Not Enough Pace for this Level

[hang on]

i think that gimh was referring to pup clarke, not stuart clark.

 

[centurymaker]

Sachin at the end of the IPL was having all sorts of trouble against a few less-than-brilliant SLA's too so I'd not read a great deal into that

Slight weakness against SLAs and Left-arm pacers has crept into his game.
Even in the SA tour, he looked more comfortable against steyn and morkel than against t'sobe and harris.
T'sobe beat him more times than steyn, but tsobe did get smacked around in return.
Harris even troubled him in the away series. However, sachin looked alot better against him in the 3rd test (probably faced ohja alot in the nets and got better).

Against left arm pacers, he sometimes misjudges the angle they create- somewhat like what dravid does.
At times you see him hang his bat out at slightly wide deliveries, especially the ones that bounce a bit more.
Just a couple of years ago, he was a also big lbw candidate early on in his innings against inswingers/quick deliveries. Obviously he has now improved on that.
But he doesn't have to worry about all that as england don't have left arm bowlers,

Since he's that guy who puts 110% effort into practice sessions and is always working on his game, you can expect him to eradicate some of these flaws fairly soon.

 

[vic_orthdox]

Pathan was clocking north of 140 in that SCG Test. Lost a lot of pace quickly though. Yes, he put in some good performances, but he was a proven failure over a long period of time against teams that weren't still figuring out what hand to bat with.

 

[Xuhaib]

You played into our hands by preparing roads in that series, and scoreboard pressure and Kumble on wearing wickets did the rest.

Both Pathan and Balaji looked genuine talents but on the away tour next year they started bowling like trundlers.

 

[Daemon]

One look at the highlights of his hat trick in the first over against Pakistan makes me wonder where the **** it all went..

When I first started watching cricket IIRC he used to come on and get wickets first up like it was regulation. Swing, seam, pace, all gone By the time he got dropped he had been reduced to bowling cutters and slower balls to avoid getting smashed.

 

[smash84]

One look at the highlights of his hat trick in the first over against Pakistan makes me wonder where the **** it all went..

When I first started watching cricket IIRC he used to come on and get wickets first up like it was regulation. Swing, seam, pace, all gone By the time he got dropped he had been reduced to bowling cutters and slower balls to avoid getting smashed.

This

 

[tooextracool]

There's a repeated assumption when it comes to bowlers of around 80mph or less that, even if they've taken bucketloads of wickets in first-class cricket, they're not good enough for tests. It's applied pretty heavily by selectors, even when- as in the case of Stuart Clark- the player in question has already taken boatloads of cheap test wickets. And by fans, hence Darren Sammy's place is constantly being whined about despite him having the most successful start to a West Indian test career since the 90s. The Sri Lankan selectors believed it so strongly that they selected Suranga Lakmal ahead of Nuwan Kulasekara for the test series in England. It's a dogma so strong that it was used to justify a bowler with an enormously successful first-class and ODI career (and a decent start to his test career) being left out in favour of someone who's never had any remote success at any level.

So I'm questioning that assumption. Where did it even come from, and why is it applied to such a serious extent? What makes test batsmen so notably better at playing medium-fast bowling in comparison to first-class batsmen relative to their ability to play fast-medium or fast bowling? I haven't seen anywhere near enough evidence for this idea to justify the extent to which the hypothesis is accepted by the cricketing community.

Pardon me if I’m repeating anything someone has already said in this thread, I haven’t had a chance to read through what most have said. The problem is that people continually put a statistic as a threshold, despite the fact that this has been proven time and time again to be untrue. We see it with batsmen, can’t be remotely test class without a 40+ average or great without a 50+ average. With bowlers the perennial argument is that you can’t be test class without a pace of 80+ mph.

It’s all a little ridiculous because the fact of the matter is that you have to look at it on a case by case basis. Curtly Ambrose at 6’7 bowling at 80mph is quite obviously going to be more threatening on any pitch than Craig White @ 6’1 bowling at 80mph even if the latter were capable of landing every ball in his desired zone. Similarly, a bowler like Dominic Cork was quite always going to be less effective without pace than Richard Hadlee even though they both effectively bowled at the same pace and were the same height merely because Hadlee had a higher arm action and bowled whereas Cork was skiddier. And then there’s of course the Zaheer Khan’s and Mohammed Asif’s of this world whom as I’ve gone to pains to point out in the past cannot be pigeon-holed as medium pacers because they are routinely capable of bowling at around 85+mph when are required to but constantly sacrifice pace for swing/movement and accuracy in conditions that suit their style of bowling. It is a classic double agent cover up, there is simply no reason to bowl at 85mph when you can get away with bowling at 80mph.

Regarding the paragraph on Sammy, I’m not sure where he ranks amongst the bowlers from the WI since the 90s, but the reason why he isn’t rated has little to do with pace but because he is simply incapable of moving the ball off the straight. His record is quite ordinary when you remove his performances against Bangladesh and it’s hard to see how he is likely to take wickets at the test match level. Considering that he is keeping someone like Kemar Roach out of the side, who is not only a far more capable but just a better bowler, there is clearly some merit in the argument against Sammy.

In response to your question, whilst there is somewhat of a false illusion that a medium pacer is less effective than a wayward fast bowler (I would have had Kulasekara ahead of any of the SL bowlers that toured England, not because he is test class but because he is a far superior option to the bowlers that toured England), the fact of the matter is that there is evidence that International batsmen are significantly better at playing medium pacers than FC players. There are countless examples from Ealham to Cork to James Kirtley that suggest that bowling wicket-wicket is all that is required to take wickets at the FC level.

 

[smash84]

wow.....gun post TEC

 

[Jono]

Asif's not a sub-80mph bowler & gets good bounce and carry.

It's not just about speed-gun pace, because I think it's an overrated way of judging a bowler's pace, the likes of Luke Wright & early period Shane Watson are/were consistently up around or even over 85mph, but because of their trajectory don't get much in the way of leap off the pitch to trouble the batsman.

Gus Fraser, on the other hand, rarely troubled 80mph once his back woes had reduced his youthful zip, but because of his height and great seam position was consistently a threat.

The bowlers I think will struggle at test level are sub-80mph wicket-to-wicket bowlers. Praveen Kumar has had (statistically at least) decent start to his test career, but because of his lack of anything but swing I still think when he faces a real test-quality batting line up he'll be fodder. Kulasekera doubly so because he doesn't get Kumar's swing.

You've mentioned Praveen Kumar and suggested previously that he won't bowl well against England in England.

Gotta ask, surely that's the best place for someone like him to bowl in world cricket.

People have been saying Praveen is too slow for 4 years now in international cricket. Started in Australia when he played the tri-series final and Hayden hit him for 4 over his head. The Aussie commentators were basically laughing. He then won India the finals series 2-0.

Same thing is happening in tests imo. I know its a different game, but if there are swinging conditions I back Praveen to bowl pretty well. England more then any other place will offer those conditions to him.

 

[Furball]

They'll offer those conditions but they'll also offer up opposition batsmen who have grown up playing against bowlers that nibble it around a bit.

He's bowled well from what I've seen of him so far but I don't think he'll cause England's batsmen too many problems.

 

[zaremba]

Terrific thread, this. The sort of thought provoking stuff that CW should be about.

I'm not quite sure where my thoughts are on this subject. I've advocated the picking of Durham's Mark Davies (what's happened to him btw?) despite his lack of pace, but on the other hand I do think that, all other things being equal, a bit of extra pace really does count for quite a lot in Tests. As uppercut points out the evidence to support that feeling is limited, but I have no doubt that it's partly the result of my conditioning, growing up watching an endless series of wretched medium pacers trundle out their wares for England with horrible ineffectiveness. Mind you, I doubt even the reliability of that memory given that we had some ineffective genuine pace men (Malcolm, McCague, Lawrence) and one or two high class RMFs - Fraser in particular.

The ridiculous thing is that if 99% of us saw Kumar turn out for the opposition in a club match we'd regard him as scarily quick.

 

[Uppercut]

Regarding the paragraph on Sammy, I’m not sure where he ranks amongst the bowlers from the WI since the 90s, but the reason why he isn’t rated has little to do with pace but because he is simply incapable of moving the ball off the straight. His record is quite ordinary when you remove his performances against Bangladesh and it’s hard to see how he is likely to take wickets at the test match level. Considering that he is keeping someone like Kemar Roach out of the side, who is not only a far more capable but just a better bowler, there is clearly some merit in the argument against Sammy.

That's total bollocks.

Rest of your post makes some good points. But again, a lot of it's only explaining what makes a good bowler and what makes a bad bowler. I'm not much convinced by the idea that wicket-to-wicket bowlers are capable of tearing FC lineups to shreds but not even worth a shot at test level.

 

[BoyBrumby]

You've mentioned Praveen Kumar and suggested previously that he won't bowl well against England in England.

Gotta ask, surely that's the best place for someone like him to bowl in world cricket.

People have been saying Praveen is too slow for 4 years now in international cricket. Started in Australia when he played the tri-series final and Hayden hit him for 4 over his head. The Aussie commentators were basically laughing. He then won India the finals series 2-0.

Same thing is happening in tests imo. I know its a different game, but if there are swinging conditions I back Praveen to bowl pretty well. England more then any other place will offer those conditions to him.

Doubt he'll get a gig, tbh. Sree and Munaf both have more about them, IMHO.

The CC has a few bowlers of his pace who do a little with the ball. In all honesty there's probably more seamers than swing bowlers about, but I don't see him posing any serious questions for our top seven. Cook and Trott should bleed him white. They'll wait for the bad ball (of which he seems to bowl a lot, considering his lack of pace) and dead bat the rest.

Also I don't think English conditions will affect him much either way; because he's so slow I'd back him to swing the new ball pretty much anywhere.

 

[Top_Cat]

Honestly don't think Kumar is a huge swinger of the ball for someone of his pace anyway. He seems a smart bowler so that'll count for a lot. We'll see I guess.

 

[Cevno]

Doubt he'll get a gig, tbh. Sree and Munaf both have more about them, IMHO.

It's pretty much between him and Sreesanth at the moment ,and Munaf is behind them.

Munaf is good solid bowler who can keep it tight but is hardly penetrative most of the time as he hardly moves the ball much these days. And he bowls a slightly shorter length for English conditions anyway ideally.

 

[Cevno]

They'll offer those conditions but they'll also offer up opposition batsmen who have grown up playing against bowlers that nibble it around a bit.

He's bowled well from what I've seen of him so far but I don't think he'll cause England's batsmen too many problems.

He doesn't nibble it about a bit though. He can swing it a long way when the conditions suit him and either side to boot.

Honestly don't think Kumar is a huge swinger of the ball for someone of his pace anyway. He seems a smart bowler so that'll count for a lot. We'll see I guess.

Yeah ,he is very street smart in the way he plans and counters what the batsman are trying to do.

 

[tooextracool]

That's total bollocks.

Is it really? Look at Sammy's test record mate. Hes had arguably 3 good innings statistically when you exclude Bangladesh. One against England on debut, a game I saw live and I can categorically tell you that he never looked like taking a wicket all game until the England team started to look for quick runs to force the declaration. The other performance against Pakistan came on a pitch that in many quarters has been debated as perhaps not even being test class, not to mention that the Pakistani batting lineup is easily the worst out of the top 9 sides.

You have to look at patterns. Blindly considering Sammy's overall record without paying attention to his actual performance means absolutely nothing. Bowling wicket-wicket works when you bowl against sides like Bangladesh or Pakistan or when a team is looking for quick runs but it doesnt work when you are trying to bowl a half decent test side out.

Rest of your post makes some good points. But again, a lot of it's only explaining what makes a good bowler and what makes a bad bowler. I'm not much convinced by the idea that wicket-to-wicket bowlers are capable of tearing FC lineups to shreds but not even worth a shot at test level.

I dont disagree with the idea that anyone who is tearing it up in FC cricket isnt deserving of a shot at the international level. By all means they do. Thats the point of the system, if you dont reward someone who takes wickets at the domestic level then it renders the system meaningless. However, there are countless examples of bowlers who have achieved fame at the FC level but couldnt help themselves to even respectable figures in test cricket.

 

[tooextracool]

I make no secrets that I am a huge Praveen Kumar fan. Id be willing to put a marker down that Praveen Kumar is more likely to get wickets in England than Sreesanth if he gets a shot in the test side. Any bowler that can swing the ball both ways prodigiously even at 80mph is likely to be effective in England

 

[BoyBrumby]

I make no secrets that I am a huge Praveen Kumar fan. Id be willing to put a marker down that Praveen Kumar is more likely to get wickets in England than Sreesanth if he gets a shot in the test side. Any bowler that can swing the ball both ways prodigiously even at 80mph is likely to be effective in England

He's some way short of 80mph. Was bowling 72-75mph yesterday.

 

[smash84]

what.....even Praveen has lost pace?? he used to be around about 80 IIRC