Can Ashwin beat Murali's 800?

[Burgey]

We’re taking about 2.5 coke cans stacked on top of each other. TOTAB even said he’s got Garner covered.

High praise indeed.

 

[morgieb]

Also it can't be stressed enough how much of an embarrassment Warne was against India. Murali at least won marches against India at home. Warne got spanked whether it was Sydney or Mumbai.

Because bowling spin in Australia is as easy as bowling spin in Sri Lanka.

Come back to me when Murali doesn't average 75 in Australia.

 

[cnerd123]

To sidetrack from the **** posting - Murali and Warne were very different types of bowlers in their approach. And not just off spin Vs leg spin. Murali put a lot of sidespin on the ball, occasionally angling the seam to get drift as a variation, and worked a very wide of offstump line, testing a batsmen's judgement of spin and bounce. Occasionally he would work closer to the stumps and bring the doosra onto play, but given how much turn he got on his stock ball it wasn't a strategy he could use most of the time.

What happens when bowling on Australian pitches in that manner is you're essentially very hittlable on either side of the wicket. There is a reason why Australian finger spinners (and spinners who do well there) focus a lot more on overspin and keeping a tighter, straighter line. What made Lyon so great in India was that he was able to adjust from an Australian style of bowling to a more side-spin approach, allowing the turn he got and the batsmen's ability to judge it to be a weapon as well.

As for Warne - he put massive revs on the ball, and as a Wrist spinner that means huge amounts of drift and bounce. Even when he wasn't turning it square he was able to constantly test a batsmen's footwork, and playing on Aussies pitches meant that if the batsmen went on the back foot they had to deal with the possibility of the ball leaping up at them. This made his flipper such a potent weapon - the ball just skidding through and staying lot. Put Warne onto an Asian deck tho, where he didn't have that kind of bounce to work with, and the batsmen (particularly the Indian Fab 4) were very able to use the depth of their crease to play him. This is what Warne found hard to adjust to. And when he tried to push his legbth fuller, the flight lack of pace made it fairly easy for these great batsmen to use their feet and smash him. What made Kumble so great was that he was able to realise these differences in conditions, and bowled slower and loopier on Australian decks, extracting that extra drift and bounce that Warne used so effectively. And the using his quicker flatter googly or topspinner to pin those batsmen who were lazy on the backfoot.

Both Warne and Murali essentially struggled against ATG batting lineups in conditions unsuited to their natural style of bowling. I think it cancels out tbh.

 

[cnerd123]

Some typos in that and I think it's more accurate to say Warne (and Kumble on similar decks) was adapt at catching out batsmen who couldn't get to the pitch of the ball (and not just those stuck on the back foot). But yea the general point stands.

 

[Migara]

As an Aussie supporter, Murali is the only ATG bowler I would actually choose to have play against us, because he literally posed **** all threat during his career. He was utterly hopeless here over multiple tours, and quite frankly taking 5/150 or some such in SL is bog average too.

He did nothing of any substantive worth against the best side of his era for his entire career. Basically a non-event.

Lovely bloke though. Was treated terribly on his early tours here.

Warne wouldn't have either if he bowled to Aussie test batsmen. In shield games he averages 35. If some one expects him to average better than that against test class Australian batsmen, that person has a very skewed view.

Against best players of spin of era, Warne sucked home and away. Murali at least sent chills through Indian spines at home.

 

[Migara]

Ashwin has a proper technique, Jadeja is a glorified slogger.

Sloggers don't make double and triple hundreds one after another.

 

[Burgey]

To sidetrack from the **** posting - Murali and Warne were very different types of bowlers in their approach. And not just off spin Vs leg spin. Murali put a lot of sidespin on the ball, occasionally angling the seam to get drift as a variation, and worked a very wide of offstump line, testing a batsmen's judgement of spin and bounce. Occasionally he would work closer to the stumps and bring the doosra onto play, but given how much turn he got on his stock ball it wasn't a strategy he could use most of the time.

What happens when bowling on Australian pitches in that manner is you're essentially very hittlable on either side of the wicket. There is a reason why Australian finger spinners (and spinners who do well there) focus a lot more on overspin and keeping a tighter, straighter line. What made Lyon so great in India was that he was able to adjust from an Australian style of bowling to a more side-spin approach, allowing the turn he got and the batsmen's ability to judge it to be a weapon as well.

As for Warne - he put massive revs on the ball, and as a Wrist spinner that means huge amounts of drift and bounce. Even when he wasn't turning it square he was able to constantly test a batsmen's footwork, and playing on Aussies pitches meant that if the batsmen went on the back foot they had to deal with the possibility of the ball leaping up at them. This made his flipper such a potent weapon - the ball just skidding through and staying lot. Put Warne onto an Asian deck tho, where he didn't have that kind of bounce to work with, and the batsmen (particularly the Indian Fab 4) were very able to use the depth of their crease to play him. This is what Warne found hard to adjust to. And when he tried to push his legbth fuller, the flight lack of pace made it fairly easy for these great batsmen to use their feet and smash him. What made Kumble so great was that he was able to realise these differences in conditions, and bowled slower and loopier on Australian decks, extracting that extra drift and bounce that Warne used so effectively. And the using his quicker flatter googly or topspinner to pin those batsmen who were lazy on the backfoot.

Both Warne and Murali essentially struggled against ATG batting lineups in conditions unsuited to their natural style of bowling. I think it cancels out tbh.

Ok

 

[Migara]

I apologize for bringing a tired argument but minnow bashing improves his average by quite a bit, as well as his SR.

The Dev comparison is a bit extreme considering the difference in SR despite Murali being a spinner. Kumble would be a better comparison. Even if you don't rate Murali, no way is he less than second best after Warne.

Even without minnows, Murali has better stats. And sorry for bringing the tired argument that England were minnows in playing spin in most of Warne's career. If Murali played similar number of tests against WI, SAF, ENG and NZ, he would have ended up with 900 instead of 800.

 

[Migara]

Right. So let me follow suit: assess spin bowlers based on how they played in my backyard or against against my country (we did have some of the best players of spin bowling), and then form a hypothesis about how they would have played had they played for my country. That should certainly tell me how good these guys really were.

Starting with a small sample size of three:

Warne vs India 14 matches, 43 wickets @47.18, SR 91.2, WPM 3.1
Warne in India 9 matches, 34 wickets @43.11, SR 81.0, WPM 3.8


Murali vs India 22 matches, 105 wickets @32.61, SR 66.8, WPM 4.8
Murali in India 11 matches, 40 wickets @45.45, SR 86.2, WPM 3.6


Lyon vs India 14 matches, 64 wickets @33.31, SR 57.2, WPM 4.6
Lyon in India 7 matches, 34 wickets @30.58, SR 51.7, WPM 4.9

I see that I have reached the inescapable conclusion that, overall, Lyon was a far better spin bowler than either of the two overrated palookas Warne and Murali.


.

Nope. Time separates Lyon form Murali and Warne. Different players. No Sidhus, Azhars, Tendulkars, Shewags. Only Shikar Dhawan comes close to that quality in playing spin.

 

[Borges]

Continuing my on earlier impeccable analysis, the definitive conclusion is this:
All things considered, Swann > Lyon >> Murali > Warne. >>> Herath.

It's another matter altogether that, if I can't have two spinners in my ATG team, it would have to be Warne and not Murali (I'm partial to leg spin).

 

[trundler]

Why is it only between Warne and Murali both of whom got thrashed by the best players of spin they faced? Why don't players like O'Reilly, Laker and Gibbs, for example, pop up in this discussion?

 

[trundler]

Both of them would go over 4 r.p.o against 2 ATG players of spin at both ends and hence release pressure. When they've had their asses handed to them by Laxman, I don't see them troubling Bradman and Sobers at all, except for a lucky dismissal a la McGill.

 

[Borges]

Why is it only between Warne and Murali both of whom got thrashed by the best players of spin they faced? Why don't players like O'Reilly and Gibbs, for example, pop up in this discussion?

I think we are terribly biased in favour of the more recent crop of players. One reason being that we haven't seen O'Reilly, Grimmet et al.
Bradman? What Bradman? Did you mean Stoneman etc.

 

[TheJediBrah]

To sidetrack from the **** posting

stopped reading here. Not interested.

 

[cnerd123]

Both of them would go over 4 r.p.o against 2 ATG players of spin at both ends and hence release pressure. When they've had their asses handed to them by Laxman, I don't see them troubling Bradman and Sobers at all, except for a lucky dismissal a la McGill.

O'Reilly is definitely up for the conversation, as are Gibbs and Laker for mine

Warne and Murali obviously benefit from longevity and playing televised (we can see them actually bowl), modern cricket with modern pitches, bats, etc. Much easier to be a spinner when the batsmen are using a toothpick for a bat on uncovered wickets.

A subjective analysis can lead to interesting results - brings in guys like Gupte, Chandrasekhar, Bedi, Grimmet, Qadir, etc all into the conversation as well - but it's really hard to come to an objective answer when comparing within eras. And most statistical measures will put Warne and Murali at the top anyways given the sheer numbers they put up.

 

[trundler]

Here's the case for Laker:
Awesome average, especially for a spinner (21)
Awesome strike rate for his era (Davidson sruck every 10 overs, for Laker it's 10.2 overs)
Does not average over 25 against any country except WI (30.4, not bad)
Absolute gun in dustbowl conditions (19/90 at Headingley on a pitch that supported spin) as well as Australia (averages 21 over 4 matches, taking 15 wickets in 7 innings)

 

[trundler]

O'Reilly is definitely up for the conversation, as are Gibbs and Laker for mine

Warne and Murali obviously benefit from longevity and playing televised (we can see them actually bowl), modern cricket with modern pitches, bats, etc. Much easier to be a spinner when the batsmen are using a toothpick for a bat on uncovered wickets.

A subjective analysis can lead to interesting results - brings in guys like Gupte, Chandrasekhar, Bedi, Grimmet, Qadir, etc all into the conversation as well - but it's really hard to come to an objective answer when comparing within eras. And most statistical measures will put Warne and Murali at the top anyways given the sheer numbers they put up.

Only aggregates put Warne and Murali above the others. Barnes trumps them both in many analyses that I've read though I'm unsure if he counts. Bedi was essentially the Ashwin of his time, Qadir wasn't that great away either. Grimmet definitely deserves a mention though. Surely Australian and English batsmen are worse at playing spin than they were before so that should count for something. I'm just saying it isn't clear cut that Warne=Murali>>>>>>>> any other spinner that's ever lived. I'm certain some of them would have been as good or better if they had played today (not talking about guys like Underwood who feasted on uncovered tracks).

 

[cnerd123]

Barnes doesn't really count as a spinner does he

Barnes is an interesting one. He should be a lock in all ATG XIs going by his figures, but somehow he often goes overlooked because we're just not so sure what to make of him. Does he style of bowling translate to modern cricket? Was he really the Bradman of Bowling (so to speak), or an anamoly who benefitted from being a strange bowler in an era that suited him?

 

[trundler]

Barnes doesn't really count as a spinner does he

Barnes is an interesting one. He should be a lock in all ATG XIs going by his figures, but somehow he often goes overlooked because we're just not so sure what to make of him. Does he style of bowling translate to modern cricket? Was he really the Bradman of Bowling (so to speak), or an anamoly who benefitted from being a strange bowler in an era that suited him?

TBF, Bradman benefited from such an era too (to some extent) though I have no doubt in my mind that he's the greatest and far ahead of anyone before or since.
You could argue that Barnes gives your attack flexibility by allowing you to play 3 pacers + 1 spinner and also 2 bowlers who can bowl well in spinning conditions but he's so hard to gauge because no one even knows how to classify him. Another example of a high-class player I don't know what to make of is Keith Miller. The most balanced all-rounder in history but you cant play him as a frontline bowler and he might weaken the batting in the top 6.

It's weird to consider that the guy who has come closest to Bradman's feats (46 wickets in 4 matches comes pretty close to 974 runs in a series) isn't the first bowler we lock in, yeah.

 

[morgieb]

Tend to think that the changes to cricket were far more significant before WWI than since then, which probably doesn't help Barnes's case.

The other issue is that Bradman statistical dominance is by a far bigger margin than Barnes's.