I just missed Kallis, Ponting, Border and Steve Waugh as well. Will average 50 in any era.
Agreed. But why mention Border, he didn't play in the 2000s?.
Plus Waugh is basically a 90s baby as well.
These players are big home track bullies. They'll bully even the best on their home tracks. But all of them are average on foreign soils. (Note that SL tracks are not flat by any means, so Jayawardane and Samaraweera are HTBs, not FTBs). Hayden, Smith, Clarke, Laxman and Chanderpaul I reserve my judgment of them being HTBs. I think they'll average high 40s even against the best of attacks, because they are technically accomplished players although they are unorthodox.
Agreed, have always said this about those players.
BTW how are SL tracks not flat?.
Yes they were and it was by bowling umpteen number of bouncers and at a snail paced over rate. Get the over rare up to 15 and cut the bouncers and put them on flat tracks today, they'll be in for much more work than they used to do. Indian pitches of 80s and 90s were frankly bad for batting because of variable bounce, and that was the exact thing that WIndies bowlers extracted. Calling these decks flat is speculative. They were supremely fit, but still even fitness geeks of this era do break down due to the work load.
Nah it wasn't the bouncers that forced the game to moev @ a snails pace really, although it played a part. It was in general back then urgency to get through overs for all nations was lacking.
The only extra work they would be into is that given in the 90s & 2000s. India had their best combination of batsmen in history in Tendy/Dravid/Laxman/Ganguly/Azhar. Compared to what the IND batsmen they bowled to in the 80s & 70s, they would have to war harder for wickets. But if Donald/Pollock & McGrath/Dizzy/Kasper, Steyn/Morkel/Ntini, Hoggard/Flintoff had owned them & won/drew series in India. I see no reason why Marshall/Holding/Garner/Roberts etc couldn't do the same if they had to bowl to them.
How has indian pitches of the 80s & 90s any different to what it has been in the 2000s era?. Nothing has changed expect for one & two English style greentops have popped up now & again this decade. But the trend with Indian pitches remains the same for probably the last 40 years. They start flat, bounce uneven & they deteriorate come the 4th & 5th days & the spinners come into play.
Just to use my knowledge i saw no difference with the Indian pitches when AUS toured India in 1998 to 2001, 04, 08 & 2010.
Yea they could break down & get injured given the amount of cricket played not. But none of them hard any troubling actions like a Waqar, Flintoff, Bond, Schultz, Akhtar that would cause them to be in & out of cricket regularly. Action of Marshall & co where fairly simple like McGrath, Donald whose bodies lasted in modern times.
