The best batsman and bowler of the 1990s

[Pratters]

Agree with Mr Incredible. Indian batting was **** abroad in the 90s.

 

[Richard]

No Richard i was simply stating that in the 90s Oz batting lineup was superior to India's.

This is what u said:

"Wrong. The best batting side of their day was India. Ambrose struggled for effect against them;..."

Clearly worldwide Oz battin line ups were far more consistent which is y they were clearly the best battin side of the 90s. In fact, up until the retirement of S waugh (or thereabouts) Oz still had the best battin line up

I'd venture to suggest that after 2001/02 when pitches flattened-out and conformed to a Worldwide (flat) norm, India's batting (which by then consisted of Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman, Ganguly and Sehwag) was unquestionably superior to Australia's, and has remained so on all bar a few occasions. However that's not relevant to the Donald question as his career of importance finished in 2001.

Australia's batting unit of 1993/94 (Taylor, Slater, Boon, Waugh, Border, Waugh, Healy) was indeed without holes and could indeed have a case for being better than any of India's around the same time (not sure if Sidhu, Dravid, Tendulkar, Azharuddin, Ganguly and Mongia ever played together for an extended period but if they did they'd run things pretty close). But on most occasions Australia's batting had some holes in it, like India's, and India's best was > Australia's best. It may indeed be true that bowling at Australia in Australia (or in England or South Africa) was more challenging than bowling at India in Australia (or in England or South Africa), but that's a little of an unfair question really.

As a seam-bowler (and arguably spinner as well) I'd consider conquering India in India the utmost challenge, followed by something else. Remember too that Australia's batting was far from unequivocally better than West Indies' throughout Donald's career, and there were times when even his own team could conceivably have been stronger (not that that's relevant of course as he never bowled at them).

 

[MrIncredible]

I would have to disagree

Hayden
Langer
Ponting
M Waugh
S Waugh
D Martyn
A Gilchrist

Is and was better than ne thing India has ever managed to muster post 02 or otherwise. Cant believe we're even having this debate.

No way India's best in the 90s compares to Oz's (esp where away tests are concerned). I dont understand the logic of succeeding in India being the be all and end all for great seamers. What would be the point of doing well in India and failing ne where else?? For me the ultimate test(s) lately for ne great bowler would be Oz (94 onwards) and India (esp post 00) but thats only because both teams had the 2 best batting lineups.

 

[stephen]

Either way, the standout quick of the 90s was Ambrose in my mind. He had it all - speed, hostility, accuracy and the ability to intimidate by just being there.

And good luck getting Richard to admit that Hayden was better than anyone else in the world. Though I would say that

Hayden
Langer
Ponting
M Waugh / Lehmann
S Waugh
Martyn
Gilchrist

is probably the best batting lineup ever seen outside ones which included Bradman. India in the early 00s was very very good though. Anything with Dravid and Tendulkar in it is going to be a ridiculously good batting lineup.

 

[Pratters]

Best Batsman of the 90s - Lara for playing more high scoring innings compared to Tendulkar
Best Bowler of the 90s - Ambrose slightly ahead of McGrath

 

[Uppercut]

Like the look of India's current lineup. In hindsight we might look back on the lineup last time they played Australia as one of the best ever:

Sehwag
Gambhir
Dravid
Tendulkar
Laxman
Ganguly
Dhoni

Four players with well-known credentials and three I expect will retire widely considered very, very good players.

 

[MrIncredible]

So you're seriously telling me that bowling against India in India was less of a challenge than bowling against Australia, in Australia or anywhere else?

No. Bowling to India in India (as a paceman in the 90s) was equally challenging as bowling to Oz in Oz since the Oz lineup was better vs pace and better overall. Bowling to the Indian lineup as a paceman in places like Oz, NZ, RSA, WI was much easier a task (in the 90s) than it was bowlin to the Oz lineup, hence Oz batting >> India's in the 90s. Post 00 Oz was only slightly better than India batting wise.

 

[Days of Grace]

Because the pitches around the world flattened out considerably post 2000.

The only place where seam bowlers got good conditions consistently was in South Africa, and as we saw India would still get ****ed over there.

 

[Jono]

Like the look of India's current lineup. In hindsight we might look back on the lineup last time they played Australia as one of the best ever:

Sehwag
Gambhir
Dravid
Tendulkar
Laxman
Ganguly
Dhoni

Four players with well-known credentials and three I expect will retire widely considered very, very good players.

Yep, and considering that they played at home vs. Australia, it made that batting line-up that much better.

Could say Indian cricket, on paper at least, peaked in the 2nd test.

Sehwag
Gambhir
Dravid
Tendulkar
Laxman
Ganguly
Dhoni
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Mishra
Ishant Sharma

I know it didn't have Kumble in it, but he was past his best (at test level, still a gun at T20s ) and Mishra was obviously great in his place.

Probably the best XI India have put out in a long long time. Especially since Ishant was bowling extremely well then too.

 

[honestbharani]

Not quite true, Ambrose against India in 1997 was certainly not off-peak in terms of his results against other sides around the same time; Ambrose basically had one non-stop "peak" (for me plateau is the more appropriate term) from 1990 to 2000, without any sustained downtime. And the overwhelming impression I've got from that series is that India simply blocked him out without great difficulty - try as he might he was unable to break through the quality of the Indian batting. Yet Franklyn Rose could.

That was Ambrose's only series against India, and had he had more - as Donald did - then it's a fair assumption that he might have done a decimation job, especially if allowed some proper seaming, bouncy decks that he so thrived on. But sadly, he didn't.

You really read too much into it. I feel India crumbled against Rose because they tried to take the liberties against him which they wouldn't dare to do against Ambrose. This is precisely the reason why rating McGrath and Ambrose is so difficult because you HAVE to take into consideration the pressure they built on batsmen with their relentless accuracy on flat tracks and which, more often than not, helped the bowlers at the other end pick up wickets...

 

[honestbharani]

Quite right too. When I say I'd have McGrath over Ambrose, you have to remember that the margins are SO fine. There's next to nothing to choose between them. Bearing that in mind, McGrath's considerable success when batsmen ruled the world becomes quite significant. And in actual fact, that could apply to McGrath vs. almost any other top-class bowler.

It cuts both ways, really... When you get tougher tracks, one can assume the batsmen are much better equipped technically to handle them and hence you do get to face better qualtiy of batsmen... And given how remarkably low the bowling standards were outside Australia and the spinners worldwide in the early 2000s, it is fair to assume that Ambrose had to bowl at better batsmen, even if on slightly more helpful tracks.


As I said earlier, it is really impossibe to seperate the two. One can argue on either side and get every point right still...

 

[Uppercut]

Yep, and considering that they played at home vs. Australia, it made that batting line-up that much better.

Could say Indian cricket, on paper at least, peaked in the 2nd test.

Sehwag
Gambhir
Dravid
Tendulkar
Laxman
Ganguly
Dhoni
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Mishra
Ishant Sharma

I know it didn't have Kumble in it, but he was past his best (at test level, still a gun at T20s ) and Mishra was obviously great in his place.

Probably the best XI India have put out in a long long time. Especially since Ishant was bowling extremely well then too.

Yeah. Fittingly, probably the best Indian performance I've ever seen was in that match too.

 

[Richard]

You really read too much into it. I feel India crumbled against Rose because they tried to take the liberties against him which they wouldn't dare to do against Ambrose. This is precisely the reason why rating McGrath and Ambrose is so difficult because you HAVE to take into consideration the pressure they built on batsmen with their relentless accuracy on flat tracks and which, more often than not, helped the bowlers at the other end pick up wickets...

I naturally didn't see that series so won't try to comment with considerable authority, and have said many times that because one bowler got better figures than another it certainly doesn't neccessarily mean they bowled better. But I have read a bit of that series - in fact that West Indian spring which also included a tour by Sri Lanka - and Rose's performances were roundly reported to be highly impressive and as such fair hopes were hung on his shoulders that he would be the next good West Indies quickie.

However I've never been one for "taking wickets at the other end". If batsmen fall prey to scoreboard pressure in a limitless-over match they've batted poorly; if bowlers in Test matches sacrifice economy for penetration they've bowled better than someone who bowled economically without the wicket-taking deliveries. If Rose pitched it up and didn't worry about the Indians going after him, thus getting them out, then he bowled better than Ambrose who even if they struggled to lay bat on him and get him away was unable to hit the edge very often. Again, I emphasise, I'm not saying this neccessarily did happen in that particular 1997 series, merely that I have seen it do so and people credit one bowler with "taking wickets at the other end" when in reality the bowler who's got the wickets has bowled well and the one who hasn't hasn't bowled particularly well at all.

And as an outstanding bowler, the fact that batsmen are not going to attempt liberties against you is mostly an advantage - only very rarely does it work against you and in favour of another bowler. If at any time it does things will soon change.

 

[Richard]

Because the pitches around the world flattened out considerably post 2000.

Post-2001/02 TBH. The calendar-year of 2000 was one of the most successful for bowlers Worldwide in modern times.

The only place where seam bowlers got good conditions consistently was in South Africa, and as we saw India would still get ****ed over there.

There have indeed been some proper seam-friendly conditions in South Africa again since 2006/07 but 2001/02-2005/06 you were as likely to get anything for bowlers as you were anywhere else - which is not very likely. In that time I can recall about 3 Tests where there were seam\swing-friendly conditions for more than the odd session.

 

[Richard]

I would have to disagree

Hayden
Langer
Ponting
M Waugh
S Waugh
D Martyn
A Gilchrist

Is and was better than ne thing India has ever managed to muster post 02 or otherwise. Cant believe we're even having this debate.

Not really. At the time said line-up appeared, which was 2001/02, both Waughs were completely out-of-nick (Mark terminally so). And only Ponting and Hayden of those was as prolific as the likes of Tendulkar, Dravid, Azhar and Laxman, and Hayden was absolutely nowhere near as good AFAIC as any of them or Sidhu. Langer and Martyn were nothing more than good Test batsmen, of the sort India don't produce a great deal of (generally it's either brilliant or definately-not-Test-class).

No way India's best in the 90s compares to Oz's (esp where away tests are concerned). I dont understand the logic of succeeding in India being the be all and end all for great seamers. What would be the point of doing well in India and failing ne where else??

There isn't any, and no-one has even remotely intimated that there is. Merely that if one has failed in India in the 1990s as a seamer, it's a bigger CV-gap than failing (homeor away) against Australia.

 

[MrIncredible]

No its not. In fact very few of the very good/great fast bowlers have poor records in India (Mcgrath, Akram, Donald, Walsh, Pollock) but quite a few have poor records in Oz (comparatively speaking) draw from that what u may. Oh and btw (and i know im goin to ruffle a few feathers) but even the great Tendulkar wasnt ne great shakes vs quality pace either (see his record vs the very good/great pace lineups of his time)

Second India (post 00) has never had as reliable opening pair as Oz their middle orders are comparable and India has no answer to Gilchrist, or no answer to the stubborness of the Oz lower order. Seriously Richard!!

 

[Uppercut]

I naturally didn't see that series so won't try to comment with considerable authority, and have said many times that because one bowler got better figures than another it certainly doesn't neccessarily mean they bowled better. But I have read a bit of that series - in fact that West Indian spring which also included a tour by Sri Lanka - and Rose's performances were roundly reported to be highly impressive and as such fair hopes were hung on his shoulders that he would be the next good West Indies quickie.

However I've never been one for "taking wickets at the other end". If batsmen fall prey to scoreboard pressure in a limitless-over match they've batted poorly; if bowlers in Test matches sacrifice economy for penetration they've bowled better than someone who bowled economically without the wicket-taking deliveries. If Rose pitched it up and didn't worry about the Indians going after him, thus getting them out, then he bowled better than Ambrose who even if they struggled to lay bat on him and get him away was unable to hit the edge very often. Again, I emphasise, I'm not saying this neccessarily did happen in that particular 1997 series, merely that I have seen it do so and people credit one bowler with "taking wickets at the other end" when in reality the bowler who's got the wickets has bowled well and the one who hasn't hasn't bowled particularly well at all.

And as an outstanding bowler, the fact that batsmen are not going to attempt liberties against you is mostly an advantage - only very rarely does it work against you and in favour of another bowler. If at any time it does things will soon change.

The problem I have with "taking wickets for the other end" is that it only gets mentioned when you aren't taking wickets at your end. Dale Steyn takes bucketloads of wickets for the other end. Someone whizzing the ball past your outside edge every over is going to get to your head for sure (personally I'd be more inclined to feel the pressure in that situation than I would against a bowler pinning me down ala Andrew Flintoff, but it's different for everyone). Steyn, unlike Flintoff, gets no credit for these wickets because he takes wickets at his end too.

Personally I like bowlers with a healthy strike rate rather than the economical ones. When you throw the ball to Waqar, he's statistically got about a 1 in 7 chance of getting you a wicket that over compared to Ambrose's 1 in 9. While I certainly wouldn't argue for Waqar being better than Ambrose, that's pretty statistically significant when comparing players.

 

[SJS]

I dont think you should shortchange Steyn. The fact is he is playing is a heavily batting-dominated era against teams with at least 2-3 batsmen averaging 45+. His fantastic record goes to his credit, and he is much more than just pace.

I think Steyn has been fabulous. If I did not include him in my stats it was only because we were comparing him at the peak of his career against bowlers who had finished theirs. If one forgets that bit, his record is amazing.

 

[Top_Cat]

I think Steyn has been fabulous. If I did not include him in my stats it was only because we were comparing him at the peak of his career against bowlers who had finished theirs. If one forgets that bit, his record is amazing.

The bit I like about him is that he's had a few years now where people have been able to have a good look at him, develop plans, etc. Batters know exactly what he's about yet he still takes poles. Top bowler and, tbh, a bit under-estimated by those who don't face him..

 

[honestbharani]

The problem I have with "taking wickets for the other end" is that it only gets mentioned when you aren't taking wickets at your end. Dale Steyn takes bucketloads of wickets for the other end. Someone whizzing the ball past your outside edge every over is going to get to your head for sure (personally I'd be more inclined to feel the pressure in that situation than I would against a bowler pinning me down ala Andrew Flintoff, but it's different for everyone). Steyn, unlike Flintoff, gets no credit for these wickets because he takes wickets at his end too.

Personally I like bowlers with a healthy strike rate rather than the economical ones. When you throw the ball to Waqar, he's statistically got about a 1 in 7 chance of getting you a wicket that over compared to Ambrose's 1 in 9. While I certainly wouldn't argue for Waqar being better than Ambrose, that's pretty statistically significant when comparing players.

I agree with the gist of your post. But that is exactly my point... When you bowl well on a flat track, there are always instances when batsmen play you out (which is not impossible on a flat track) and then try to go after some other lesser known bowler who bowls more attackable lines and lengths... Precisely what happened in the Jamaica test in question.