Is Jacques Kallis Ken Barrington of modern age?

[cnerd123]

Good thread.

Barrington is quite different to Kallis then isn't he? In that he batted slow to maximise how much he could score, and not because he was incapable of going quick, and that his runs were more valuable and consequential.

 

[cnerd123]

wait, so Chanders is assumed to be selfish and playing for his average on here? rememeber im new

Yes. Definite red ink master. Insists on batting at 5 when he could (and should) be taking more responsibility higher up. Terrible at farming the strike or upping his aggression when batting with the tail. Racks up lots of not outs in collapses, and not enough innings that hell arrest a slide. Also doesnt communicate with other batsmen in the middle, tends to bat in his own shell.

Great player, but selfish.

 

[OverratedSanity]

wait, so Chanders is assumed to be selfish and playing for his average on here? rememeber im new

Opinion isn't unanimous or anything.

I personally believe the evidence should be overwhelming to anyone who's watched his career. Awesome batsman but definite red-inker.

 

[Chrish]

Kallis has a better record overseas and if people are going to say Kallis isn't rated so high because of Australia then why not the same with Sobers and New Zealand?

NZ during Sobers' time were minnow, OZ during Kallis' time weren't. When a batsman fails against strong opposition, it counts against him. But if he fails against minnow, it's assumed due to lack of form rather than opposition causing any problem.. Lara only averages 34.55 against India but you won't see anyone bringing it up.. India were pretty weak bowling unit during that time.

 

[mr_mister]

i havent seen much of his career actually. most of my cricket viewing was watching whoever toured australia

 

[Chrish]

urgh "x-factor" is such a flowery factor in these discussions

If "x-factor" means ability to take game away, then Sobers had that.. If you look at the scorecard of late 60s/ early 70s, you will see he normally scored quickly, most of the times with the SR of around 60.

 

[viriya]

Kallis isn't rated lower than others because he was dour, it's because his knocks were less consequential than the others. Steve Waugh was dour but was rated up there with the best Australia produced for a reason. Kallis scored mountains of runs and took tons of wickets, that's a guy you want in your side no question. But a bloke like him affected the contest for a session, a day or a Test. Guys like Ponting, Lara and Sachin scared the pants of the opposition for years and affected contests even when they weren't in great form. That's the province of the best.

I think this is just the impression you get. IMO this is true of Kallis in ODIs, but not in Tests.

A simple stat that seems to suggest otherwise - Kallis had the most MoM awards (23 MoM awards over 166 tests):
Records | Test matches | Individual records (captains, players, umpires) | Most player-of-the-match awards | ESPN Cricinfo

This is at almost the same rate as Murali (14%) who was the greatest matchwinner in Tests.

 

[Jono]

Yes. Definite red ink master. Insists on batting at 5 when he could (and should) be taking more responsibility higher up. Terrible at farming the strike or upping his aggression when batting with the tail. Racks up lots of not outs in collapses, and not enough innings that hell arrest a slide. Also doesnt communicate with other batsmen in the middle, tends to bat in his own shell.

Great player, but selfish.

Yes in your view but the question was about CW. Only some have that view on CW. It is totally split, just like how views on Kallis are split.

 

[Furball]

Chanderpaul was a red inker but spent a lot of his career batting amongst some utter **** so I don't hold that against him as much as I would if he was Australian or South African.

 

[Furball]

Kallis has a better record overseas and if people are going to say Kallis isn't rated so high because of Australia then why not the same with Sobers and New Zealand?

Why has no-one pointed out that 1960s New Zealand were amongst the greatest sides of all time before?

 

[viriya]

Why has no-one pointed out that 1960s New Zealand were amongst the greatest sides of all time before?

It's only important to do well vs good teams, doing bad vs bad teams means nothing, everybody knows that. In fact, it just shows that the player wasn't a minnow basher - which is to his credit.

 

[smash84]

I think this is just the impression you get. IMO this is true of Kallis in ODIs, but not in Tests.

A simple stat that seems to suggest otherwise - Kallis had the most MoM awards (23 MoM awards over 166 tests):
Records | Test matches | Individual records (captains, players, umpires) | Most player-of-the-match awards | ESPN Cricinfo

This is at almost the same rate as Murali (14%) who was the greatest matchwinner in Tests.

Wasim seems to have a better percentage than Murali in your list.

 

[cnerd123]

Yes in your view but the question was about CW. Only some have that view on CW. It is totally split, just like how views on Kallis are split.

Really? Felt it was the majority view here

 

[viriya]

Wasim seems to have a better percentage than Murali in your list.

Yea, I didn't mean that Murali was the best matchwinner just based on the percentage of course, just a good benchmark to compare Kallis to since he's #2.

 

[Black_Warrior]

Wow a simple question on why Kallis does not make it to more CW All Time XI turns into a full on analysis on his career and stats. This is why I CW. You will never get these conversations with dumb casual fans on FB.

Kallis has a better record overseas and if people are going to say Kallis isn't rated so high because of Australia then why not the same with Sobers and New Zealand?

There are a couple of factors here.. Firstly for a large part of his career (almost until 2007), Kallis did not get the 'tough runs'. Australia being just one of them, but for a long time, he would score massively against weaker bowling sides like India and West Indies but then under perform in tough tours of England and Australia. Although England's attack in the late 90s and early 00s, was weaker than the attack post 2004, Kallis did not score that heavily against them. What this meant was Kallis would have a pretty high average still, but he would not do against Warne and McGrath that Lara or Tendulkar did against them...but he was able to maintain an average pretty close to theirs at that time, and ultimately higher than them.

Now, Kallis was certainly not the only top batsman of that time to struggle in Australia. Almost everyone struggled against them, even Tendulkar (compared to his standards).
So why is Kallis singled out? It is more a set of factors beyond his control. Dravid has a pretty poor record in Australia too and I have mentioned this before on CW and I know I am going to ruffle a few feathers with this.

But here's the thing..Dravid has that one double century in Adelaide, in that one season when McGrath and Warne were both not playing, against one of the weakest bowling attacks that Australia had fielded during that era, and it resulted in one of the most famous wins in the history of Indian cricket. Coming just 2 years after the greatest win in India's history, and the first and only time India drawing a series in Australia, Dravid was forever enshrined in the history books, and people started to think that he has a great record in Australia. Had that double hundred not resulted in a famous win, people would be looking far more harshly at Dravid's record in Australia.

Kallis unfortunately was not part of such a famous win for his team. So his record was looked at for what it was, and it is deservedly looked at harshly. If you average 55 but go AWOL against two of the greatest bowlers of your time, that should go against your record.

As for Sobers vs NZ, most of us here (perhaps no one) has actually seen Sobers bat, we did not see those games. We judge him based on his record, based on what we have read, based on what his peers, and contemporaries spoke about him..and by all means Sobers was a freak of nature...

Really? I would say if you are an aggressive batsman and you're averaging in the 30s, you're gonna be rated less. You don't get a free pass. I'm not sure there is an aggressive all-time batsman averaging 50+ who consistently was 'too aggressive'. There's a difference as to why people critique Kallis and that's because he tends to play the way to improve his numbers, rather than his team's chances to win and while a lot of the time that overlaps; it's not necessarily a joint interest.

I honestly don't know how or why someone can make this kind of an argument. How can us as the spectators watching on TV or at the ground tell this? I would think the only people who would probably be aware of this would be the players in the dressing room. I think it's quite unfair to question someone's intentions because for us, there is no objective way of deciphering this.

I distinctly remember Windies touring RSA in 2003 or so after the WC and Boycott was on commentary and always talked about how Kallis was very worried about his average and that he wanted to get it back up since he had rather ordinary start as a youngster in tests. Cronje declared on him when he batted way too slowly going for a declaration with him on 80 odd or at least on the verge of a milestone score.

Cronje died in 2002, played his last game in 2000.

i havent seen much of his career actually. most of my cricket viewing was watching whoever toured australia

So you've only seen England and India play then?

The guy is a statistical marvel.. His batting average is up there with the best of his era. Nearly 300 wickets.. And if this wasn't enough, he was a brilliant slip fielder; one of the best the game has ever seen.

Yet he almost never makes any all time XI.. Is this all because of Barrington-like nature of his batting?

To go back to the original topic, a major reason why he is not picked in All Time XI (other than the one I mentioned above) is because he is slotted as an all rounder. So when people are making their teams, they are not thinking of putting him in the middle order (where there are 4 spots available) but more in the role of an all rounder and there is only room for 1 there and he is competing with Imran and Sobers. He was an amazing all rounder as his records suggest, but neither was he a better bowler than Imran, nor is he considered a better batsman than Sobers. So he misses out.

 

[Marius]

I can see why there is no real Jacques Kallis love. He did come across as selfish sometimes, and he certainly had the talent to do what AB de Villiers does.

But I think there are some complex factors behind this. When Kallis started playing for SA he played for a fairly mediocre batting side - there was no De Villiers, Amla etc. You had a couple of strokemakers, like Cullinan and Gibbs, but neither of them averaged above 50. Both were good players but not on the level of De Villiers or Amla for example. This probably influenced the way Kallis played Tests. He was a bit of a dasher when he was younger - I remember him square driving someone for six playing for Western Province in 1996 or so. But being in a team which often suffered from the 90/5 syndrome it was important he kept his wicket intact.

Also, I think his upbringing played a part. The SA team in the 1990s was, for the most part, fairly dour. I really think having been brought up in apartheid SA played some part in that - the society we grow up in influences us more than we think. Now guys who were ten years younger than Kallis started coming into the team, and grew up in a much freer society, so you get your Amlas, De Villiers, De Kocks etc.

Kallis has also played some great knocks. This innings against that great England side in Durban in 2003. Kallis was the only guy who stood firm, guiding SA to 332 after being 118-6. Also two hundreds in two innings versus Pakistan in Karachi. There was also this century versus India when only one other person made a fifty in the innings.

I get why people don't feel the same about Kallis as about players with similar (or even worse records) but without Kallis, SA certainly wouldn't have become the team they did. He is a legend of the game, and I'm glad SA was lucky enough to have him.

 

[SeamUp]

I can see why there is no real Jacques Kallis love. He did come across as selfish sometimes, and he certainly had the talent to do what AB de Villiers does.

But I think there are some complex factors behind this. When Kallis started playing for SA he played for a fairly mediocre batting side - there was no De Villiers, Amla etc. You had a couple of strokemakers, like Cullinan and Gibbs, but neither of them averaged above 50. Both were good players but not on the level of De Villiers or Amla for example. This probably influenced the way Kallis played Tests. He was a bit of a dasher when he was younger - I remember him square driving someone for six playing for Western Province in 1996 or so. But being in a team which often suffered from the 90/5 syndrome it was important he kept his wicket intact.

Also, I think his upbringing played a part. The SA team in the 1990s was, for the most part, fairly dour. I really think having been brought up in apartheid SA played some part in that - the society we grow up in influences us more than we think. Now guys who were ten years younger than Kallis started coming into the team, and grew up in a much freer society, so you get your Amlas, De Villiers, De Kocks etc.

Kallis has also played some great knocks. This innings against that great England side in Durban in 2003. Kallis was the only guy who stood firm, guiding SA to 332 after being 118-6. Also two hundreds in two innings versus Pakistan in Karachi. There was also this century versus India when only one other person made a fifty in the innings.

I get why people don't feel the same about Kallis as about players with similar (or even worse records) but without Kallis, SA certainly wouldn't have become the team they did. He is a legend of the game, and I'm glad SA was lucky enough to have him.

I sort of get the argument about our 90's batting line-up. Wessel's, Hudson, P.Kirsten, McMillan probably would have played a bit of test cricket in the 80's but the changes were probably G.Kirsten in for Wessel's & Gibbs in for Hudson, Kallis in for P.Kirsten and then Cullinan , Cronje, Rhodes, McMillan.

I think that was a pretty decent batting line-up & deservedly 2nd best in the world behind Australia almost through out the 90's. I agree with the assessment of Gibbs (42 ave) & Cullinan (44 ave) in that when they were on song they were the players to watch. Absolute poetry in motion. They were teenage prodigies after all. But had soft under-bellies at times if you want to put it that way.

The funny thing is, Cronje and Rhodes were probably more steely than people realised and often stood up v England/Australia but their records aren't up there with G.Kirsten, Gibbs, Kallis, Cullinan, McMillan etc they often scored the tough runs and they did so quite quickly but were never as talented as the rest.

But with Gibbs/Hudson blowing so hot and cold and Kallis thinking about Cullinan's deficiencies against that great Australian side and while Cronje and Rhodes were good players I think he probably had doubts at the back of his behind because how often did G.Kirsten or Kallis save the day ?

It is tough to judge that batting line up because it was still pretty good and the shackles weren't totally on them but think Bob Woolmer wanted the others to bat around G.Kirsten/Kallis so the risk taking wasn't there for both of them in that period.

So Kallis was set in his ways. He was a young player with a lot of responsibility and it became what he knew. That other batsmen must bat around him.

Kallis played some great backs to wall knocks and the great first test century at the MCG comes to mind. He had the ability to score quick all around the ground. Ask the Australians he played as a teenager when a WP team toured there early 90s

AB and Amla are quality players and will go down as greats but it is that same old argument of did they have to face McGrath, Warne, Wasim, Waqar, Ambrose, Walsh, Kumble, Murali like the above batting line-up did etc

 

[Black_Warrior]

Kallis has 3 hundreds against Warne and McGrath, and 2 of them in Australia IIRC, that is still 2 more than what Dravid managed.. These are not poor numbers by any means.

It's just that it's not even close to being enough when compared against Tendulkar and Lara..and he is generally compared against those 2 and Ponting, Dravid.

Not to mention that none of those hundreds are particularly memorable.

 

[OverratedSanity]

I agree with all Marius said there except the bit about SA's batting being mediocre. They were always good. They were phenomenal after Smith, Amla and AB came in but they were never anything less than very good. Kirsten was one of the very best openers of the era, Cullman was a top player (Warne troubles notwithstanding), and their batting lineup had extraordinary depth with guys like Klusener , McMillan, Pollock etc. down the order. Neither was there any shortage of dashers in SA's batting in the era. Gibbs, Rhodes, Klusener, even Cronje to an extent were very attacking batsmen.

 

[The Battlers Prince]

Wow a simple question on why Kallis does not make it to more CW All Time XI turns into a full on analysis on his career and stats. This is why I CW. You will never get these conversations with dumb casual fans on FB.




There are a couple of factors here.. Firstly for a large part of his career (almost until 2007), Kallis did not get the 'tough runs'. Australia being just one of them, but for a long time, he would score massively against weaker bowling sides like India and West Indies but then under perform in tough tours of England and Australia. Although England's attack in the late 90s and early 00s, was weaker than the attack post 2004, Kallis did not score that heavily against them. What this meant was Kallis would have a pretty high average still, but he would not do against Warne and McGrath that Lara or Tendulkar did against them...but he was able to maintain an average pretty close to theirs at that time, and ultimately higher than them.

Now, Kallis was certainly not the only top batsman of that time to struggle in Australia. Almost everyone struggled against them, even Tendulkar (compared to his standards).
So why is Kallis singled out? It is more a set of factors beyond his control. Dravid has a pretty poor record in Australia too and I have mentioned this before on CW and I know I am going to ruffle a few feathers with this.

But here's the thing..Dravid has that one double century in Adelaide, in that one season when McGrath and Warne were both not playing, against one of the weakest bowling attacks that Australia had fielded during that era, and it resulted in one of the most famous wins in the history of Indian cricket. Coming just 2 years after the greatest win in India's history, and the first and only time India drawing a series in Australia, Dravid was forever enshrined in the history books, and people started to think that he has a great record in Australia. Had that double hundred not resulted in a famous win, people would be looking far more harshly at Dravid's record in Australia.

Kallis unfortunately was not part of such a famous win for his team. So his record was looked at for what it was, and it is deservedly looked at harshly. If you average 55 but go AWOL against two of the greatest bowlers of your time, that should go against your record.

I think there's a few points. His first series in Australia 97/98 he did fairly poorly averaging 38 with the bat. However next time 01/02 he averaged 49 in 6 innings. For me this was a series I thought we were going to run through them easily. Kallis' "slow" batting was a thorn in the side. He never made a century that series but his fortitude at the crease was impressive to me. Again in 05/06 his three matches including the "World XI" test he averaged 69.
I know he's not everyone's favourite player but over his career he averaged nearly 50 in Australia including some good series against top bowling.