Best After The Don

[Jono]

 

[Lillian Thomson]

In the late 80's Sobers was asked in an interview to comment on the top batsman of the era and he said of Allan Border that he was similar to Geoff Boycott in that he "tolerated the bowling and wore it down but rarely dominated it." This left him short of greatness in the eyes of Sir Garfield - God knows what he must think of Kallis.

 

[Coronis]

In the late 80's Sobers was asked in an interview to comment on the top batsman of the era and he said of Allan Border that he was similar to Geoff Boycott in that he "tolerated the bowling and wore it down but rarely dominated it." This left him short of greatness in the eyes of Sir Garfield - God knows what he must think of Kallis.

"How does this guy have more runs and wickets and catches than me?"

 

[Red]

In the late 80's Sobers was asked in an interview to comment on the top batsman of the era and he said of Allan Border that he was similar to Geoff Boycott in that he "tolerated the bowling and wore it down but rarely dominated it." This left him short of greatness in the eyes of Sir Garfield - God knows what he must think of Kallis.

Crap from Sobers. Border was pretty aggressive (cover drive, pull shot) and a master at turning the strike over.

 

[sobers no:1]

"How does this guy have more runs and wickets and catches than me?"

or

why do people compare me to this far inferior guy

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Crap from Sobers. Border was pretty aggressive (cover drive, pull shot) and a master at turning the strike over.

I don't think rotating the strike counts towards dominating the bowling.

 

[Flametree]

If Border never did anything other than play in this match, he'd be worth a mention in a list of all time top 15 batsmen....
2nd Test: West Indies v Australia at Port of Spain, Mar 16-21, 1984 | Cricket Scorecard | ESPN Cricinfo

 

[Lillian Thomson]

If Border never did anything other than play in this match, he'd be worth a mention in a list of all time top 15 batsmen....
2nd Test: West Indies v Australia at Port of Spain, Mar 16-21, 1984 | Cricket Scorecard | ESPN Cricinfo

Great performance in the circumstances and he was in his element. Still wouldn't come under dominating the bowling though.

 

[Red]

I don't think rotating the strike counts towards dominating the bowling.

In test cricket it contributes to it. Border was hardly what you'd consider a slow batsman (like Boycott).

 

[watson]

In test cricket it contributes to it. Border was hardly what you'd consider a slow batsman (like Boycott).

I agree. Border was only 'slow' when he was up against the West Indian pace quartet (who wasn't) or trying to rescue his batting order.

I can't find figures for his Test Strike Rate, but his ODI Strike Rate was 71. This SR is reasonably fast for the 1980s and on a par with known attacking batsman like Dean Jones who scored 72 runs every 100 balls. Given the opportunity Border could, and would, thrash the ball around the park with the best of them.

 

[coolkuna]

I think every batsman has holes in his resumé. Since I have always been extremely hard analyzing batsmen, I see "non-achievements" in every one of them. The question is, what non-achievements does one give importance to. I am only going to pick amongst the batsmen I have seen. To my eyes, Graeme Pollock, like Brian Lara, looked vulnerable against very quick, short-pitched bowling directed at the body. Of what little I saw of Garry Sobers, I thought he handled that kind of bowling noticeably better than Pollock did.

Viv Richards never had to face an attack even remotely close to his team's (although the same could be said for practically every batsman in the above list, including Sir Don - most of them never faced a consistently ferocious attack similar to the WI pace quartet of late 70s and 80s). It would have been very interesting to see how Richards (and others as well) would have fared against his own attack, as some of his most brutal battles in County cricket came against his own bowlers. But facing four of them one after another with no respite whatsoever in Test match cricket is something else.

Lara's technique and attitude were not convincing enough for me. Too flashy, lacked stability, and for a certain period looked very vulnerable against quality pace. Have to admit though, he did come up with stellar performances against quality pace attacks (Aus 99 and 2003 are good examples).

Tendulkar has the best technique I have seen in any batsman. Never seen another batsman scoring runs so spontaneously while following a perfect, textbook technique. His balance and stability is beyond compare. But I give huge importance to what McGrath considers as his criteria - "How you perform against the best?".

Tendulkar's very modest record against McGrath/Donald/Wasim (arguably the best bowlers as well as the best attacks he has faced in his career) doesn't cut it for me. It was against bowlers like these that I wanted to see him have a dominating series like he did against Aus in 98. At least once in his career, but that never happened. Only one 50+ Test series against all the above bowlers combined isn't good enough for me. Against rest of the attacks the likes of Dravid, Laxman, Sehwag, Azhar, Gnaguly etc. were good enough anyway. Unfortunately, all of Tendulkar's stellar series came when these bowlers were absent.

Hard to pick one.
Maybe Viv Richards in the above list as his non-achievements are relatively ambiguous, and he did win his fair share of battles with Marshall, Holding, Roberts when he came up against them.

 

[Plumbinfront]

Tendulkar has only played 2 full series vs McGrath, one in Aus and one in India. Was MOTS in Aus as captain in the Aus series in 1999 and averaged 50 in the 2001 series in India including a match winning ton that helped India clinch the final test (and series). Pretty good I would say. Also had a stellar series against Ambrose and Walsh too. Never played too much of Wasim either aisde from when he was 16. Has scored tons against McGrath-Warne, Donald-Pollock and Wasim-Waqar. Don't think there is another batsman who managed that. He has always kind of struggled against us but he improved that record also by stopping a rampaging Steyn and Morkel last time in RSA. My problem with him is more that he tends not to make very big scores. Lots of lesser batsmen make much bigger scores and more frequently. Pujara already has 2 doubles I believe!

 

[Slifer]

I think every batsman has holes in his resumé. Since I have always been extremely hard analyzing batsmen, I see "non-achievements" in every one of them. The question is, what non-achievements does one give importance to. I am only going to pick amongst the batsmen I have seen. To my eyes, Graeme Pollock, like Brian Lara, looked vulnerable against very quick, short-pitched bowling directed at the body. Of what little I saw of Garry Sobers, I thought he handled that kind of bowling noticeably better than Pollock did.

Viv Richards never had to face an attack even remotely close to his team's (although the same could be said for practically every batsman in the above list, including Sir Don - most of them never faced a consistently ferocious attack similar to the WI pace quartet of late 70s and 80s). It would have been very interesting to see how Richards (and others as well) would have fared against his own attack, as some of his most brutal battles in County cricket came against his own bowlers. But facing four of them one after another with no respite whatsoever in Test match cricket is something else.

Lara's technique and attitude were not convincing enough for me. Too flashy, lacked stability, and for a certain period looked very vulnerable against quality pace. Have to admit though, he did come up with stellar performances against quality pace attacks (Aus 99 and 2003 are good examples).

Tendulkar has the best technique I have seen in any batsman. Never seen another batsman scoring runs so spontaneously while following a perfect, textbook technique. His balance and stability is beyond compare. But I give huge importance to what McGrath considers as his criteria - "How you perform against the best?".

Tendulkar's very modest record against McGrath/Donald/Wasim (arguably the best bowlers as well as the best attacks he has faced in his career) doesn't cut it for me. It was against bowlers like these that I wanted to see him have a dominating series like he did against Aus in 98. At least once in his career, but that never happened. Only one 50+ Test series against all the above bowlers combined isn't good enough for me. Against rest of the attacks the likes of Dravid, Laxman, Sehwag, Azhar, Gnaguly etc. were good enough anyway. Unfortunately, all of Tendulkar's stellar series came when these bowlers were absent.

Hard to pick one.
Maybe Viv Richards in the above list as his non-achievements are relatively ambiguous, and he did win his fair share of battles with Marshall, Holding, Roberts when he came up against them.

Havent seen u post b4 but excellent analysis of the 2 outstanding batsmen of our time. Totally hit the nail on the head with Lara. He was good to great vs medium to medium fast bowlers but against ne thing express who could aim at his body then he was really at sea. Thats y for the most part he came up second best vs Donald and the Ws and I saw this myself, he was owned by Shane Bond. Sachin looked a hell of a lot more at ease vs express pace and had a few centuries vs the Ws and Donald but for some weird reason he never dominated them (over the course of a series) and his overall record (ala average) was well below par.

 

[the big bambino]

You know its a little tedious having players down graded bcos they didn't face the WI quartet. There have been other good attacks in cricket's history people and all the batsmen mentioned have proven themselves against quality fast (and spin) bowling. Besides why doesn't the argument run the other way? Did the WI quartet ever face batting as good as their own batsmen? How would they fare against 6 gun batsmen, series after series on true wickets? What if their fielders weren't as good as the ones they relied on in their careers?

That being said it is SRT, not Lara, whose record is more suspect against fast bowling and his record is more modest than its usual lofty heights when they are present. Though this isn't really to be wondered at.

 

[watson]

You know its a little tedious having players down graded bcos they didn't face the WI quartet. There have been other good attacks in cricket's history people and all the batsmen mentioned have proven themselves against quality fast (and spin) bowling. Besides why doesn't the argument run the other way? Did the WI quartet ever face batting as good as their own batsmen? How would they fare against 6 gun batsmen, series after series on true wickets? What if their fielders weren't as good as the ones they relied on in their careers?

That being said it is SRT, not Lara, whose record is more suspect against fast bowling and his record is more modest than its usual lofty heights when they are present. Though this isn't really to be wondered at.

Actually, it's the flip-side of the coin. Players who did well against the West Indian fast bowlers from the mid70s to the mid90s get upgraded .

Hence Greg Chappell, Graham Gooch, Robin Smith etc deserve more kudos than they generally get.

 

[centurymaker]

You know its a little tedious having players down graded bcos they didn't face the WI quartet. There have been other good attacks in cricket's history people and all the batsmen mentioned have proven themselves against quality fast (and spin) bowling. Besides why doesn't the argument run the other way? Did the WI quartet ever face batting as good as their own batsmen? How would they fare against 6 gun batsmen, series after series on true wickets? What if their fielders weren't as good as the ones they relied on in their careers?

That being said it is SRT, not Lara, whose record is more suspect against fast bowling and his record is more modest than its usual lofty heights when they are present. Though this isn't really to be wondered at.

 

[centurymaker]

Havent seen u post b4 but excellent analysis of the 2 outstanding batsmen of our time. Totally hit the nail on the head with Lara. He was good to great vs medium to medium fast bowlers but against ne thing express who could aim at his body then he was really at sea. Thats y for the most part he came up second best vs Donald and the Ws and I saw this myself, he was owned by Shane Bond. Sachin looked a hell of a lot more at ease vs express pace and had a few centuries vs the Ws and Donald but for some weird reason he never dominated them (over the course of a series) and his overall record (ala average) was well below par.

I think we was fine against Ws (they only had one shot at each other in tests really), and was fine against even Ambrose and Walsh. He's also been excellent against Steyn and co.

Having said that, he did struggle against Donald, particularly in India. However, if you asked Donald, he'd say he has never bowled to a better batsman than him

Akhtar at times troubled him with his pace, especially during Tendulkar's downturn. However, Brett Lee didn't IMO.

 

[the big bambino]

Centurymaker check SRT's record in odis and tests against the Pakistani, West Indian pacemen and McGrath. Its not as good as you think and no point of advantageous distinction with Lara.

 

[centurymaker]

Centurymaker check SRT's record in odis and tests against the Pakistani, West Indian pacemen and McGrath. Its not as good as you think and no point of advantageous distinction with Lara.

That record is better than everyone else's from this era, although it is not as good as his record against weaker attacks.

If a great has an avg of 50+, it doesn't mean that the great should be avg'ing 50+ against great attacks. If he did, then those bowlers wouldn't be that great afterall for allowing him to avg 50+?

I just had a look at his stats and still can't fugure out what you are going on about.
Besides, a player avg'ing say 25 or even 60 against an attack containing a particular bowler doesn't tell you jack all about how he fared against that bowler. You have watch their head-head battle with your own "eyes"

 

[centurymaker]

As I said earlier (although he may not have been "great", he was good enough)

Ambrose/Walsh - very good

Wasim-Waqar- good (didn't play enough)

McGrath - avg to good

Donald- below avg to average

Steyn- beyond great

Warne- beyond great

Murali - great