The class of mid 00's

[vcs]

Sachin's tour in '99 was amazing. That's the best he has batted in Australia (Tests, I think he didn't do well in the ODIs on that tour).

 

[honestbharani]

2013/14 for Johnson was the realisation of the potential Johnson always had. In the past though he'd have one beast mode test and two terrible tests. He was the most hot and cold bowler I've ever seen. 2013/14 was just him stringing 8 of his hot tests together in a row.

Yeah that is fine but my point is when you have had 60 odd tests of mediocre thrown together with about 8 tests, there is a much better chance it was a purple patch or an insane peak than it has of being a "sudden realization of potential". Everything that happened before and after suggests it was more of a flash in the pan, really. And I dont think you should judge players that way, especially if they have retired and you can retrospect their whole career.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Sachin's tour in '99 was amazing. That's the best he has batted in Australia (Tests, I think he didn't do well in the ODIs on that tour).

He was better in 08 imo. His 116 on the 99 tour is one of his best innings ever though, and one of the best anyone's ever played against Aus.

 

[honestbharani]

The brash young 18 year old smashing the Aussie attack around in 92 was pretty awesome too. But gotta go with OS on this one. In 1999, it was always like a question of when will India lose and as such there was no game level pressure on Sachin coz we were typically so much behind in the game or series anyways. 08 was amazing because the pressure was intense, the team was competitive and motivated and the pitches and the bowling were challenging from different aspects as well.

 

[vcs]

I'll take you guys' word for it.

Sad thing is, I never watched much of his batting in '99 because I had lots of important engineering entrance tests around then. Caught the last part of his century in Melbourne though.

He was indeed very good in '08 as well, against a much inferior attack. That was Sachin 2.0, efficiency personified.

 

[honestbharani]

Yeah 1999 was perhaps the best attack he would have faced in Oz.

 

[TheJediBrah]

I don't know about slow coz Melbourne was fast enough and Brisbane seemed to be ok too. Adelaide and Sydney have always been on the flatter side as well IIRC. There was a lot of discussion on how most of them being drop in wickets makes them flatter than usual in the commentary. But again, they have been drop in tracks almost all along.

Are you sure you are not confusing flat with slow?

Melbourne and Sydney (Melbourne especially) were possibly the 2 slowest Test wickets Australia's had in my lifetime. This isn't really controversial or debatable and it was a major talking point of the series, so I don't understand why you are having such a hard time accepting it.

Lol. Good try. FWIW, I will always hold Vaughan's performance higher than almost any batting performance in Australia except Lara's. And read your own posts again. If this is what you wanted to communicate, you did not do a good job of doing that. And again, Johnson's "best" was a season and a half, its no way to judge anyone or we can go back and figure out every other player who had a freakish season and say certain other players won't have done well either. Just like I said about the Sachin post, you don't need to invent excuses why Vaughan's performances were better than Kohli's. They clearly were off their own merits.

It is literally exactly what I said, word for word, unambiguously. How you managed to misunderstand is a mystery but don't go and act as if my posting was somehow ambiguous because it wasn't. It was very clear.

 

[honestbharani]

Melbourne and Sydney (Melbourne especially) were possibly the 2 slowest Test wickets Australia's had in my lifetime. This isn't really controversial or debatable and it was a major talking point of the series, so I don't understand why you are having such a hard time accepting it.



It is literally exactly what I said, word for word, unambiguously. How you managed to misunderstand is a mystery but don't go and act as if my posting was somehow ambiguous because it wasn't. It was very clear.

Dude, this is the last time I am responding to this topic because its obvious you want to change your tune post to post. Go read your original posts, the context and tell me how in the blue hell it was what you posted just now. Anyone reading your posts here knows what your posts are like anyways. I am just tired of having to put up with the same thing over and over in every thread, especially when they are factually incorrect. And again, flat does not = slow. The thing that was talked about was how flat the wickets were but they have been getting flat for number of years. And slow wickets actually mean run scoring is more difficult than even some of the faster paced tracks. If they were as slow as you claim, it actually shows the batting efforts by the players in that series were better, esp. the high SR innings. Trust me, you cant keep middling pull and hook shots on a "slow" wicket, that is not how it works.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Dude, this is the last time I am responding to this topic because its obvious you want to change your tune post to post. Go read your original posts, the context and tell me how in the blue hell it was what you posted just now. Anyone reading your posts here knows what your posts are like anyways. I am just tired of having to put up with the same thing over and over in every thread, especially when they are factually incorrect. And again, flat does not = slow. The thing that was talked about was how flat the wickets were but they have been getting flat for number of years. And slow wickets actually mean run scoring is more difficult than even some of the faster paced tracks. If they were as slow as you claim, it actually shows the batting efforts by the players in that series were better, esp. the high SR innings. Trust me, you cant keep middling pull and hook shots on a "slow" wicket, that is not how it works.

You are living in your own world if you think any of this true. I don't care, post however you want but in future just leave me out of it because it's beyond ridiculous.

 

[honestbharani]

You are living in your own world if you think any of this true. I don't care, post however you want but in future just leave me out of it because it's beyond ridiculous.

Nah... every thing I said is true as any real cricket fan will know.


EDIT: removed needless comment.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Nah... every thing I said is true as any real cricket fan will know.


EDIT: removed needless comment.

Seriously, can we just start over? I really think you've got me typecast in your mind as "Australian Fan - Hates India" and everything you read from me gets distorted through that lens. I'm trying my best to really nice, I'm explaining myself thoroughly and politely but it still gets distorted to the point that when you finally understand what everyone's talking about you decide people have "changed their arguments".

Looking back there is nothing significant that we actually disagree on, you're just arguing for the sake of arguing. Especially when everything ends up boiling down to "No you're wrong" and "you don't know what facts are". It's painfully childish.

All I'd ask is next time read my posts carefully, don't jump to paranoia and maybe just consider that there's a possibility that I'm not saying what you think I'm implying. There's no reason we can't get along.

 

[honestbharani]

Seriously, can we just start over? I really think you've got me typecast in your mind as "Australian Fan - Hates India" and everything you read from me gets distorted through that lens. I'm trying my best to really nice, I'm explaining myself thoroughly and politely but it still gets distorted to the point that when you finally understand what everyone's talking about you decide people have "changed their arguments".

Looking back there is nothing significant that we actually disagree on, you're just arguing for the sake of arguing. Especially when everything ends up boiling down to "No you're wrong" and "you don't know what facts are". It's painfully childish.

All I'd ask is next time read my posts carefully, don't jump to paranoia and maybe just consider that there's a possibility that I'm not saying what you think I'm implying. There's no reason we can't get along.

And all I ask you do everything you ask of me, first. And just go and read your own posts again for God's sakes.

 

[TheJediBrah]

And all I ask you do everything you ask of me, first. And just go and read your own posts again for God's sakes.

Ok then in the name of avoiding confusion for you in the future, could you show me exactly what you want me to reread? Just pick one thing i said that you have issue with and it would help me understand what kind of language confused you or led you to misunderstand.

 

[honestbharani]

Mate, I am tired and its a sunday and I just wanna watch the friggin game. The thread is here, the posts are here, people can read them and make up their own minds. I am done. Enjoy the game.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Mate, I am tired and its a sunday and I just wanna watch the friggin game. The thread is here, the posts are here, people can read them and make up their own minds. I am done. Enjoy the game.

That's fine, but doesn't really help me help you, as the issue isn't with what i said, it's with how you perceived it. If you want to look back later and point any words or sentence structure that you don't understand I'll be happy to help. I'd much prefer to avoid this kind of childish conflict in the future so it would be appreciated.

 

[honestbharani]

That's fine, but doesn't really help me help you, as the issue isn't with what i said, it's with how you perceived it. If you want to look back later and point any words or sentence structure that you don't understand I'll be happy to help. I'd much prefer to avoid this kind of childish conflict in the future so it would be appreciated.

Dude, you keep doing this. I am not the one who has to work on his posting here. I will leave it at that.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Dude, you keep doing this. I am not the one who has to work on his posting here. I will leave it at that.

WHAT do you think i need to "work on"? You are giving me literally no information to go on. You just keep repeating the same thing over and over.

You're complaining about my posts constantly and when i politely give you the opportunity to fix whatever issue you have, you flat out refuse. Do you see the issue there

 

[honestbharani]

WHAT do you think i need to "work on"? You are giving me literally no information to go on. You just keep repeating the same thing over and over.

You're complaining about my posts constantly and when i politely give you the opportunity to fix whatever issue you have, you flat out refuse. Do you see the issue there

Do you see the issue about you asking again and again when I have already pointed it out to you in the first place?

 

[TheJediBrah]

This has to be a joke

 

[stephen]

Yeah that is fine but my point is when you have had 60 odd tests of mediocre thrown together with about 8 tests, there is a much better chance it was a purple patch or an insane peak than it has of being a "sudden realization of potential". Everything that happened before and after suggests it was more of a flash in the pan, really. And I dont think you should judge players that way, especially if they have retired and you can retrospect their whole career.

That's the point. Johnson didn't have 60 odd mediocre tests. He had some rank ordinary tests mixed in with brilliant tests. Check out these:

1st Test, New Zealand tour of Australia at Brisbane, Nov 20-23 2008 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
1st Test, South Africa tour of Australia at Perth, Dec 17-21 2008 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
1st Test, Australia tour of South Africa at Johannesburg, Feb 26-Mar 2 2009 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
(During his terrible tour of England) 4th Test, Australia tour of England and Scotland at Leeds, Aug 7-9 2009 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
2nd Test, West Indies tour of Australia at Adelaide, Dec 4-8 2009 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
2nd Test, Australia tour of New Zealand at Hamilton, Mar 27-31 2010 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
3rd Test, England tour of Australia at Perth, Dec 16-19 2010 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
3rd Test, South Africa tour of Australia at Perth, Nov 30-Dec 3 2012 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo
2nd Test, Sri Lanka tour of Australia at Melbourne, Dec 26-28 2012 | Match Summary | ESPNCricinfo (the batsmen who retired hurt or were absent hurt in this match were all injured off Johnson's bowling)

They are excluding his 8 test purple patch Ashes and South Africa series (which is over 10% of his career).

So with those 9 tests and the 8 tests of his purple patch, he had 17 tests out of 73 (around 1/4) where he took huge bags of wickets. The rest of Johnson's career was a mix of everything from good to very poor. The guy took 313 wickets over 73 tests. He wasn't the best bowler ever, but he certainly wasn't crap for the majority of his career.

Given the hype around him, Johnson didn't live up to expectations (outside his purple patch) but he certainly had a very good career. Not many bowlers take over 300 wickets at an average under 30.