Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
People have talked about that before - Harmison should never have been allowed near a ODI and it's a damn good job he's not playing them any more.
-
Welcome to the Cricket Web forums, one of the biggest forums in the world dedicated to cricket.
You are currently viewing our boards as a guest which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community you will have access to post topics, respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join the Cricket Web community today!
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us.
***Official*** South Africa in England
- Thread starter TT Boy
- Start date
zaremba
Cricketer Of The Year
I think that his opponents rated him a little more highly than you do. His performance against Australia at Bristol was pretty special. He managed to dismiss Gilchrist, Hayden, Ponting, Martyn, Hussey. You can try put this down to repeated inexplicable batsman error but I don't think you'll convince many people.
Last edited:
Goughy
Hall of Fame Member
Why? The last time England were good he was by far the best bowler.
Also his career record is virtually identical to that of Anderson (who is seen as a quality OD bowler)
Woodster
International Captain
I think it's unlikely that we'll see Harmison in coloured clothing again. The repeated problems he has with travelling mean that he is certainly ready to come home, when touring abroad, by the end of the Test series (presuming these come before the ODI's). Any other one-day tournaments like the Champions Trophy are surely seen by him as something he can do without (Not a bad idea as far as the Champs trophy is concerned).
Goughy
Hall of Fame Member
Thats the key really, rather than his performances. Harmison does not want to be away from home any longer than he needs to be and Test cricket has been the priority.
Im sure he isnt wishing for a break in Pakistan for the CT, though Im sure he would be more than happy to take the short jaunt to WI for the Stanford games.
Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
Well no I don't think it was the most outstanding spell you'll ever see, no (the Ponting and Martyn balls were good, but the Gilchrist, Hayden and Martyn ones were all rank poor deliveries) and certainly not as good as so many have painted it. Nonetheless, it was a decent spell, as were several others that summer and even more the summer before.
Nonetheless, like the first 7 Tests in year 2004, they are rather a different case to the rest. In the summers of 2004 and 2005, Harmison's figures were from an economy-rate of 4.28-an-over and an average of 22.46 in 18 matches. In the rest of his career, they were an economy-rate of 5.73-an-over and an average of 45.56 in 23 matches. Which is utterly dreadful.
Admittedly, though, 18 to 23 is not that much of a difference. In fact you could say that for 44% of his ODI career Harmison was a good bowler. As I said, though, the good was in the middle and the poor at either end. And his Test performances, as well as his domestic record, just made it patently obvious that he should never have been playing ODIs.
BTW, I can't really recall any opponents - or indeed anyone else during his ODI career rather than after it in hindsight - calling him an outstanding or even good ODI bowler.
Woodster
International Captain
Yes the benefits of the Stanford matches are sure to raise the interest in the players that suffer from home sickness and fatigue due to a heavy workload.
Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
Aside from the fact I'd dispute England were really all that good at ODIs in either 2004 or 2005... he bowled above himself on that occasion. You might as well say Richard Hadlee was the best New Zealand bowler last time they were a really good Test side so their best chance to become good again would be to recall him now.
Harmison is and more often than not has been dreadful in ODIs, and if he were to be picked that'd likely make England poor, not good.
Well I certainly don't see him as such. Anderson IMO is a very poor ODI bowler indeed, and has been for almost all his career other than the summer of 2003, where he was exceptionally effective via a golden arm more than bowling exceptionally.
If England continue to see Anderson as quality, they'll not get very far.
Goughy
Hall of Fame Member
Goughy
Hall of Fame Member
No, that would be ********. Cant quite believe Ive acknowledged it with a reply.
zaremba
Cricketer Of The Year
You may have been watching a different match to me if you think that "a decent spell" is an apt description of his performance. It really does seem as though you're absolutely determined to ignore every piece of evidence to suggest that he's a good bowler.
Well I don't think it's very likely that many of his opponents would say something like "Steve Harmison's an outstanding ODI bowler." What they would say, and what they did say, is that he is an outstanding bowler (without the otiose qualification). If you want me to dig out the relevant quotations, I will happily do so.
With respect, this is an area where your running-down of Steve Harmison is at its least convincing, because people who really know about the merits of his kind of fast bowling - which is to say, those that have to face it, and those who are glad to play alongside him, rather than those that have the luxury of watching him through a TV screen - rate him very very highly, particularly when he was at his "anomalous" peak.
BoyBrumby
Englishman
Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
As I said - he certainly didn't bowl poorly, it's difficult to bowl 10 overs for 33 in a ODI if you're bowling poorly, but if you're really telling me that the Gilchrist, Hayden and Martyn wickets weren't out-and-out poor deliveries (they were all short and wide and should have been smashed for four) then yes, I think we were indeed watching a different game. Change those wicket deliveries to fours and you've got 10-45-2. Yes, I realise this is very simplistic and once you change 1 delivery of a ODI, especially early on, you can potentally completely change the whole thing. But hypothetically speaking, that's what'd happen.
No, I just don't consider it evidence that suggests such a thing - if I did, I'd clearly consider him a good bowler. There are several occasions in ODIs where I've acknowledged he bowled well, as I said - as much as 44% of his career. But I don't consider him to be a good ODI bowler overall, because this was bookended by stuff which was utterly woeful.
Well Kev's already found one, but the trouble is people are often all too happy to blur the two game-forms into one, and once that's done I'm never going to attach any relevance to it.
I'm well aware of that, but I also refuse to accept that someone is a good bowler if their figures are poor, never mind very poor, just because their opponents say they don't like facing him.
Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
I know it would - that's the point. Saying Harmison was England's best bowler when they had a semi-decent side so should play despite there being little evidence to suggest he'll repeat the performances he put in at that time would be, well, not ********, but nonsensical.
zaremba
Cricketer Of The Year
So, to sum up:
(i) his good figures are misleading (because some batsmen got out to bad balls; we shall ignore the good balls in that spell which didn't take wickets);
(ii) his good performances should in any event be cleansed from the record as anomalous; and
(iii) his opponents' rating of him can be dismissed as inaccurate / ignorant / unreliable because the stats (as purified: see (i) and (ii) above) don't suggest he's as good as they seem to think he is.
Masterful!
Richard
Cricket Web Staff Member
No. That's a very, very twisted take on my words.
More accurately:
His figures are poor, and go from poor to abysmal if a little in-depth looking involving splitting things up into a couple of different phases is done.
Thus because his figures are poor, and for a greater part are abysmal despite a small amount of very good, I can't take too seriously any opponents' words on how good he is. How much someone likes to face a bowler does not neccessarily have a direct correlation with how good they are.
More accurately:
His figures are poor, and go from poor to abysmal if a little in-depth looking involving splitting things up into a couple of different phases is done.
Thus because his figures are poor, and for a greater part are abysmal despite a small amount of very good, I can't take too seriously any opponents' words on how good he is. How much someone likes to face a bowler does not neccessarily have a direct correlation with how good they are.
zaremba
Cricketer Of The Year
No, with great respect, you're the one twisting words - Glenn McGrath (to take Goughy's example) was not saying how little he likes to face Harmison - merely what a great bowler he is.
And as for this -
- you do sound as though you believe you have a Hotline to Truth which has passed everyone else (including those a little closer to the cutting edge than you) by.
Top_Cat
Request Your Custom Title Now!
Furball
Evil Scotsman
Hadn't realised until now how much of a form slump Kevin Pietersen has been in in ODIs.
His England career from debut to the end of the World Cup reads: 49 matches, 2008 runs, 5 hundreds, 14 fifties, 1 duck, average 59.05, S/R 91.81
Since the World Cup, it reads 25 matches, 661 runs, 1 hundred, 4 fifties, 3 ducks, average 31.47, S/R 74.52
His England career from debut to the end of the World Cup reads: 49 matches, 2008 runs, 5 hundreds, 14 fifties, 1 duck, average 59.05, S/R 91.81
Since the World Cup, it reads 25 matches, 661 runs, 1 hundred, 4 fifties, 3 ducks, average 31.47, S/R 74.52