Greatest cricketers since 1980

[Migara]

Why? Ponting's batting and Murali's bowling nullify each other but Ponting is undoubtedly the better fielder, and has actually had the pressure of leading a side. How is he not a better cricketer than Murali?

No it isn't. Murali as a bowler has a higher place than Ponting as a batsman. Good bowlers are better than good batsmen, because in a team, you have four bowlers, but seven batsmen.

I dn't think Ponting is a **** capatin. He's a good captain, who was never tested to the extend as some one like Fleming or Jayawardane.

 

[Migara]

Level 1 is perfect. And Dravid, Jayasuriya and Pollock won't be anywhere close to even level 3. Good list, otherwise. Andy Flower probably deserves a mention.

FTR, Jayasuriya is only second to Jayawardane as a captain, in win % (IIRC about 55%)

 

[Migara]

best slip catchers of the last 30 years

mark waugh
mark taylor
rahul dravid
jacquel kallis
mahela jayawardane
greg chappell
ian botham
shane warne
sunil gavaskar
viv richards
graeme smith
inzamam ul haq
clive lloyd

best close in fielders/ground fielders

jonty rhodes
ricky ponting
AB de villiers
mohammad azharuddin
kapil dev
allan border
Joel Garner


I will be missing in action for sometime.... duty beckons.... I hope we knock the aussies out later this year and then hopefully I can come back and gloat about it in between my work...

Hashan Tillekaratne is a glaring omission in close fielders, and so is Mahanama, who were better than both Dilshan and Jayawardane.

 

[Ikki]

No it isn't. Murali as a bowler has a higher place than Ponting as a batsman. Good bowlers are better than good batsmen, because in a team, you have four bowlers, but seven batsmen.

Ponting is about as good as you can get without being Bradman TBF. For the sake of argument I'll agree with you, but the difference between their respective disciplines and the fielding and captaincy of Ponting outweighs that difference.

I get what you're saying, and it makes sense, but you have to put a cap on that kind of logic. Otherwise Gilchrist is the #1 pick because there is only 1 wicket keeper. And as much as I like Gilchrist, I wouldn't use that line of reasoning to his favour.

 

[silentstriker]

I am not getting into this debate.

But:

Captaincy of Ponting works against him, not for him - it nullifies his fielding and more.

Thank you for Nagpur, please come back again. Always appreciate a gifted series win against Australia.

 

[Maximus0723]

Ponting is decent captain. Not good. Decent.

 

[silentstriker]

Well if you said you were making a team to face against a team I picked, and I had to pick a captain to oppose me, I'd pick Ponting. Ponting the batsman is obviously great, but if he is already in the team, I'd pick his captaincy to help nullify his batting. Unless he's touring India, in which case I'll take them both.

 

[vic_orthdox]

When you are a captain for long enough, and not the absolute top of the pile, you'll be remembered for your mistakes more than what you do right.

Eh, Nasser?

 

[TumTum]

Captaincy of Ponting works against him, not for him - it nullifies his fielding and more.

ha ha yer .. and Bradman is better than Hughes

 

[Jono]

I am not getting into this debate.

But:

Captaincy of Ponting works against him, not for him - it nullifies his fielding and more.

Thank you for Nagpur, please come back again. Always appreciate a gifted series win against Australia.

Never loved Ponting more than when he did that.

 

[vcs]

We were winning that game anyway and would have done so regardless of Ponting's blooper IMO.

 

[silentstriker]

No, India were totally under pressure. Check out the commentary as it was happening...

And Ponting was one down in the series and this was the final Test.

 

[Jono]

I almost threw something at my TV after Ganguly's wicket. We most definitely were not 'winning'.

 

[Sir Alex]

Winning? Absolutely no wa. We were hardly 100 runs ahead

 

[vcs]

We took a stranglehold on the match with Dhoni's defensive 8-1 field placing on the third day which completely stifled Australia's scoring.. after conceding an 86-run lead, they were always going to struggle.

 

[vcs]

Winning? Absolutely no wa. We were hardly 100 runs ahead

Rubbish. We were 250+ runs ahead and Dhoni and Harbhajan (with Mishra to come) are hardly mugs with the bat. I'm not defending Ponting's captaincy... his bizarre decision no doubt made things easier for us, but saying we were gifted the win only because of that? no way.

 

[Sir Alex]

Yep, my memory was wrong. But there was a good chance of us putting up a 270 odd target which would definitely have made things much more interesting.

India played well, but what sealed Australia's fate in that test was perhaps that session of play. There was no way Australia could hope to save the series after that.

 

[vic_orthdox]

Yeah, I remember thinking more along the lines of "we've given ourselves a sniff here", where we had the momentum but looking at the pure scorecards it was maybe advantage India. Then came the part-timers.

 

[four_or_six]

The funniest thing about that test was how every one was so desperate for Ponting to break the rules all of a sudden! We do all usually complain when Australia do the 'win at all costs' thing, but personally I actually secretly admire it.

 

[honestbharani]

The funniest thing about that test was how every one was so desperate for Ponting to break the rules all of a sudden! We do all usually complain when Australia do the 'win at all costs' thing, but personally I actually secretly admire it.

I don't think many here really rate over rate offences as "breaking" rules, tbh..