I did mean it in a sense about the more rounded all-rounders like Botham and Kapil though. They wouldn't add anything significant to either the batting or bowling at that level. Miller, Imran and Hadlee have a case because of the quality of their stronger suit.
I only included one opener in my 25 (well two really, but Goddard wasn't picked as a specialist batsman). I had Gavaskar, Hutton and Bruce Mitchell in my top 50 but they missed they cut. It does make me think I slightly under-rate exactly how much harder opening is compared to middle order batting.
That's Sir Ravindra Jadejaji to you.
Yeah I get that with specific players. At first I thought you weren't thinking outside the box enough and couldn't comprehend the idea of a allrounder who was to the level above Test cricket what Miller and Kapil were to Test cricket, but it was actually me who was thinking too much inside the box in that I hadn't considered the theoretical possibility of a level even beyond that to marginalise that theoretical player too. Infinite loop really, I do agree though. It makes players like Kapil, Miller etc better Test players than players who'd have much more utility in a World XI situation, and I agree with that.
Goddard's an interesting one - where did you rank him? A very fine and very valuable cricketer, no question, but not one I'd personally have anywhere near my all time top 25.
Do you know if it's going to be today or not, yet? Or does it depend on how lazy you feel later?
I had Goddard at #12; I think he's the most under-rated cricketer in history (as I'd probably have to to rank him so high) - he was world class with both bat and ball over a loooong career as well as being one the great unlikely captains. A cricketer in the purest sense. I highly doubt anyone else ranked him in their top 25, let alone that high, but he's my bolter I guess.
Ah, I obviously haven't seen your latest standardised averages - in the last version I saw Lohmann had standardised from 10 up to 15 so he was still ahead of anyone else. Didn't realise he'd blown out so badly in the latest iteration.
The first version of my standardised averages merely took eras into account, and it did it pretty broadly (decades). The newest version takes specific opposition home or away into account and (for example) instead of treating a game played in 1912 as being part of the 1911-1920 decade, treats is as being part of 1910-1914 period (two years either side of the year of match start). So it's a lot more accurate now, rather than just standardising era differences. To give a real and specific example, the old system recognised Lohmann's debut as being "a match in the 1880s" while the new system recognises it as "a home match against Australia in 1886". That put Lohmann's demolition of South Africa into much better context.
No apparently.Oh and Smali is it time to post the next few? In a non pestering way
Fantastic stuff. Linky?
