Saker rates attack as good as great Australians

[Ikki]

I'll argue this in full later. His average looks good in isolation but he played 1 innings of any substance all series, his average is boosted by an irrelevant not out in Brisbane and places him 7th in the list of series averages. Hardly a good series.

He had plenty of good starts and decent scores (4 50s). Not the kind of performance you can put down to one inning inflating his record. 15 runs from averaging 50 for the series.

1st Test match: 36, 41*
2nd Test match: 51, 57
3rd Test match: 13, 95
4th Test match: 5, 54
5th Test match: 45, 38

Very Watson-like. Decent average in the end, but should've been higher with the starts he made. Considering the attack, it was a 'good' series and no where near 'poor'.

 

[Ruckus]

I'll argue this in full later. His average looks good in isolation but he played 1 innings of any substance all series, his average is boosted by an irrelevant not out in Brisbane and places him 7th in the list of series averages. Hardly a good series.

I said he had a decent series, not a good one (does Watson ever really have good series' anyway?), and not a poor one either.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

The thing was that they did have a chance to get some confidence back, they played some cricket against the Windies at home and defeated them. If they got a sniff in Australia, it could've gone either way; they didn't bat all that badly against Australia in the first Test. It took some very good bowling in the first two Tests to snuff them out.

The capitulation had a lot to do with the English series. But, similar to the series in England, it was sort of an "earned" capitulation.

England knocked the stuffing out of them and once Australia went 2-0 up India folded even more pathetically against the Aussies. A combination of constantly being thrashed and good Aussie bowling against a demoralised side. To be honest we don't know how good this Aussie attack is and whether McDermott going will have any impact.

England are a bloody good attack, easily the best England one I have seen (not much opposition though) but for anyone to claim they are as good as the great Aussie one is either on a wind up or didn't watch much cricket in the years Australia dominated.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

I said he had a decent series, not a good one (does Watson ever really have good series' anyway?), and not a poor one either.

Strauss's book about the ashes says it all, they were happy enough with Watson getting starts as they knew he wouldn't be capable to go on to a big one. He throws away so many starts it is unreal.

 

[Spark]

I'll argue this in full later. His average looks good in isolation but he played 1 innings of any substance all series, his average is boosted by an irrelevant not out in Brisbane and places him 7th in the list of series averages. Hardly a good series.

You'd take that from a Test opener most times tbh.

My concern is more to do with the fact that that seems to be the best he can give us, when really you'd say that's "decent".

Having said that he loses more than a few marks for the fact he was involved in so many run outs, the way he got out at Adelaide just after lunch (remember, despite being 3/2, our position at lunch wasn't actually that dissimilar from our position at lunch at Adelaide this year, and being bowled out for 250 on that deck even 3-down at lunch was criminal) means he loses a few marks.

 

[vic_orthdox]

Should make Watson face the bowling machine for the whole day instead of an hour and a half at training, then he wouldn't ever get out until six hours of batting, by which stage he's back in the sheds because it's stumps.

 

[Spark]

Ponting was coming off a good series against India away. Don't buy it. I really don't think that there was a massive difference in the quality of his batsmanship from England to India at home, there was a bit of a change in tactics with him being less adventurous outside off at the start of his innings.

Clarke I'm prepared to give some leeway to, there were some issues with his back; he looked all over the shop against not particularly amazing bowling in Brisbane.

And Hussey was superb. The rest weren't up to the requisite standard. Yet they have looked better against others than what they did in the Ashes - Watson, North in Ashes 2009 for example, show that England have definitely improved.

India haven't painted themselves in glory since, but you couldn't say that their players looked terribly out of form during the series vs England. VVS just kept on getting himself out in the first couple of Tests after looking good, Tendulkar was choked by great bowling, and Dravid was just bloody awesome.

A lot of hindsight in that post.

I remember that. Geez that was painful to watch (literally?)

 

[GIMH]

The thing was that they did have a chance to get some confidence back, they played some cricket against the Windies at home and defeated them. If they got a sniff in Australia, it could've gone either way; they didn't bat all that badly against Australia in the first Test. It took some very good bowling in the first two Tests to snuff them out.

The capitulation had a lot to do with the English series. But, similar to the series in England, it was sort of an "earned" capitulation.

Yeah, fair points and well put.

 

[Spikey]

You'd take that from a Test opener most times tbh.

My concern is more to do with the fact that that seems to be the best he can give us, when really you'd say that's "decent".

Having said that he loses more than a few marks for the fact he was involved in so many run outs, the way he got out at Adelaide just after lunch (remember, despite being 3/2, our position at lunch wasn't actually that dissimilar from our position at lunch at Adelaide this year, and being bowled out for 250 on that deck even 3-down at lunch was criminal) means he loses a few marks.

Yep. I mean, he made 100 runs that particular match but really he played as much part in losing the match as north did. getting out for 50-55 two times on Adl? Really? Come on.

 

[Arachnodouche]

Since this is a very subjective and opinionated thread, I'd say there were a lot of psychological factors involved in India's bad batting performances in the two big series. I also don't think they'd have fared as poorly against the likes of Anderson, Broad and Bresnan just about an year prior to the games in England. I'm also going to go out on a limb, (and that's a lot because I generally hate the Indian cricket team) and say that we'll ground the same English bowling into the dust later this year ()

 

[Spark]

Think the psychological factor is vastly overplayed tbh wrt the batting. Consistent, accurate full-length swing/seam bowling on and around off stump takes wickets, quelle surprise.

The bowling is another matter.

 

[Ruckus]

I think the success of the Aus attack against the Indian batsmen was a combination of a few things, nothing particularly mystifying:

-Gambhir and Sehwag just aren't good enough against decent bowling on pitches giving something to the fast bowlers.
-Dravid just didn't look comfortable the entire series imo.
-Tendulkar and Laxman were the target of some pretty awesome bowling, despite looking in pretty good nick.
-And Kohli is a ****.

 

[TNT]

How??

Gillespie on song was just as good and has a much better overall.

Its not even a contest, Gillespie by a mile.

 

[Spark]

I think the success of the Aus attack against the Indian batsmen was a combination of a few things, nothing particularly mystifying:

-Gambhir and Sehwag just aren't good enough against decent bowling on pitches giving something to the fast bowlers.
-Dravid just didn't look comfortable the entire series imo.
-Tendulkar and Laxman were the target of some pretty awesome bowling, despite looking in pretty good nick.
-And Kohli is a ****.

Still don't buy this at all ftr. Maybe in the last year or two it's not the case, but he's played good knocks in quick-friendly conditions before.

 

[Ruckus]

so, practically every batsman has at some point. Doing it consistently is another matter.

 

[Spark]

That kind of contradicts your point that he can't score well against decent bowling on pitches giving something to the fast bowlers...

He was never going to do it on this tour when he was too busy trying to have a chat with the square leg umpire the whole time though.

 

[Ruckus]

no it doesn't, it's an obvious assumption that being good enough entails doing something with at least some consistency, not just a one off. Hell, Sehwag himself scored a half century in Melbourne in somewhat tricky conditions. It doesn't automatically make him adept at scoring runs in those conditions (his half century was in fact incredibly streaky). It's no suprise to me either that Gambhir's only runs were in Sydney when the pitch was an absolute road.

 

[Uppercut]

so, practically every batsman has at some point. Doing it consistently is another matter.

How many batsmen in the world would you say score consistently in those situations?

 

[Cabinet96]

Face SA and do well for starters. I'd like to see them bowl to a side in form and willing to grind them down, not people like Kieron Powell, and then see if they have a plan B or C.

So every line up we've faced in the last few years has been out of form? Maybe that's simply because we ruined their form? If not it's incredibly ironic that most teams have lost their form against us recently, and then gained it when playing other teams. I'm sure you'll say SA were out of form if we do well against them too.

Sri Lanka at Lord's was also the last time any side has managed to score 400 or more against England. Since then England have played 12 Tests without conceding 400 in any innings.

Also worth noting Anderson and Bresnan were injured for that game, and it was also during Broad's, "bowl everything half way down", period.

 

[ImpatientLime]

And Lee's average probably took a fair hit because he was being asked to play a role for a lot of his career. Steve Waugh in particular want him to rough opposition batsman up rather than get them out.

It was noticable how much better he became after McGrath retired. He was finally bowling to get batsmen out rather than knock them out.

If we wanna start playing these games then I think its fair to say Broad and Anderson's career averages have both taken a hit due to being pitched in at test level far too early.