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Would Stuart Broad make India's strongest test XI?

Cevno

Hall of Fame Member
srinath ishant sree pk munaf etc etc.

my turn, name one aussie spinner after warne better than virender sehwag pl
You missed out Zak?:blink:

Could contend Irfan too. Also Kapil played into the 90's.
 
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Cevno

Hall of Fame Member
Oh!!

Naming 3 except them isn't that tough then ,tbh.

Btw, seriously surprised by Colin Miller's record.:blink: But Mathews wasn't really that good.
 
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biased indian

International Coach
MacGill. Miller. Matthews. All way better. I'm limiting it to post-1990 there. Plainly if we went way back there would be plenty more. Actually, since you're so happy to talk about spinners, name me one from India, Kumble aside, who's had any success in Australia since 1990?

I will grant you Sreensanth. Disagree Prasad was "definitively" better than Broad. Lol Munaf Patel is a joke, Sharma has had one good test in three years, and Praveen Kumar bowls as slow as me - he's your second spinner.

Moreover, the fact there is this thread rather indicates none of those blokes are clearly better than Broad. So please, keep going.

Edit: I left out Tim May as well, apologies.
jokes apart ....why you left out srinath from his list ?????
 
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marc71178

Eyes not spreadsheets
Yeah, Srinath being missed by Burgey was an oversight, but it's well and truly trumped by the "claims" of Irfan "let me play against Ban/Zim but be total utter ****e against everyone else" Pathan!
 

Cevno

Hall of Fame Member
Just said it could be contended.

Btw, Broad has played in Bangladesh too and was utter **** even there.:p

Has only really had 2/3 good series one against West Indies away and one against a Pakistan team in all kinds of trouble and problems in pretty helpful conditions.

It's not like Pathan here is being compared to Malcolm Marshall or something. He was pretty useful on occasions even against top teams when the ball swung.

And at the same time Greg Mathews is really debateable whether he was a better spinner than Sehwag.
 
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Blaze 18

Banned
Australia have at least produced a few great/very good/good ATG spinners; we have not produced one great fast bowler of note. Kapil Dev was a great all rounder - was he an ATG great bowler like say, Lillee, Marshall or Imran? No.

That said, I do think Stuart Broad is being a tad overrated in this thread. I'd have in the current Indian side as the second choice fast bowler after Zaheer, but there's not, dare I say it, much that separates him from the Ishant Sharmas of this world (I know CWers love stats - Ishant Sharma's average is about four points better than Broad's! even Sreesanth's average is better!). :-O

Let me just reiterate that I'm not saying I'd have Sharma or Sreesanth over Broad, but they're all in the same ballpark.
 

Eloquentia

U19 12th Man
For me, Zaheer is easily India's class pace bowler. If Broad was Indian, he'd be behind, vying with Sharma or so for that second seamer spot. His batting would be well used too, could fit in at number 7 to strengthen their bowling - his batting is abundant in potential. Clearly > Harbhajan's batting.
 

Bun

Banned
no not clearly he is better than habry.

also he is well behind ishant sharma now. both have played comparable games, taken comparable wickets, and ishant is leading him by more than 4 points.

sreesanth too by talent alone is better than broad, just that his avg is hurt real bad because of some absolute roads (check his record in matches whcih produced a result vs which didnt)....

praveen kumar swings it much better and is not unidimensional like broad is. burgey may be capable of bowling faster than him, but so too can tait.

broad will be competing with likes of mithun, unadkat, etc had he been indian
 

Prince EWS

Global Moderator
Lets not get silly about this either way.

Zaheer is conclusively better than Broad. Broad is conclusively better than Mithun and Unadkat. He's in same league as Sharma, Sreesanth, Munaf and Praveen - all bowlers who have shown promise and/or the tools to be successful at Test level without proving their consistency just yet.

At this very moment Sharma's just coming off his best series ever and Broad has had a difficult return from injury, so Sharma's going to look better, but given the general inconsistency of both bowlers across their careers its definitely too early to say that Sharma is conclusively better. If we compared them just after Broad had run through the Australians in the 2009 Ashes while Sharma had been axed for Sreesanth it'd have a whole different complexion to it; we've just picked a random point in two young bowlers' careers that happens to favour one. Just because that point happens to be now doesn't give it special significance, particularly given how up and down the bowlers have been in their careers; it's no real pointer at all to how well or otherwise they'll play in their next series.

Personally I think Sreesanth is better than both but they're all in the same ballpark.
 
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marc71178

Eyes not spreadsheets
also he is well behind ishant sharma now. both have played comparable games, taken comparable wickets, and ishant is leading him by more than 4 points.
Out of interest, I'm assuming you're saying Broad's series in the Windies is comparable with Ishant's?
 

Cevno

Hall of Fame Member
Lets not get silly about this either way.

Zaheer is conclusively better than Broad. Broad is conclusively better than Mithun and Unadkat. He's in same league as Sharma, Sreesanth, Munaf and Praveen - all bowlers who have shown promise and/or the tools to be successful at Test level without proving their consistency just yet.

At this very moment Sharma's just coming off his best series ever and Broad has had a difficult return from injury, so Sharma's going to look better, but given the general inconsistency of both bowlers across their careers its definitely too early to say that Sharma is conclusively better. If we compared them just after Broad had run through the Australians in the 2009 Ashes while Sharma had been axed for Sreesanth it'd have a whole different complexion to it; we've just picked a random point in two young bowlers' careers that happens to favour one. Just because that point happens to be now doesn't give it special significance, particularly given how up and down the bowlers have been in their careers; it's no real pointer at all to how well or otherwise they'll play in their next series.

Personally I think Sreesanth is better than both but they're all in the same ballpark.


Yep. That is fair enough.

But for me Sharma is the better of the 3 currently and as well as on potential(in all conditions tests) ,said so on potential before this series and even after the SA series when everbody and their grandmothers were Writing him off.

Some of the comments in this thread specially before the current 2 series are really unfairly harsh on both Sharma and Sreesanth though. As VCS said before ,as if they were some Timbuktu 11 bowlers.
 
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Howe_zat

Audio File
What makes Borad the exception among bowlers with high averages here, apart from his batting, is that he was a genuine quality bowler for well over a year. Just before the Ashes I genuinely thought he'd cracked it and I wasn't alone.

After his finest hour in 2009, he went and took the South Africans apart at Durban, rattled Bangladesh and did some serious damage during the 2010 summer. This was in addition to getting his two highest Test scores, including his 169.

At that point, he had been a world class all-rounder. For well over a year from 2009-10 his record was 45 wickets at 27, along with 459 runs at 26.

I put him in my team of the 2010s, a predictive article that has held up reasonably well, if my posting back then was somewhat crude. (for the record, I am not really that impressed by Ajantha Mendis anymore.)

Basically no-one disagreed with having Broad in there, unlike such seemingly questionable selections like Cook and Raina. When Broad got injured during the Ashes, everyone expected Broad to come straight back into the team, without argument and almost without exception, despite how well the attack had performed without him.

Of course, Broad has had less successful time in Test cricket before that. And people have stuck with him because he had shown promise, not very often, but in flashes he'd shown he was capable. Rather like many of these bowlers have had, except they don't have the sustained period of success to back it up. Broad has.

Taking the time out now to laugh at his average and say it's all he's capable of is not just annoying and mean-spirited. It's simply horse****.
 

Bun

Banned
Lets not get silly about this either way.

Zaheer is conclusively better than Broad. Broad is conclusively better than Mithun and Unadkat. He's in same league as Sharma, Sreesanth, Munaf and Praveen - all bowlers who have shown promise and/or the tools to be successful at Test level without proving their consistency just yet.

At this very moment Sharma's just coming off his best series ever and Broad has had a difficult return from injury, so Sharma's going to look better, but given the general inconsistency of both bowlers across their careers its definitely too early to say that Sharma is conclusively better. If we compared them just after Broad had run through the Australians in the 2009 Ashes while Sharma had been axed for Sreesanth it'd have a whole different complexion to it; we've just picked a random point in two young bowlers' careers that happens to favour one. Just because that point happens to be now doesn't give it special significance, particularly given how up and down the bowlers have been in their careers; it's no real pointer at all to how well or otherwise they'll play in their next series.

Personally I think Sreesanth is better than both but they're all in the same ballpark.
what are you saying? nobody is saying ishanth will become the next malcolm marshall. we are comparing him with broad. and definitely at the moment he is way better than broad. this is despite the former having to play on som really dire pitches, and the latter almost always getting to ply his trade on favorable wickets.

further this coming out of injury is sounding like a weak excuse. I don't recollect him being way slower than his normal self during the sri lankan tour. also he did bowl as many overs as anyone else did without marked degradation in speeds. also he's bowled his full quota in the four one dayers too. so his coach definitely thinks he is fit.

and marc, I meant they have played similar no. of matches.
 

Teja.

Global Moderator
Lets not get silly about this either way.

Zaheer is conclusively better than Broad. Broad is conclusively better than Mithun and Unadkat. He's in same league as Sharma, Sreesanth, Munaf and Praveen - all bowlers who have shown promise and/or the tools to be successful at Test level without proving their consistency just yet.

At this very moment Sharma's just coming off his best series ever and Broad has had a difficult return from injury, so Sharma's going to look better, but given the general inconsistency of both bowlers across their careers its definitely too early to say that Sharma is conclusively better. If we compared them just after Broad had run through the Australians in the 2009 Ashes while Sharma had been axed for Sreesanth it'd have a whole different complexion to it; we've just picked a random point in two young bowlers' careers that happens to favour one. Just because that point happens to be now doesn't give it special significance, particularly given how up and down the bowlers have been in their careers; it's no real pointer at all to how well or otherwise they'll play in their next series.

Personally I think Sreesanth is better than both but they're all in the same ballpark.
Champion. Agreed with most of the post.
 

Daemon

Request Your Custom Title Now!
what are you saying? nobody is saying ishanth will become the next malcolm marshall. we are comparing him with broad. and definitely at the moment he is way better than broad. this is despite the former having to play on som really dire pitches, and the latter almost always getting to ply his trade on favorable wickets.

further this coming out of injury is sounding like a weak excuse. I don't recollect him being way slower than his normal self during the sri lankan tour. also he did bowl as many overs as anyone else did without marked degradation in speeds. also he's bowled his full quota in the four one dayers too. so his coach definitely thinks he is fit.

and marc, I meant they have played similar no. of matches.
Injury can upset your rythm. Also, what EWS was basically saying is that Ishant and Broad are hot and cold, and how well they do in this series is not a good indication of what they will do in the coming tour. Comparing their current form is slightly unfair because of the two extremes they are in. Broad could very well regain it and Sharma lose it, and they'll both meet back in the middle.
 

Bun

Banned
Injury can upset your rythm. Also, what EWS was basically saying is that Ishant and Broad are hot and cold, and how well they do in this series is not a good indication of what they will do in the coming tour. Comparing their current form is slightly unfair because of the two extremes they are in. Broad could very well regain it and Sharma lose it, and they'll both meet back in the middle.
good fast bowlers need just a few overs to get into rythm... not half of the summer...

broad has played some county matches, two test matches and four one dayers, and if still he cant find eythm, he's ****. end of.
 

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