Wisden names All Time World XI

[SpofforthLohman]

I don't know.... Benaud did the exact opposite by picking Lillee in his XI and not even naming any of the West Indian bowlers in his shortlist

I always come across a problem with the Windies quicks I have seen, there were so many that were so hard to separate, to me the finest exponent they had was Holding, but Ambrose was so scary and hostile and so was Roberts, that man was not to be messed with, NO ONE SLEDGED ANDY, that would be called suicide. Lillee was just a freak of nature, the perfect fast bowler and the others closet to him in ability were Jack Gregory, Lindwall, Miller, Spofforth, Turner and of course good old Ooohhh Ahhhhh McGrath. some of them have awesome averages and better than Lillee's , it is just impossible for me to imagine a better fast bowler. Lets face the truth here, you could pick any of the names above and you are likely to win any test and I haven't even touched on the great pommies yet. How can you go past Lohmann with that stunning record and average, or Trueman or Barnes...... For a short period there was a Pommie practically Thomson's equal in pace and he was unplayable for a time, I refer to Tyson who was like lightning. How can we truly claim our side is way superior to another bowling combo when on any gievn day those above mentioned could annihilate any batting line up... hell throw in Snow as well, when he was in his prime Australia was his breakfast.

 

[kyear2]

Well the great man has his reasons I suppose. He might have wanted an international balance and already had enough Aussies in his team. Benaud's opinion is the opposite to say, THE DON's on this matter. He picked Miller ahead of all but Sobers.

Don't team was honestly quite poor in section and balance.

The best AT teams are the ones selected by panels as it eliminated any apparent biases. As such the Widen, Cricinfo and even our own selections are probably the fairest and most balanced. Benaud with his biases still picked a good team and obviously put a lot of time and research into it and the same can be said for Armstrong effort. Boycott too as a player and commentator is well placed to make such selections.

Don't recall Miller making any of those teams.

 

[Acko88]

Hi guys,

I thought it would be interesting to pick a world XI from the modern era(since Sri Lanka entered test cricket in 1982) with one little caveat. The team must feature a player from every test playing nation. So aynway, here's my team.

1. Tamim Iqbal(Bangladseh)
2. Virender Sehwag(India)
3. Hashim Amla(SA)
4. Viv Richards(WI)
5. Kumar Sangakarra(SL)
6. Andy Flower+(Zimbabwe)
7. Ian Botham(England)
8. Imran Khan(Pakistan)
9. Richard Hadlee(NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall(WI)
11. Shane Warne(Australia)

When picking these sides I like to assume you could actually play a game with them. I've tried to pick as many guys as I could who could turn a match through sheer will. I expect to cop some flak for not picking Kallis, but he simply failed to deliver in this area over his career. For all his runs and great record, he didn't drag his side to victory often enough, like Botham or Hadlee for example.

Anyway I'd love to see some other peoples picks.

C'mon girls, stop arguing and have a go at this.

 

[Esperance]

1. Tamim Iqbal(Bangladseh)
2. Ishant Sharma(India)
3. Hashim Amla(SA)
4. Viv Richards(WI)
5. Kumar Sangakarra(SL)
6. Andy Flower+(Zimbabwe)
7. Ian Botham(England)
8. Imran Khan(Pakistan)
9. Richard Hadlee(NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall(WI)
11. Shane Warne(Australia)

 

[Agent Nationaux]

Miller was someone who had it all. ATG cricketer, War hero, good looking, a ladies man (slept with a royal), etc. What a guy!

 

[Acko88]

1. Tamim Iqbal(Bangladseh)
2. Ishant Sharma(India)
3. Hashim Amla(SA)
4. Viv Richards(WI)
5. Kumar Sangakarra(SL)
6. Andy Flower+(Zimbabwe)
7. Ian Botham(England)
8. Imran Khan(Pakistan)
9. Richard Hadlee(NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall(WI)
11. Shane Warne(Australia)

Haha, nice side.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

why wouldn't Richie's team have Bradman in it?

It would but not if Richies team played Don's team , you cant play against yourself.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

Don't team was honestly quite poor in section and balance.

The best AT teams are the ones selected by panels as it eliminated any apparent biases. As such the Widen, Cricinfo and even our own selections are probably the fairest and most balanced. Benaud with his biases still picked a good team and obviously put a lot of time and research into it and the same can be said for Armstrong effort. Boycott too as a player and commentator is well placed to make such selections.

Don't recall Miller making any of those teams.

Well Miller made Don's Australian team. I agree to a point that both men were a bit biased towards their own time. I criticized Don's team for not including Gilchrist... and Hayden in his Aussie XI. Obviously Arthur Morris was a gem of a player but to suggest he is as good or better than Hayden smacks of bias... He said O'Reilly was the best bowler he'd seen, that is his opinion, he must have been brilliant for him to overlook Warne. Problem with panels is that there is always a bias against the old timers from the Golden Age, probably because of the skewed stats from so many poor wickets.I tend to think that many of the greats from that long gone era must have been very exceptional, especially the batsmen on such diabolical wickets (to get an idea of a truly diabolical wicket look no further than the film of Lakers Test and that sort of pitch was very common in Trumpers time.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

1. Tamim Iqbal(Bangladseh)
2. Ishant Sharma(India)
3. Hashim Amla(SA)
4. Viv Richards(WI)
5. Kumar Sangakarra(SL)
6. Andy Flower+(Zimbabwe)
7. Ian Botham(England)
8. Imran Khan(Pakistan)
9. Richard Hadlee(NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall(WI)
11. Shane Warne(Australia)

Good team, Flower was so obvious. I have seen Bangladesh only once, when Steve Waugh played them so I have no idea about any of them. Hadlee was obvious too but I'd probably just put in Ponting for Viv and Ambrose for Marshall just to be contrary and immediately boot Sharma out for Tendulkar., I would put Steve waugh in somehow as well, he makes nearly every team I make up in my head.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

While Miller may have been seen as a better batsman than Imran, he also batted higher in the order as a specialist batsman and an average of 37 is not good enough for a top order batsman or a batting All Rounder in an ATG team or perspective. Additionally he played immediately after the war against some ordinary bowling attacks from England (vs whom he still averaged only 33 and in the UK averaged 24), South Africa (avg 33) and India (an especially weak attack vs which he averaged 37) and flat pitches and a worn out attack in the W.I (especially in '55 after Ramdin and Valentine were well past their brief peak and over used) which is the only region/country that he averaged over 41 (avg of 73). So if as you say It's tests vs England that mattered, in 29 Tests against them he average just over 33 with 3 Hundreds and in England in 15 Tests he averaged 24.40 with 1 solitary hundred.

As a bowler even though his average was similar to Imran's his strike rate and WPM were well below ATG status and not even that great overall. Over his career of 55 Test matches he took 170 wickets at an average of 22.97 at a strike rate of 61.5 with 7 five wicket hauls and he took 3.09 Wickets Per Match. Additionally this was aided by the fact that they had the luxury of a new ball every 55 overs in the '48 series and he was primarily used as a new ball shock bowler and hardly had to bowl with the old ball, a luxury Imran never had (though he managed to used it to his advantage) and he still out performed him. Again, as you stated, its his performances vs England that should count and vs the old enemy he took 87 wickets at an average of 22.4 at a s/r of 65.7 and took 3 WPM. In England he averaged 24.3 with a s/r of 72.1 and took less than 3 wpm with 2 five wicket hauls. Also of note is that in the W.I where he averaged 73 with the bat, he averaged over 32 with the ball as Walcott took to him quite nicely.

Additionally where you said that Imran's name is never mentioned in any ATG teams, it has been named in considerably more than Miller's and I can only find 1 ATG that featured Keith Miller and that wasn't exactly a site know for their cricket acumen. Also while Imran can be fitted into an ATG team at 8 and be a front line bowler and add depth to the batting lineup. Miller as shown above was not good enough a bowler to be chosen in an ATG team as a front line bowler and if he batted in the top order he would significantly weaken the batting. Also to your point about reverse swing, yes conventional swing is also difficult to bowl against, but the old ball doesn't swing and so reverse swing comes into play with the older ball thus it added to your attack if you have a bowler who can reverse it later in the innings before the 2nd new ball.

So I don't fully understand your argument for Miller over Imran and I wouldn't even bother to respond to your comments on IVA and MM.

I think many of the pitches in the 50's were very good batting wickets... apart from rain affected English wickets so bowling stats probably reflect that. Miller may have batted high up in order sometimes but that usually because we Aussies had a weak team in the 50's, we sometimes had tail ends that started from number 7 and we didn't have wicketkeeper who could even barely bat. Throw in the fact that England in the 50's had it's last really great batting line ups and even the best bowlers suffered often against them. You may be thinking I have something against Imran but you are wrong, he was one of my favorites when he played. I have a high opinion of Miller mainly because he was one of the fastest Australia ever had. My grandfather said on his day, Miller was terrifyingly quick and every team should have at least one bowler like that. In a perfect world you'd bat Miller at 8 or even 9 but we didn't have enough top flight batsmen to make that possible. Of all the players who played in the 50's I think Miller would have slipped easily into the one day format as would have Bradman so Miller was a very modern type of cricketer. Maybe he wasn't as good as Jack Gregory was, I'd say that Gregory was a bigger hitter that Miller was and maybe faster than Miller but Gregory is hard to judge from so vast a timespan, no damn film of him in his prime that I know of.

 

[kyear2]

Miller was primarily a top order batsman who was a reluctant bowler.

 

[Dan]

I feel like I've read this entire discussion somewhere before.

 

[watson]

Miller was primarily a top order batsman who was a reluctant bowler.

170 wickets at 22.98 runs each is a nice kind of reluctant.

 

[Dan]

1. Tamim Iqbal(Bangladseh)
2. Ishant Sharma(India)
3. Hashim Amla(SA)
4. Viv Richards(WI)
5. Kumar Sangakarra(SL)
6. Andy Flower+(Zimbabwe)
7. Ian Botham(England)
8. Imran Khan(Pakistan)
9. Richard Hadlee(NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall(WI)
11. Shane Warne(Australia)

Sharma opening ITSTL.

1. Gordon Greenidge (WI)
2. Sunil Gavaskar (IND)
3. Ricky Ponting (AUS)
4. Jacques Kallis (RSA)
5. Kevin Pietersen (ENG)
6. Andrew Flower (ZIM) +
7. Shakib Al-Hasan (BAN)
8. Imran Khan (PAK)
9. Richard Hadlee (NZ)
10. Malcolm Marshall (WI)
11. Muttiah Muralitharan (SL)

 

[SpofforthLohman]

Miller was primarily a top order batsman who was a reluctant bowler.

In the big matches they had during the War, Miller was indeed a batsman who bowled rarely but that changed quickly when he started taking wickets. By Millers test stats he is more of a bowling allrounder, wouldn't you agree ?

 

[smash84]

I think many of the pitches in the 50's were very good batting wickets... apart from rain affected English wickets so bowling stats probably reflect that. Miller may have batted high up in order sometimes but that usually because we Aussies had a weak team in the 50's, we sometimes had tail ends that started from number 7 and we didn't have wicketkeeper who could even barely bat. Throw in the fact that England in the 50's had it's last really great batting line ups and even the best bowlers suffered often against them. You may be thinking I have something against Imran but you are wrong, he was one of my favorites when he played. I have a high opinion of Miller mainly because he was one of the fastest Australia ever had. My grandfather said on his day, Miller was terrifyingly quick and every team should have at least one bowler like that. In a perfect world you'd bat Miller at 8 or even 9 but we didn't have enough top flight batsmen to make that possible. Of all the players who played in the 50's I think Miller would have slipped easily into the one day format as would have Bradman so Miller was a very modern type of cricketer. Maybe he wasn't as good as Jack Gregory was, I'd say that Gregory was a bigger hitter that Miller was and maybe faster than Miller but Gregory is hard to judge from so vast a timespan, no damn film of him in his prime that I know of.

Dude, you seem to be far too influenced by your gramps . I didn't see Miller play but by all accounts he was very very good possible even the most well rounded all rounder ever but he doesn't bring so much to the table as Imran does in an ATXI. Miller at his peak may have been quick but Imran at his peak was probably quicker.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

Dude, you seem to be far too influenced by your gramps . I didn't see Miller play but by all accounts he was very very good possible even the most well rounded all rounder ever but he doesn't bring so much to the table as Imran does in an ATXI. Miller at his peak may have been quick but Imran at his peak was probably quicker.

Well I don't think I am overinfluenced by him, he is remarkably still alive and he has never missed the cricket so he has seen them all play ever since then. I reckon he has a right to an opinion at 95 years of age..... what do you reckon ?

 

[OverratedSanity]

Miller's probably the most remarkably underrated All rounder here imo. The more I read about his exploits and the way he played, the more I admire him.

 

[smash84]

Well I don't think I am overinfluenced by him, he is remarkably still alive and he has never missed the cricket so he has seen them all play ever since then. I reckon he has a right to an opinion at 95 years of age..... what do you reckon ?

Of course he is entitled to his opinion but I'd rather take Richie Benaud's opinion over your grandfather. I hope you don't mind

 

[fredfertang]

Miller's probably the most remarkably underrated All rounder here imo. The more I read about his exploits and the way he played, the more I admire him.

Agree entirely, for reasons I explained here