*Official* England in West Indies

[Jigga988]

Nah he picked up Smith later in the game. And five wickets in a match isn't a fifer anyway. "Looking threatening" is not the same thing as being effective. His yorker to Hashim Amla was so, soo good though.

Sorry, didn't realise Richrd posted his figures for the match thought it was just an innings... must have made me look like an idiot

What I'm trying to get at is that, one could argue a fully fit high 80mph Harmy should be in the side which is in my opinion fair enough - know I must be sounding like Beefy or Nasser or Gower - but don't think there's enough bowlers in the county circuit right now that are that much better than him when fully fit... hard to judge Kabir Ali's achievements as they are in Div 2, and Davies is close...

 

[Richard]

As well as the shocker Cook dropped, might as well have been fifer, anyway, I thought he bowled well and looked pretty threatening, as he did when he was at the top pf his game, rigth now he's just a remnants of his former self and dead weight...

I don't think he's remnents of his former self right now, at all. I think he's moreorless exactly what he's been for the vast majority of his career.

Effectiveness is the exception; ineffectiveness is the rule, where Harmison is concerned. Not the other way around. Not remotely close to, either.

 

[Richard]

What I'm trying to get at is that, one could argue a fully fit high 80mph Harmy should be in the side which is in my opinion fair enough - know I must be sounding like Beefy or Nasser or Gower - but don't think there's enough bowlers in the county circuit right now that are that much better than him when fully fit... hard to judge Kabir Ali's achievements as they are in Div 2, and Davies is close...

Harmison has bowled in the high-80s and been fully fit for most of his career. Mostly he's still been ineffective, because bowling in the high-80s in itself is not enough to make a bowler very good against good-quality batting.

You need to do something with the ball, and also have considerably better accuracy than he mostly does.

 

[Jigga988]

Harmison has bowled in the high-80s and been fully fit for most of his career. Mostly he's still been ineffective, because bowling in the high-80s in itself is not enough to make a bowler very good against good-quality batting.

You need to do something with the ball, and also have considerably better accuracy than he mostly does.

I just don't think a lot of the England bowlers currently have the ability to dismiss quality batting so the fact that Harmy cant do it is a bit redundant. Bar a fit Sidebottom and Flintoff, and Anderson ( only really in swinging conditions) there's not much penetration in that attack... and there isn't really anyone who can come in and be a strike bowler, bar maybe Kabir Ali, but like I said before, hard to gauge how good his bowling is in div 2... so, having said that I reckon a fully fit Harmy would hardly be a burden on the England attack, nor be carried by the England attack... you could argue Harmy is capable of more 'wicket balls' (for lack of better term) than everyone bar those previously mentioned.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Mahmood is not an expensive wicket-taker, he's an expensive non-wicket-taker.

Better test strike rate than any of the seamers in the squad, but you know best, of course.

 

[Pup Clarke]

Ridiculous that there's still people out there defending Harmison.

 

[Manee]

Not sure Amjad would have dislodged the tail, probobly would get a wicket with a no ball knowing him... don't see the point in playing a Harmy that can't bowl full pace, the pace was the reason why he was so effective against SA last summer, tbh, I'd go as far to say that I'd rather see a fully fit Amjad in the team than a 80mph Harmy from an English POV... it's sort of like having an 80 mph Edwards, which is btw not very good... didn't appreciate the turd comments btw...

Harmison at 80mph is a useless bowler. Moreover, it signals the far more important issue of him not feeling at his best, he bowls down on pace because he is lacking rhythm or fitness and this means issues with accuracy, which is bad news for second slip. I would rather a fully fit county fast bowler than pretty much any non world class unfit fast bowler in a team because fast bowlers tend to perform unanimously poorly when not fully fit. I don't think that Khan was the best option for England as I think that Mark Davies or Kabir Ali would have been better options but he must play if it comes down to him or an unfit bowler.

In a dead rubber. Harmy bowled very well in that match, but effective is not the word.

He did bowl well, having watched him bowl throughout the game. Harmison in England is a totally different bowler to Harmison outside England. Quick stereotyping of 'home sickness' or whatever may be exaggerated but the statistics and empirical evidence (ie. speed gun readings) back up the assessment of there almost being two different Harmisons, a very good bowler in England and a poor one outside.

What I'm trying to get at is that, one could argue a fully fit high 80mph Harmy should be in the side which is in my opinion fair enough - know I must be sounding like Beefy or Nasser or Gower - but don't think there's enough bowlers in the county circuit right now that are that much better than him when fully fit... hard to judge Kabir Ali's achievements as they are in Div 2, and Davies is close...

I don't think that it is too difficult to assess Kabir Ali's achievments as it was shown that he outbowled Simon Jones, who it has been established is an international option. Moreover, it is not as if his Division Two figures are comparible to anyone from Division 1, he bloody well dominated the Division with the ball for the entire season, on high scoring tracks and low scoring tracks alike. The main reason of poor transferral from one level to the other is either that a bowler outpaces the opposition but is erratic (not the case) or that a bowler is very slow by the standards of the higher level but acceptable for the low level of competition in which he plays (not the case either).

Harmison has bowled in the high-80s and been fully fit for most of his career. Mostly he's still been ineffective, because bowling in the high-80s in itself is not enough to make a bowler very good against good-quality batting.

You are on the money here. However, the recent trend, and I do stress recent, is that Harmison's pace is an indication to the rhythm he is in (looking for a more long term word, but alas, can't find one).

 

[Richard]

Better test strike rate than any of the seamers in the squad, but you know best, of course.

I do indeed, because I've actually watched the games (I didn't even need to have done that - I could just have read the individual scorecards rather than looked purely at one simplistic overall statistic); that strike-rate is not the be-all-and-end-all, nor in fact anything of the slightest significance. Apart from in his first 3.2 overs in Test cricket (in which he took 3-6 and bowled genuinely superbly) virtually all his wickets were gimmes.

Here are some of the illustrious names he's dismissed thereafter:
Farveez Maharoof (2)
Nuwan Kulasekara
Faisal Iqbal
Kamran Akmal (2)
Shahid Nazir (2)
Umar Gul (2)
Stuart Clark (2)
Glenn McGrath

That's 8 genuine tailenders (out of 17 wickets - ie almost half), 4 players who could at best be called useful lower-order batsmen, 1 who is possibly the worst regularly-picked specialist batsman in Test history and a whole 4 batsmen who might be recognised as of some usefulness (Thilan Samaraweera, Younis Khan, Matthew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist).

Mahmood's high strike-rate has everything to do with being fortunate to be bowling at the right time (and being rightly deemed patently not good enough to bowl regularly at top-order players) and absolutely nothing with an ability to regularly bowl wicket-taking deliveries - because he does not possess such a thing.

 

[Richard]

I just don't think a lot of the England bowlers currently have the ability to dismiss quality batting so the fact that Harmy cant do it is a bit redundant. Bar a fit Sidebottom and Flintoff, and Anderson ( only really in swinging conditions) there's not much penetration in that attack... and there isn't really anyone who can come in and be a strike bowler, bar maybe Kabir Ali, but like I said before, hard to gauge how good his bowling is in div 2... so, having said that I reckon a fully fit Harmy would hardly be a burden on the England attack, nor be carried by the England attack... you could argue Harmy is capable of more 'wicket balls' (for lack of better term) than everyone bar those previously mentioned.

I don't think he is, myself - I think he's capable of far fewer. Harmison just doesn't do enough with the ball to bowl wicket-taking deliveries very often. He only gets big hauls of wickets through poor batting, which (not surprisingly given it's Test cricket) doesn't happen very often.

It's quite true that plenty of the other England bowlers currently available don't offer all that much either. However, I'd prefer the current Anderson to Harmison (I'd prefer Kabir Ali to him as well FTR, and his team-mate Simon Jones) and I hope that eventually Sidebottom and Flintoff will regain fitness. As things stand, you probably won't gain a great deal by dropping Harmison but nor should anyone ever expect him to achieve very much, because he just isn't a very good bowler.

 

[Woodster]

Regarding Harmison, I though he bowled ok in the last Test, considering his physical health throughout the Test. This is not an excuse, simply a fact, although I know people are judging him on more below par performances than the last Test. I agree that an 80-82 mph Harmison is not worth the selection, yes he'll still get the bounce, but he lacks the consistent direction and movement to trouble the best when operating around this mark.

A fit and firing Harmison (which sadly is far too infrequent in an England shirt) is a handful for anyone, and, imo, worth a place in the squad at the least.

 

[Richard]

He did bowl well, having watched him bowl throughout the game. Harmison in England is a totally different bowler to Harmison outside England. Quick stereotyping of 'home sickness' or whatever may be exaggerated but the statistics and empirical evidence (ie. speed gun readings) back up the assessment of there almost being two different Harmisons, a very good bowler in England and a poor one outside.

Yet Harmison has bowled dreadfully in England for most of his career, same as he's bowled dreadfully away from England for most of his career.

The only time period which took in any success for Harmison (March to June 2004) comprised one away and one home series. Which proves nothing.

 

[Manee]

Regarding Harmison, I though he bowled ok in the last Test, considering his physical health throughout the Test. This is not an excuse, simply a fact, although I know people are judging him on more below par performances than the last Test.

Indeed, I know I am not comparible in the slightest, but I have bowled with a stomach bug before and it is the most exhausting, difficult thing to do.

 

[Manee]

Yet Harmison has bowled dreadfully in England for most of his career, same as he's bowled dreadfully away from England for most of his career.

128 wickets at 28.28 is a good effort though, but I'm sure you will discredit these statistics.

 

[Richard]

Indeed, I know I am not comparible in the slightest, but I have bowled with a stomach bug before and it is the most exhausting, difficult thing to do.

I've bowled when semi-hungover (pretty much never get properly badly hungover) and while I actually happened to bowl superbly for my first 3-4 overs I literally could not continue after my 6th.

Relatively tip-top physical condition is essential to bowl well for a seam-bowler. If Harmison had been putting in excellent performances for ages before this Test I'd basically write it off completely, because you cannot possibly bowl well when ill.

But I see no reason to suspect Harmison would've bowled remotely well given full health in the previous Test.

 

[Woodster]

Indeed, I know I am not comparible in the slightest, but I have bowled with a stomach bug before and it is the most exhausting, difficult thing to do.

It must take so much out of the body, that for him to still be reaching speeds of mid 80's shows a great deal of effort. As I said, I think people's judgements on Harmy are made over a longer period of time than the last Test, but I thought he performed reasonably in such circumstances.

 

[Richard]

128 wickets at 28.28 is a good effort though, but I'm sure you will discredit these statistics.

Well yes - for starters it includes Bangladesh and Zimbabwe - against Test-class teams it's 109 at 30.00. It also includes just 23 Tests outside that NZ series in 2004, whereas the away sample includes 25 outside the WI one of 2004.

The biggest thing, though, is that all of Harmison's one-off grossly-flattered-by-figures games (The Oval 2004, Lord's 2005, Multan 2005/06, Old Trafford 2006) 3\4s of them have been at home.

 

[Woodster]

I've bowled when semi-hungover (pretty much never get properly badly hungover) and while I bowled superbly for my first 3-4 overs I literally could not continue after my 6th.

Relatively tip-top physical condition is essential to bowl well for a seam-bowler. If Harmison had been putting in excellent performances for ages before this Test I'd basically write it off completely, because you cannot possibly bowl well when ill.

But I see no reason to suspect Harmison would've bowled remotely well given full health in the previous Test.

Harmy's continuous flirtation with the Test side despite some real below par performances over the last few years are understandable because of what he does bring to the side should he find his rhythm and be delivering steepling balls around the 90mph mark.

Now the counter argument is obviously whether he is worth persevering with considering he more often than not does not find that rhythm. It's been said countless times, on his day he is fairly unplayable and few batsman can handle him. What they must weigh up is how frequent he has those days ?

His position is similar to that of England's footy keeper David James (not in terms of being a fast bowler!). On his day he is easily the best keeper in England that makes saves no other keeper can. Sadly, he drops more bloopers than most, therefore Capello must weigh that particular dilemma up.

 

[Woodster]

Well yes - for starters it includes Bangladesh and Zimbabwe - against Test-class teams it's 109 at 30.00. It also includes just 23 Tests outside that NZ series in 2004, whereas the away sample includes 25 outside the WI one of 2004.

The biggest thing, though, is that all of Harmison's one-off grossly-flattered-by-figures games (The Oval 2004, Lord's 2005, Multan 2005/06, Old Trafford 2006) 3\4s of them have been at home.

But Richard, these stats do not include the dropped chances off his bowling, so presuming they count as wickets (as you use the same theory for batsmen that give a chance being classed as out) surely his average will plummet ?

 

[ozone]

His position is similar to that of England's footy keeper David James (not in terms of being a fast bowler!). On his day he is easily the best keeper in England that makes saves no other keeper can. Sadly, he drops more bloopers than most, therefore Capello must weigh that particular dilemma up.

Maybe, but you might argue, that despite what Ian Botham says, Harmison is no longer capable of being the best bowler in the country, even on his good days.

 

[Woodster]

Maybe, but you might argue, that despite what Ian Botham says, Harmison is no longer capable of being the best bowler in the country, even on his good days.

Yes quite possibly. That certainly becomes a matter of opinion, but certainly indications are suggesting he is struggling to reach those heights again, although I, like the selectors, am not quite ready to write him off just yet.