Second Spitter
State Vice-Captain
That's a fantastic piece of mythology..
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The ATG Teams General arguing/discussing thread
- Thread starter Red
- Start date
watson
Banned
Computer simulations have accurately clocked available footage of Larwood deliveries as ranging between 137 to 142 kph. Albert Cotter was claimed by contemporaries to be every bit as fast as Larwood. Gregory and McDonald operated at speeds only a little slower than Larwood. The point being that early 20th century batsman had the skill and technique to handle true fast bowling.
Also, there are only two fast bowlers who have hit the side-screen on the half volley after bouncing the batsman - Kortright and Thomson. And Kortright played from 1889 to 1907.
Coronis
International Coach
1. Hutton - 945
2. Hobbs - 942
3. Bradman - 961
4. Ponting - 942
5. May - 941
6. Sobers - 938/715 (669)
7. Flower - 895
8. Imran - 922
9. Lohmann - 931
10. Barnes - 932
11. Muralitharan - 920
Couldn't bring myself to pick Walcott, Sanga or de Villiers for the w/k spot, despite their higher batting ratings.
watson
Banned
Wow, never would have predicted that Peter May's peak would top Viv Richard's, or even Weekes' for that matter.
marc71178
Eyes not spreadsheets
In another thread you've just told us sport is all about entertaining and winning is entertaining.
Make your mind up.
Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
i didnt think it would require much deduction to figure out that while sports is all about winning, its also all about competetive winning, not steamrolling around. Nobody wants to watch a boring 1-0 scoreline after 2 months of test cricket for a 5 test series. But no one wants to watch 5 consecutive innings victory by one team either.
Eds
International Debutant
So you decided you'd be a WK snob, but still pick Andy Flower?
Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
Again, what does that have to do with intimidatory bowling ? show us some references for how many noses did Kortright or Spofforth break. Or how many concussions they handed out. I've read a lot of cricket books talking about pre-war cricket, read a lot of Cardus too but i find very little mention about people getting their hands and heads broken. Such bowling was uncool back then, a fact underscored by the hue and cry of the Bodyline series.
If you want to convince me that Hobbs, who played cover drive with both feet in the air had the proper technique to deal with hostile fast bowling, i have a bridge to sell you outside the Queen's palace.
Oh and this doesnt take away from the fact that these fast bowlers were rare as a leg spinner is in international cricket. Today, every FC side has atleast one bowler operating in the 135kph zone. Sometimes more. Back then, every FC side had bowlers who were Hansie Cronje speed, the likes of Philander pace was rare and not every team posessed. This is why Hobbs and Sutcliffe ended up opening against spinners and military medium in most of their test matches!
Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
ankitj
Hall of Fame Member
Red
The normal awards that everyone else has
Don't be absurd. Hobbs coped with Jack Gregory and Ted McDonald without a helmet on all sorts of pitches unfamiliar to modern players. Gregory and McDonald were not 'military medium pacers', I assure you. Gregory was just flat out quick, and McDonald was quick enough.
Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
I tire of repeating myself. Its not about the speeds bowled at. I am sure a half volley at 95mph is not the same challenge as a rib tickler at 88mph.
Gregory, McDonald may've been the extremely rare fast men, but there is nothing in the copious volumes of work covering that era that suggests Gregory and McDonald went around breaking people's faces and hands. that was simply not cricket. To bowl a consistent barrage at the body with intent to injure & intimidate was not something Hobbs, Sutcliffe etc. ever faced. I wouldn't be a tad bit concerned about my well being facing Waqar Younis at his pomp if i knew he was gonna bowl at the stumps and or full and wide. I'd be trembling in fear if Ishant Sharma was going to bowl to me with the intent to target my head.
Find me passages from any book or article from the pre-war era, except for Bodyline, where bowlers were targeting the batsmen's body with intent to injure and caused injuries. I am yet to find anything more than a 'once a season' incident where someone broke a finger every few seasons or so.
So unless you want to conclude that every single English county batsman of the Hobbs era were orders of magnitude greater players of intimidatory bowling than the 70s-80s test players, the conclusion is simple: they did not get injured because they did not face physical intimidation.
Bodyline created such a hue and cry because of the intent to injure. What else do you think they were protesting ? Why would the Aussies be up in arms if the practice of targeting a batsman for injury was as common back then as it is now ?
Nobody cried bloody murder when Lillee and Thommo went around cracking skulls or the West Indies speed demons broke arms, heads and hands at will every single year for two decades. Why ? Because it was the norm, to be expected.
The lack of any evidence of sustained intimidatory bowling being remotely common back then and the hue and cry created due to bodyline's intimidatory bowling are proof enough of the players of that era being alien to the kind of physical barrage that was the norm of the post 60s era.
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Magrat Garlick
Global Moderator
HeathDavisSpeed
Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
It's a bit later than post war (1953) but the South African attack of Adcock and Ironside had absolutely no qualms about knocking the block off of the opposition batsmen. Bert Sutcliffe and Lawrie Miller in particular could testify to that. It certainly wasn't a new practice in the 1970s. Peter Heine, another quick of the same vintage was certainly not backwards about his intentions to hurt the opposition batsman, informing Trevor Bailey that "I want to hurt you."
I'm not a big cricket historian, so can't really comment on pre-war, but Adcock and Heine were fast and dangerous and willing to do what it took to get the batsmen out.
I'm not a big cricket historian, so can't really comment on pre-war, but Adcock and Heine were fast and dangerous and willing to do what it took to get the batsmen out.
Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
Bodyline changed everything. The field placement got banned (leg theory) but no restrictions were put on how many balls you can bowl at the heads or noses of batsmen. They saw the effect- who were ATG opening bats reduced to being bed ridden, even the untouchable Don had his figures cut in half.
The practice didnt become an overnight sensation, because of the sense of 'fairplay and its just not cricket' still were strong but with the advent of professionalism, these restrictions were losened in the player's mind and by the time the late 50s/early 60s rolled around, the practice of trying to kill a batsman were becoming more frequent.
By the early mid 60s, the license to kill being granted to the likes of John Snow, Wes Hall, Charlie Griffiths and Fred Trueman made it the model to copy, which is why the generation that grew up idolizing these guys- the guys debuting from early mid-70s onwards, were so bloody hostile, along with the fact that there was an absurd glut of great super-fast bowlers, mostly west indian, in that era that made the propensity to target batsmen's heads alltogether commonplace.
watson
Banned
In his autobiography Wally Hammond states that McDonald bowled at '90 mph'. Obviously this a best guess so may not be accurate. Suffice to say though, McDonald was a fast bowler of the Larwood variety.
Hobbs also faced Albert Cotter in 1905 on English wickets and remarked that he 'was the fastest bowler he ever faced'. Cotter took 121 wickets for the tour at 20.19. Historians were to later conclude that Cotter's slinging action made him also as fast as Larwood, That is, in excess of 140 kph.
IMO All those bowlers would have been at least as lethal as most fast bowlers around today.
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Muloghonto
U19 12th Man
Hmm, i am not 100% sure, but it seems to me that the reason no-one ever crossed the 1000 rating points- both as batsmen or bowler- is because there must be a mathematical limiting factor. Otherwise, nobody has ever gone through a purple patch in batting or bowling to attain the 1K ? I assumed it to be logarithmic, since it'd make sense why it gets so bloody hard to acquire rating points near the top end of the scale.