Choose three batsmen for the Post Packer XI middle order

[Ikki]

hey, you mentioned tendulkar scoring mostly in india and against weak australian attacks! when i disproved it by showing his record is better than pontings in such circumstances, you want to change it to overall figures. you are welcome to do so. but dont use this to argue that ponting has a better record against better bowlers. he does not. lara and sachin have a better record against great bowlers in overseas tests. you accept it and change your earlier argument.

The original poster talked about Ponting batting in Australia as if it's easy to bat in Australia because of flat pitches, I assume. When it's equally true, if not more so, with India.

Furthermore, I showed you, Tendulkar faced mostly a 2nd-string Aussie bowling outfit.

Your analysis was flawed because Tendulkar's record is helped out by his mauling of one side: Sri Lanka.

It's like that example I showed in the Wicketkeeper thread:

Player A may average 30 against 9 teams and average 100 against the 10th team and take his average to 40.

Player B may average 44 against 9 teams and average 20 against the 10th team and bring his average to 39.

On the whole, it looks like Player A was more successful than Player B, but in reality it is Player B who had more success - if you measure success in that he had the consistency to score higher against a broader range of opponents.

i am cherry picking???? tell me which great bowler have i missed out or which mediocre bowler have i added to make sachin's record better than ponting's? actually, if you want to believe in something irrespective what the actual facts are it is your problem. just dont be surprised the rest of the world is functioning normally. cheers.

You are cherry picking because by lumping them all together you fail to look at the true picture. You can't put Murali in there - he is a great bowler, but his side did not have a good attack. It hides the fact that through all the great attacks one by one Tendulkar was merely average.

Look at my post before this, it illustrates this point clearly. Lara and Ponting were great against the best. Tendulkar was simply average.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Toughy for me. On one hand there's Lara, my personal favourite to watch and someone who could really dominate an attack, but who's been criticised in the West Indies for his unprofessional approach and for seeming to score so many of his runs when it didn't matter. Then there's Tendulkar, who rules the world in terms of style, class and longevity after carrying the hopes of his country on his shoulders for so long. But in terms of sheer run-scoring ability, his record isn't quite at the level of the others when his record against minnows isn't considered. There's Ponting, a batsman with some clear technical weaknesses yet also one who scores more runs more quickly than the others. Richards, a legend in every sense of the word who averaged over 50 without the benefit of 2000s pitches and poor opposition.

Most people will go for Richards, Lara, Tendulkar evidently, but I'm going to go for Kallis, Richards, Lara. Kallis has to be in the team for me, being one of the most incredible all-rounders of all time, and the other two from four are so close IMO that it's largely down to personal preference.

Kallis is not in the same league as a batsman and not likely to bowl in a team that includes Marshall, Hadlee, McGrath, Imran and Warne.

 

[bagapath]

Look at my post before this, it illustrates this point clearly. Lara and Ponting were great against the best. Tendulkar was simply average.

why should performing well against murali be counted against sachin? and why should ricky getting jacked by harbhajan be ignored? ponting is crap against quality spin. sachin and lara are never crap against anything - true sign of greatness.

 

[Uppercut]

btw, neither sachin nor lara have such ****ty records as ponting's in india. even in SA - his nemesis, sachin averages 40. ponting has a sub 30 avg (it used to be 12) in india that has repeatedly punctured his ego. he cannot expect to be called a great player with such a pathetic record in a major cricketing nation. actually it is a pity he is getting more votes than border and waugh. just goes to show people have short memories.

you want me to remove murali from the list of great bowlers so that lara and sachin's records take a beating and remove bhajj's name too so that ricky looks better. i am sorry you are so desperate to prove a point. let me tell you this as my final argument. ricky is an awesome player. but he is no lara or sachin.

Haha, you're getting heated in my absence!

Ponting's record in India doesn't detract from him anywhere near as much as you claim. It's just something that happens in stats. Sometimes he scores runs, sometimes he doesn't, and if you divided them randomly into 8 groups, one for each country, a lot of the poor scores will quite possibly end up in one country. Sachin has the same thing in SA, but to a lesser extent. To a large degree it's just chance- Ponting played better quicks on similar pitches in Pakistan and a better spinner on similar pitches in Sri Lanka. And he outscored Tendulkar enough elsewhere to overcome it.

Personally, I can't choose between them. All that annoys me in such debates is people claiming a close-run, opinionated subject is cut-and-dry or obvious. They score similar amounts of runs (Ponting scores slightly more, in fact) and scoring runs is what batsmen are there for. It's close enough that you can choose who you want, and most prefer Sachin, but it'd be perfectly reasonable to go for Ponting.

 

[weldone]

Let Ponting have a long career (not in terms of no. of matches please) like Tendulkar and Lara and then we'll have this discussion...And bagapath never cherry picked, but Ikki is doing so by arbitrarily dropping Kumble and Murali...And by the way, Sri Lanka, in no way, had a poor bowling line-up...SriLankan attack, in the last 10 years or so, have been good if not great...

Having said all these, if Ponting keeps his overall average at the same level for 3 more years or so (and if in these three years Tendulkar either retires or does nothing much, say averages around 45 or so) then Ponting will surpass sachin (and Lara) in my book...And till now Ponting is perhaps slightly (very slightly) behind Sachin and Lara in my (and many others') book...

 

[Ikki]

btw, neither sachin nor lara have such ****ty records as ponting's in india. even in SA - his nemesis, sachin averages 40. ponting has a sub 30 avg (it used to be 12) in india that has repeatedly punctured his ego. he cannot expect to be called a great player with such a pathetic record in a major cricketing nation. actually it is a pity he is getting more votes than border and waugh. just goes to show people have short memories.

So? Sobers has an even poorer record in NZ than Ponting has in India. Not only poor in NZ, but overall. The fact is, being poor in one country and not even overall against the country, just playing them AT home and being good to great everywhere else outweighs any little flaw in Ponting's record. You can't argue this really, unless you're choosing to put logic to the wayside.

you want me to remove murali from the list of great bowlers so that lara and sachin's records take a beating and remove bhajj's name too so that ricky looks better. i am sorry you are so desperate to prove a point. let me tell you this as my final argument. ricky is an awesome player. but he is no lara or sachin.

No, I don't want to remove them because they are not great. You don't seem to realise: having a great record against Sri Lanka is not a great feat: because they only had 1 bowler worthy of note. Likewise, neither Kumble and Harbhajan were/are great bowlers. So you ARE cherry picking and your method is flawed. Ponting had no trouble with the best.

There were only 4 great bowling sides of the time. Lara was magnificent against them, Ponting too and Tendulkar was average. It looks like I've just crushed your dreams. But I think you are a reasonable person. When you put away your bias you'll see exactly what I mean. Right now, and as bad as this sounds, your argument doesn't have a leg to stand on.

 

[Ikki]

why should performing well against murali be counted against sachin? and why should ricky getting jacked by harbhajan be ignored? ponting is crap against quality spin. sachin and lara are never crap against anything - true sign of greatness.

Because he didn't perform well against just Murali...Murali comes with 3-4 other mediocre bowlers (most of the time). When you include Murali's name...that is Tendulkar's record againt matches where MURALI played - i.e. Sri Lanka. It's not exactly the amount of runs he scored on MURALI himself. So with that inclusion you make the whole analysis a joke. 44 jumps to 50.

Ponting is crap against spin? Wouldn't explain why he does so well against every other spinner bar Harbajan. Murali rates him one of the best in the world.

You need to take a breather mate. I hope all this hasn't been a big shock for you .

 

[weldone]

What? Do you understand how these polls work? If a 'Best Batsman ever' poll consists of just Bradman and Tendulkar, and Bradman gets 100/100 votes, that doesn't imply that Tendulkar is under rated. It just means no one chose to cast a pity vote.

Again you didn't read my whole post and read just the first two sentences (and that's evident from the part of my post you made bold) and replied...

My point was (and that was clearly stated in that post itself) Border and Miandad should have gotten more votes than Kallis, Dravid, Sangakkara and the others...

Let me reiterate I have no problems with Lara, Sachin, Richards, Chappell and Waugh getting more votes...

And yes I understand how these polls work as much as you do...Probably you don't understand the requirement of reading a post fully before replying as much as I do...

And no, if Tendulkar gets 0 votes and Bradman gets 100 it doesn't mean Tendulkar is underrated...But if there are 3 contenders Bradman, Tendulkar and Hussey and if Bradman gets 90 votes, Hussey gets 10 votes and Tendulkar gets 0 votes then it means Tendulkar is underrated...Hope I don't have to be simpler to help you understand my point...

 

[bagapath]

Because he didn't perform well against just Murali...Murali comes with 3-4 other mediocre bowlers (most of the time). When you include Murali's name...that is Tendulkar's record againt matches where MURALI played - i.e. Sri Lanka. It's not exactly the amount of runs he scored on MURALI himself.

So with that inclusion you make the whole analysis a joke. 44 jumps to 50. Ponting is crap against spin? Wouldn't explain why he does so well against every other spinner bar Harbajan. Murali rates him one of the best in the world.

You need to take a breather mate. I hope all this hasn't been a big shock for you .

If you think harbhajan and kumble are mediocre what does it speak of a batsman who is **** against a mediocre attack? and you are going to prove that batsman who fails against a mediocre spinner like harbhajan is better than the two who have done better, many times over, against murali, and against warne? It is my turn to laugh at you Ikki.

 

[Ikki]

If you think harbhajan and kumble are mediocre what does it speak of a batsman who is **** against a mediocre attack? and you are going to prove that batsman who fails against a mediocre spinner like harbhajan is better than the two who have done better, many times over, against murali, and against warne? It is my turn to laugh at you Ikki.

Well, it's really just Harbhajan. But that's how it goes. You can't be perfect, can you? Because if Ricky were to not have succumbed to Harbhajan his record would be without flaw.

Ricky himself belted Murali...who is better than Harbhajan, so again, your argument has no leg to stand on.

Sometimes great batsmen meet an opponent who might not be great but for some reason gives them trouble. The point is, on the whole, Ponting is superior to Tendulkar. I mean, it would be really hard to argue based on their records. Ponting scores more runs against a broader range of opponents, at a higher average and SR, home and away, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th innings...against the best or mediocre...his record is so damn complete.

I was just thinking of another example where I might make it clear why your method was just so flawed. It's like including Shane Bond simply because his record is outstanding, but failing to realise that he played for NEW ZEALAND () and they didn't have a great anything besides him. And imagine if I brought that in: Ricky averages 107 against Shane Bond and Tendulkar averages 25.

But that would muddy the comparison. The reason I name 4 great bowling attacks because that's exactly what they were. They had 2 all-time great bowlers at least and had the batsmen to put up a fight as well. So in every way they are challenging. Of course, I already put up the stats with regards to these teams and these are, as you put it, cold-hard-facts.

 

[bagapath]

Haha, you're getting heated in my absence!

Ponting's record in India doesn't detract from him anywhere near as much as you claim. It's just something that happens in stats. Sometimes he scores runs, sometimes he doesn't, and if you divided them randomly into 8 groups, one for each country, a lot of the poor scores will quite possibly end up in one country. Sachin has the same thing in SA, but to a lesser extent. To a large degree it's just chance- Ponting played better quicks on similar pitches in Pakistan and a better spinner on similar pitches in Sri Lanka. And he outscored Tendulkar enough elsewhere to overcome it.

Personally, I can't choose between them. All that annoys me in such debates is people claiming a close-run, opinionated subject is cut-and-dry or obvious. They score similar amounts of runs (Ponting scores slightly more, in fact) and scoring runs is what batsmen are there for. It's close enough that you can choose who you want, and most prefer Sachin, but it'd be perfectly reasonable to go for Ponting.

sachin's record in SA is no way comparable to ponting's in India. in fact it is not very different from Ponting's in England. please check it before you start pulling sachin's SA record down. if sachin's SA record is poor by his standards, so is ponting's in england. and sachin is not that horrible anywhere as ponting is in india.

When are you guys going to wake up and smell the coffee? Ponting is not THAT great yet. Dont be shocked when he is not put on the same pedestal as lara and sachin. I understand he is the only one left of the great australian team of the past decade. but, hey, the rest of the world accepted gilly and warne as the best ever and mcgrath among the very best of all time. be ahppy about it. but that doesnt mean hayden and ponting can also sneak into all-time XIs very easily.

 

[Ikki]

sachin's record in SA is no way comparable to ponting's in India. in fact it is not very different from Ponting's in England. please check it before you start pulling sachin's SA record down. if sachin's SA record is poor by his standards, so is ponting's in england. and sachin is not that horrible anywhere as ponting is in india.

Sachin averages 35 against S.Africa over all and 39 away, 28 at home. Ponting averages 48 against England and 42 away, 54 at home. They're not comparable.

Even Ponting's record in India is in a way better. Overall he averages 48 against India but 20 away, 79 at home.

When are you guys going to wake up and smell the coffee? Ponting is not THAT great yet. Dont be shocked when he is not put on the same pedestal as lara and sachin. I understand he is the only one left of the great australian team of the past decade. but, hey, the rest of the world accepted gilly and warne as the best ever and mcgrath among the very best of all time. be ahppy about it. but that doesnt mean hayden and ponting can also sneak into all-time XIs very easily.

When will you wake up and smell the coffee that Ponting is simply superior to Tendulkar? Be honest with yourself. Try to build a case for Tendulkar. If you can't, then you should just accept it. I am someone who likes to see arguments because if you put something forth I can't argue, I'll accept it. Thus far, it's just too easy to argue for Ponting because his record is that much better. I mean, look at your own stats, Tendulkar barely pushes past Dravid and Kallis without minnows...whilst even without minnows Ponting comfortably averages higher than all his competition for this spot. These guys played in the same era, the comparison is not difficult.

 

[bagapath]

Well, it's really just Harbhajan. But that's how it goes. You can't be perfect, can you? Because if Ricky were to not have succumbed to Harbhajan his record would be without flaw.

Ricky himself belted Murali...who is better than Harbhajan, so again, your argument has no leg to stand on.

Sometimes great batsmen meet an opponent who might not be great but for some reason gives them trouble. The point is, on the whole, Ponting is superior to Tendulkar. I mean, it would be really hard to argue based on their records. Ponting scores more runs against a broader range of opponents, at a higher average and SR, home and away, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th innings...against the best or mediocre...his record is so damn complete.

I was just thinking of another example where I might make it clear why your method was just so flawed. It's like including Shane Bond simply because his record is outstanding, but failing to realise that he played for NEW ZEALAND () and they didn't have a great anything besides him. And imagine if I brought that in: Ricky averages 107 against Shane Bond and Tendulkar averages 25.

But that would muddy the comparison. The reason I name 4 great bowling attacks because that's exactly what they were. They had 2 all-time great bowlers at least and had the batsmen to put up a fight as well. So in every way they are challenging. Of course, I already put up the stats with regards to these teams and these are, as you put it, cold-hard-facts.

but sachin is never as ****ty as ricky is in india. a great player cannot be so ****ed up in one country that he averages one third of his career over four series.

also, ponting averages 42 in england. sachin averages 40 in SA. you expect me to believe sachin has failed in SA and ponting has succeeded in england?

all you guys are spoilt by watching punter score runs off post ambrose-walsh west indies and post akram-waqar pakistan. he started peaking after 2003. after donald, akram, waqar, walsh and ambrose retired. and after pollock started slipping. all the bowlers he scored against harmisons, flintoffs, vettoris average more than 30. even those he failed pathetically against, harbhajan and ishanth, average more than 30. imagine him facing the champion bowlers who retired during or before 2003 world cup. go back to my first post on this topic. you will find him lagging miles behind lara and sachin when that happens.

remember, sachin's record in australia is outstanding. even if it goes down a notch below when mcgrath and warne played, it is still more valuable than ponting's record in australia because he never had to face warne and mcgrath. if he is so pathetic against ishanth sharma and harbhajan i cant imagine him opening his account against gillespie and mcgill. he might not even pad up to face mcgrath and warne.

ikki.. my first post sealed this argument. dont wonder why punter is getting one third of sachin and lara's votes. he is getting due respect.

 

[Ikki]

but sachin is never as ****ty as ricky is in india. a great player cannot be so ****ed up in one country that he averages one third of his career over four series.

Sachin averages 28 at home against S.Africa. And he averages 39 away. Ponting at LEAST averages a massive 79 at home for his poor 20 away. And everywhere else, on the whole, is superior to Sachin.

also, ponting averages 42 in england. sachin averages 40 in SA. you expect me to believe sachin has failed in SA and ponting has succeeded in england?

Are your rounding skills giving you trouble? If Sachin is 40 in SA (rounding up) Ponting is 43 in England. But the difference is, Sachin averages a poor 28 at home and Ponting averages 54 at home against England.

Sachin: 40-28
Punter: 43-54

Not comparable . And anyway, averaging poorer at home is really worse than averaging poorer away because you're expected to have the upper-hand in familiar/favoured conditions.

all you guys are spoilt by watching punter score runs off post ambrose-walsh west indies and post akram-waqar pakistan. he started peaking after 2003. after donald, akram, waqar, walsh and ambrose retired. and after pollock started slipping. all the bowlers he scored against harmisons, flintoffs, vettoris average more than 30. even those he failed pathetically against, harbhajan and ishanth, average more than 30. imagine him facing the champion bowlers who retired during or before 2003 world cup. go back to my first post on this topic. you will find him lagging miles behind lara and sachin when that happens.

Go look at their records in the 90s (when said bowlers were at their peaks). Ponting still averaged 40 against the Windies, 63 against Pakistan and 50 against S.Africa.

Ponting, ironically, didn't have trouble with the best teams in the 90s, it was his inconsistent scoring against the average teams (although something that didn't help him is that he was shifted around quite a bit). If you'd bothered to actually look at the records you'd know this. And it is post 2000 that he starts improving his record against the ordinary sides, as he was already good against the best sides and continued to be good in this current era.

Let's all remember that Tendulkar's been pretty average this era...even if you wish to entertain that there has been a lesser quality in the bowling stocks.

remember, sachin's record in australia is outstanding. even if it goes down a notch below when mcgrath and warne played, it is still more valuable than ponting's record in australia because he never had to face warne and mcgrath. if he is so pathetic against ishanth sharma and harbhajan i cant imagine him opening his account against gillespie and mcgill. he might not even pad up to face mcgrath and warne.

ikki.. my first post sealed this argument. dont wonder why punter is getting one third of sachin and lara's votes. he is getting due respect.

Sachin's record goes some 10-12 average points down when McGrath and Warne are playing - which is not simply a "notch". Even lower when it's just McGrath (funny enough). Ponting's record against the best is not up for question, whether he batted against McGrath and Warne (which I think he did in SS), because he belted comparable bowlers in Ambrose, Donald and Murali.

I'm sorry, I was hoping for someone with a good argument so that I could take these Sachin is God arguments seriously, but I think I argued well enough so that if someone with an unbiased mind comes to read them they'll know who the superior batsman was and they'll agree with me that it's a joke that someone like Ponting has 1/3rd of Sachin's votes - someone who he is at LEAST as good if not simply better.

Again, I was hoping you'd sway me, but you just repeated yourself without understanding or clarifying what you were saying. You seemed to be a reasonable person to me, especially when I look back at your other arguments but this one just teetered out in poor generalisations.

 

[G.I.Joe]

Again you didn't read my whole post and read just the first two sentences (and that's evident from the part of my post you made bold) and replied...

My point was (and that was clearly stated in that post itself) Border and Miandad should have gotten more votes than Kallis, Dravid, Sangakkara and the others...

Let me reiterate I have no problems with Lara, Sachin, Richards, Chappell and Waugh getting more votes..

And yes I understand how these polls work as much as you do...Probably you don't understand the requirement of reading a post fully before replying as much as I do...

No, actually you still don't understand these polls. You're asking for results consistent with a graded voting system in a first-past-the-post poll. Which you're not going to get.

And no, if Tendulkar gets 0 votes and Bradman gets 100 it doesn't mean Tendulkar is underrated...But if there are 3 contenders Bradman, Tendulkar and Hussey and if Bradman gets 90 votes, Hussey gets 10 votes and Tendulkar gets 0 votes then it means Tendulkar is underrated...Hope I don't have to be simpler to help you understand my point...

You're interpreting your own example incorrectly, for the reason stated above. If Hussey gets 10 votes and Tendulkar gets 0, it means that in the views of 10% of the voters, Hussey > Tendulkar. However, the poll says nothing of the views of the other 90% voters (who voted for Bradman) with regard to their relative preferences for either Tendulkar or Hussey. It could well be that a large majority of those 90% regard Tendulkar as being better than Hussey (and obviously both below Bradman). But since the first-past-the-poll system does not permit the expression of that preference, you cannot substantiate those claims of yours. You're going down the simplistic and incorrect route of extrapolating the 10-0 Hussey Tendulkar result as representative of the entire voting population, when in reality the opposite could very well be true, and even more so given that you're talking about a 10% who voted for Hussey ahead of Bradman .

Its really that simple.

 

[haroon510]

went for Lara, Sachin and Inzi

i didn't see sir Viv until after i voted.. or else i would vote for him..

 

[bagapath]

You seemed to be a reasonable person to me, especially when I look back at your other arguments but this one just teetered out in poor generalisations.

cool ikki. did you read my longer post before this argument started? i love cricket, irrespective of whichever countryman plays it. i am not at all biased. you'd have seen weldone's post too. http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/1827585-post85.html. even he could see i was presenting a complete argument and not cherry picking. i repeated some of my arguments because you were avoiding them. you still are. you know you had to circumvent them to make a case, however weak it could be. so i would rather stop here. we dont have to agree. i hope ponting makes it to the fourth spot in this poll and comes into reckoning for the no.6 spot. i wont vote for him even then but at least you will feel better. cheers.

 

[weldone]

If Hussey gets 10 votes and Tendulkar gets 0, it means that in the views of 10% of the voters, Hussey > Tendulkar. However, the poll says nothing of the views of the other 90% voters (who voted for Bradman) with regard to their relative preferences for either Tendulkar or Hussey.

Yes, I know that as much as you do. And my comment was about that 10% of the voters, not about the rest 90%. I didn't mention that explicitly because I thought you were intelligent enough to understand that.

Because, again, it's that simple.

 

[Ikki]

cool ikki. did you read my longer post before this argument started? i love cricket, irrespective of whichever countryman plays it. i am not at all biased. you'd have seen weldone's post too. http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/1827585-post85.html. even he could see i was presenting a complete argument and not cherry picking. i repeated some of my arguments because you were avoiding them. you still are. you know you had to circumvent them to make a case, however weak it could be. so i would rather stop here. we dont have to agree. i hope ponting makes it to the fourth spot in this poll and comes into reckoning for the no.6 spot. i wont vote for him even then but at least you will feel better. cheers.

I know you're not the kind of member that just spouts things off bias, but I am disappointed that you do not follow the logic I am giving you. As you keep bringing up the same point I keep refuting it but you seem not to understand. I think you're too intelligent not to get the point, that's why I referred to maybe this truth hitting a bit harder home.

The reason I said using Murali is flawed is because it gives Sachin an average of 50 against all those bowlers, when in reality, all but Murali, his average is 44. Furthermore, the reason including Murali muddies the comparison is because it is not a simple count of runs Sachin scored against Murali, it is in actual fact the amount of runs Sachin scored against Sri Lanka when Murali was there. Just like picking Donald and Pollock is not calculating how much he scored against Donald and Pollock but against S.Africa when Donald and Pollock were present. But the difference between Sri Lanka and S.Africa in strength was huge.

Now for the past decade and a half, Sri Lanka for the most part has not been a difficult team to score runs against, so including those games where Murali is present is irrelevant because they are not a good team/not a strong attack. It hides how average Sachin was against the top teams with the top bowlers (Australia, WIndies, S.Africa and Pakistan - all easily comparable teams). By diluting games where he did well against Sri Lanka, you inflate his average by 6 points.

Similarly with Ponting, including Harbhajan is irrelevant. India were not a strong team (first of all) 2nd of all Ponting's failures only occured when Harbhajan was there. Against Kumble he is fine, but you can't include Kumble without including a lot of Harbhajan because they happened to play together for the most part against Ponting. And, in principle the same thing happens with Ponting, although for the opposite effect, that Ponting actually did awesomely against the best attacks of his time, but by diluting one bowler with which he failed (admittedly, badly) you deflate his average some 7 points.

But the idea of the analysis is to compare these two to the BEST attacks (not just bowlers, otherwise I could include someone like Bond or anyone else really, which puts us back to stage 1; their overall average).

For example, scoring against New Zealand, even when they had Hadlee, was not the same as scoring against The West Indies attack. YET, if I use the names of the West Indies' bowlers and put Hadlee...what does it calculate? The average runs made against West Indies and New Zealand when those bowlers were there. But that's wrong to do because they are not of the same standard, thus spoiling the intent of the analysis.

 

[shankar]

Sachin's record goes some 10-12 average points down when McGrath and Warne are playing - which is not simply a "notch". Even lower when it's just McGrath (funny enough).

Tendulkar faced McGrath and Warne in only 3 series. In the '99 one in Aus he was the Man of the series averaging 46. In the '01 seroes he was instrumental in India winning the series with an average of 50. In the BG series of 2004 he was included in the side midway in the series as a desperate move since India were trailing 0-1. He had been out with tennis elbow and had had no match practice and not surprisingly struggled to get the ball off the square. Given the small number of matches he's played against the pair, it's misleading to look at an overall average.