is a leg spinner

 

[R_D]

You see, I am looking for your criteria as to why you think they are better, and why so categorically. Because at the very least they are close, and if you actually go into objective reasoning it's hard to be that one-sided about it.

Anyway, the reason Waugh wasn't seen as highly was because he started off an average Test batsman. But in the 90s, he was just as good if not better than those two. IMO, he was better than them. Certainly a better record all-round and definitely carried the Aussie team in many matches. If Border epitomizes Australia's struggle and transition into a decent test side, Waugh epitomizes Australia's rise from being a great Test side into an all-time great one.



Well, argue it. Give your two cents why Lara or Sachin's records are better than Ponting's.

I think Ponting hasn't been tested as much against good bowling like the other 2 and is one of the reason i don't regard him to be good as them. He has cashed in on this era of flat pitches and some ordinary bowling. Its not much of suprise that we have many great batsman going around. Last time i checked we had Ponting, Kallis, Dravid, Yousuf, Sehwag, Sangakarra, Hayden, Inzi and maybe Jayawardne and Gilchrist until 2005.
There were so many batsman who were averg around 50 or above.
Aussie lineup really came up against a good bowling lineup in 2005 Ashes and they really struggled. Ponting avg around 35. He played one good knock but struggled throughout the series but it wasn't much of suprise that he was back in top form once he left the english shores.
If Ponting does go on to improve his record in India and continue in same vain of form for another 2 or 3 years than i'd certainly consider him to be good as Tendulkar or Lara or even better than them. But until that time i don't think he's good enough to be regarded good as the other 2.

 

[bagapath]

Sir Viv scored that many "matchwinning" centuries thanks to Messrs. Marshall, Holding, Garner etc. Those quickies ensured Sir Viv a higher win/century ratio. Sehwag never had the luxury of such bowlers. So that stat is just not appropriate.

sehwag has played in 20 victorious tests; that is a big enough number to see the he had been part of a pretty successful team. but he has contributed with a mere two centuries in these 20 games. he should have done better though. 2 hundreds in 20 matches??? not good enough....


20 32 2 1308 309 43.60 1708 76.58 2 5 3 191 20

his adelaide century to save the game was a great knock. but most of his other centuries like the triple in chennai and the 195 in melbourne and a double in b'lore vs pakistan have been pretty useless to the team.

I have taken the same time period and removed the minnows from the opponents to see how other indian batters have done in victorious matches. sachin has scored the same 2 centuries as sehwag's, though in this decade he has been past his peak. and his average is much better than sehwag's. laxman has scored 2 also. and dravid has scored 6 hundreds.

http://stats.cricinfo.com/statsguru...al1=span;team=6;template=results;type=batting

if you bring in the minnows to the equation dravid has 7, sachin, laxman and ganguly have 3 each. sehwag remains at 2.

even with his teammates, sehwag pales in comparison. so please dont even think of him in the same league as viv richards. just because he is a stroke player, he doesnt become a viv.

 

[Ikki]

I think Ponting hasn't been tested as much against good bowling like the other 2 and is one of the reason i don't regard him to be good as them. He has cashed in on this era of flat pitches and some ordinary bowling. Its not much of suprise that we have many great batsman going around. Last time i checked we had Ponting, Kallis, Dravid, Yousuf, Sehwag, Sangakarra, Hayden, Inzi and maybe Jayawardne and Gilchrist until 2005.
There were so many batsman who were averg around 50 or above.
Aussie lineup really came up against a good bowling lineup in 2005 Ashes and they really struggled. Ponting avg around 35. He played one good knock but struggled throughout the series but it wasn't much of suprise that he was back in top form once he left the english shores.
If Ponting does go on to improve his record in India and continue in same vain of form for another 2 or 3 years than i'd certainly consider him to be good as Tendulkar or Lara or even better than them. But until that time i don't think he's good enough to be regarded good as the other 2.

But you see, everything you just said is counter-able with simple and easy logic.

Ponting faced the same attacks as Tendulkar did in the 90s, and in the 90s, there were 4 great bowling sides. Ponting was successful against 2/3 sides he could have faced - of course, he could not face his own. Whereas Tendulkar was successful against 2/4 he could have faced. So by and large, against quality bowling they had similar success, I'd actually say Ponting was better overall against the better bowling because his Windies record is not as poor as Tendulkar's record against Pakistan or South Africa.

Now that was in the 90s, in the 2000s, Ponting has outscored everybody. And the difference between him and Kallis and Yousuf and the regular suspects is that they have played Bangladesh and Zimbabwe many times, thus inflating their average. The only one who averages 60+ (actually 63, without the minnows) is Ponting. Tendulkar himself only averages 46 discounting Bang/Zim. Dravid only averages 51 if you take out Bang/Zim. Ponting is 4-17 runs on average better than all the above batsman.

90s had their fair share of guys who averaged 50: Gower, Gooch, Waugh, Tendulkar, Lara, so although 2000s have a change in people from how many people average 50, it's a difference in average essentially. If we say flatter pitches have aided 1-3 points on average to a batsman's record, a lot of batsmen today lose those 50s and a lot in the 90s gain a better record. That's essentially the difference. I mean, Javad Miandad averaged 54 in the 80s, and the 80s had less batsmen averaging 50 than the 90s, so Miandad > Tendulkar?...You just can't use that logic so simply. Also, a team like Sri Lanka now actually has some geniunely great batsmen in Sangakkarra and Jayawardene. In this instance, it means that the standard of batting in the Sri Lankan side has risen, not that world bowling conditions are poor.

Now, with your third point regarding Ponting needing to do better in India against India to rank better, I have to ask you: do you ask Tendulkar to improve his record against S.Africa for him to rank better? Because Ponting's only flaw is India in India. He has no flaw in terms of overall record against anybody. Tendulkar does poor in S.Africa and barely makes the cut in other places. Why is one small facet of Ponting's record weigh so much heavily than a few facets of Tendulkar's? Especially considering the legend of Tendulkar started in the 90s, where his record has more holes than Ponting does now. I mean, if Ponting does fix his record in India, then he is the most perfect batsman bar Bradman. It would mean he has scored everywhere and against everyone, especially worth scoring runs off as a test of his batsmanship. Tendulkar currently, himself, does not have that type of record and the closest he got to it was in the 90s but to ask Ponting to do even more just to be considered equal...sorry my friend but suffice to say I was waiting to hear something that would intrigue and challenge me but I got the same chinese whispers game.

This is why I asked for your criteria, because the other arguments just don't sit right with logic, and at the very best are debatable. These batsmen debuted close enough apart and their careers have overlapped more than enough to give a fair view. Until I hear an argument that makes half-sense, I am still going to be in disbelief that at the least these two aren't comparable. Say Tendulkar is better, but let's not propagate the non-sense that Ponting is not even close.

 

[R_D]

Ponting faced the same attacks as Tendulkar did in the 90s, and in the 90s, there were 4 great bowling sides. Ponting was successful against 2/3 sides he could have faced - of course, he could not face his own. Whereas Tendulkar was successful against 2/4 he could have faced. So by and large, against quality bowling they had similar success, I'd actually say Ponting was better overall against the better bowling because his Windies record is not as poor as Tendulkar's record against Pakistan or South Africa.

Hmm Didn't know this i wonder why Ponting wasn't rated so highly in 90's when he actually did better than Tendulkar in 90's as you claim. Aus selectors must have been stupid to think about dropping him around early 2000's because here they have a guy performing better than Tendulkar and they were considering dropping him. Seriously if you think Ponting was anywhere close to Tendulkar in 90's than you have to be delusional nothing else.
Its not just about the bowlers but pitches in 90's were so much more conductive to helping bowlers; they weren't like they are now days.

ow, with your third point regarding Ponting needing to do better in India against India to rank better, I have to ask you: do you ask Tendulkar to improve his record against S.Africa for him to rank better? Because Ponting's only flaw is India in India. He has no flaw in terms of overall record against anybody. Tendulkar does poor in S.Africa and barely makes the cut in other places. Why is one small facet of Ponting's record weigh so much heavily than a few facets of Tendulkar's? Especially considering the legend of Tendulkar started in the 90s, where his record has more holes than Ponting does now. I mean, if Ponting does fix his record in India, then he is the most perfect batsman bar Bradman. It would mean he has scored everywhere and against everyone, especially worth scoring runs off as a test of his batsmanship. Tendulkar currently, himself, does not have that type of record and the closest he got to it was in the 90s but to ask Ponting to do even more just to be considered equal...sorry my friend but suffice to say I was waiting to hear something that would intrigue and challenge me but I got the same chinese whispers game.

again are you serious.. comparing Sachin's not great but ok average of around 35 against SA to Ponting's 13 in India.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Hmm Didn't know this i wonder why Ponting wasn't rated so highly in 90's when he actually did better than Tendulkar in 90's as you claim. Aus selectors must have been stupid to think about dropping him around early 2000's because here they have a guy performing better than Tendulkar and they were considering dropping him. Seriously if you think Ponting was anywhere close to Tendulkar in 90's than you have to be delusional nothing else.
Its not just about the bowlers but pitches in 90's were so much more conductive to helping bowlers; they weren't like they are now days.



again are you serious.. comparing Sachin's not great but ok average of around 35 against SA to Ponting's 13 in India.

Ponting was no where near Tendulkar in the 90's. For the first half of that decade he wasn't even playing. When Ponting came to England in 1997 he wasn't even in the team at the start of the series never mind hinting at greatness. Even if you take Tendulkar's record in the second half on the 90's when Ponting was playing it's infinitely superior, Ponting's record for that period is very ordinary.

 

[Ikki]

Hmm Didn't know this i wonder why Ponting wasn't rated so highly in 90's when he actually did better than Tendulkar in 90's as you claim. Aus selectors must have been stupid to think about dropping him around early 2000's because here they have a guy performing better than Tendulkar and they were considering dropping him. Seriously if you think Ponting was anywhere close to Tendulkar in 90's than you have to be delusional nothing else.
Its not just about the bowlers but pitches in 90's were so much more conductive to helping bowlers; they weren't like they are now days.

Whoosh. Who said Ponting was as good as Tendulkar in the 90s? I said against the best bowling sides (the four that I outlined previously) he was just as good. He failed against the lesser bowlers. Regardless, at the end of the millennium Tendulkar had 10-11 years under his belt, Ponting had 4-5. You could not compare them back then as players. Even if Ponting had averaged the same as Tendulkar you could never make that statement. It would be akin to saying Michael Hussey is better than Ricky Ponting now - and Hussey has a better case of that than Ponting ever did.

And I am glad you brought up the pitches, because back then it was like what it was now - meaning there were flat pitches. It just wasn't like this all over the world, whereas it is now.

Now hold onto your seat, but the difference in average between this decade and the last is 2 runs on average. Amazing, 2 runs only for supposedly bad bowling AND pitches. But my friend, this where even that difference falls down: without bang/zim, Tendulkar averages 46 in this easy era and Ponting averages 63. That is 17 runs of average in difference. Or if we were to take off the average difference per batsmen in the eras for Ponting, he'd still be averaging 60+.

Now that aside, the argument is usually that Tendulkar did well against the best of the last era. In terms of best bowlers, Ponting did just as well as Tendulkar. Overall, worse, however. But we're not concerned with average bowlers, we care about the very best ones, so we've established Ponting is more than capable against great bowlers, this era is no longer an excuse to hold him down.

again are you serious.. comparing Sachin's not great but ok average of around 35 against SA to Ponting's 13 in India.

No, sub-40 is not an ok average. It is a bad average, within relativity of the players we are talking about. This is the difference however: Ponting only does poor against India IN India, overall he averages almost 50 against them (49.06). Whereas with Sachin, not only is he poor in S.Africa but against them altogether. 'When bowling was hard', he was not only poor against Pakistan but IN Pakistan too.

I think this was SST main argument: Tendulkar got 'greatness' in the 90s (because he certainly isn't in Ponting's league post 2000) and how did he get it? With THIS kind of record. Yet Ponting with such a more complete record, at this state of his career he is still not even for some people. With regards to the facts above, there is a clear case of double-standards here.

 

[Ikki]

Ponting was no where near Tendulkar in the 90's. For the first half of that decade he wasn't even playing. When Ponting came to England in 1997 he wasn't even in the team at the start of the series never mind hinting at greatness. Even if you take Tendulkar's record in the second half on the 90's when Ponting was playing it's infinitely superior, Ponting's record for that period is very ordinary.

For the first half of the decade he didn't even debut to play . And the first half means even less than the latter 5 years because Tendulkar did not face Warne/McGrath for both, and when he did, it was Warne on debut - and we know how he was then. It was an Aussie attack spear-headed by McDermott. Against the Windies he didn't face Ambrose till the latter part of the decade. Against Pakistan, New Zealand, Zimbabwe and S.Africa, he was pretty bad, again (averaging in the low-to-mid 30s for each). As I said before, this is a Mohammad Yousuf type record.

Ironically, it's Tendulkar's performance in the latter part of that decade that stands out. As it should, that is when he did face Ambrose/Warne,McGrath.

 

[bagapath]

Sachin has scored two centuries in south africa. one of them was in partnership with azhar in a double century stand which old timers rate as one of the most exciting ever. The second one was scored in partnership with sehwag in which he also guided the young turk to his debut century.

ponting averages 12 in india.

you cant say sachin's SA record and ponting's India record are the same.

 

[Ikki]

Sachin has scored two centuries in south africa. one of them was in partnership with azhar in a double century stand which old timers rate as one of the most exciting ever. The second one was scored in partnership with sehwag in which he also guided the young turk to his debut century.

ponting averages 12 in india.

you cant say sachin's SA record and ponting's India record are the same.

Seriously, am I being too complicated or are you missing the point?

Ponting is poor against India...but only in India. And how many tests is that, only 8. Ponting against India in Australia averages 79, in 11 tests. Overall, 19 tests at an average of 49.

Tendulkar on the other hand averages 28 against S.Africa at home in 8 tests and 39 against S.Africa in S.Africa. Overall in 20 tests he averages 35. See the difference?

And with regards to the pre-2000, Tendulkar also has a matching record like this against Pakistan.

Ponting's record is more weird than anything else. He does excellently elsewhere in the sub-continent and smashes the same Indian bowlers at home. Whereas Tendulkar is universally sub-standard against the aforementioned.

 

[R_D]

And I am glad you brought up the pitches, because back then it was like what it was now - meaning there were flat pitches. It just wasn't like this all over the world, whereas it is now.

so you agree that there are more flat pitches around the world now right ?
The whole point being flat pitches have pretty much made sure that a good batsman is going to cash in on most avg attacks now days but in 90's even a avg bowler could hold his own against a good batsman because of the assistant provided by the pitch to bowler.

No, sub-40 is not an ok average. It is a bad average, within relativity of the players we are talking about. This is the difference however: Ponting only does poor against India IN India, overall he averages almost 50 against them (49.06). Whereas with Sachin, not only is he poor in S.Africa but against them altogether. 'When bowling was hard', he was not only poor against Pakistan but IN Pakistan too.

I think this was SST main argument: Tendulkar got 'greatness' in the 90s (because he certainly isn't in Ponting's league post 2000) and how did he get it? With THIS kind of record. Yet Ponting with such a more complete record, at this state of his career he is still not even for some people. With regards to the facts above, there is a clear case of double-standards here.

lol love it how you continuely are willing to forget about Ponting's average of 13 against in India but being rather harsh on Sachin's record agianst SA. Its certainly not good but not as bad as you make it seem. Also reagarding Sachin's record against Pakistan.. its quite misleading because it looks because of his debut series as 16 year old boy... when he only averaged around high 30's agianst them.

get back to rest of the points later