DoG's Top 100 Test Bowlers Countdown Thread 100-1

[stephen]

Yep I'm looking forward to seeing the next few. Anderson, Pollock, Walsh, Garner, Holding, Donald, Waqar, Imran, Wasim, Lillee, Davidson, McGrath, Marshall, Ambrose, Warne, Murali, Kumble, Barnes, Hadlee, Herath, Steyn, Trueman, Underwood, Laker, Statham, Grimmett, Spoffoth and O'Reilly still to come

 

[Burgey]

Id expect Sean Abbott to feature quite prominently tbh.

 

[NUFAN]

I am slightly disappointed that the countdown got updated during the process. Harder to get excited by the list now that we know that the list can change at any moment.

I know how time consuming this is and how seriously you take the changes in the quest to make it perfect, but still.

 

[Days of Grace]

You're right, Nufan. I shouldn't have tinkered with it.

Anyway, I'm going back to the wickets:career length 2:1 ratio. My final reasoning is wickets are usually the first thing you look at when assessing a player's career. Career length is also important as players of the past with long careers simply didn't get the opportunities to take as many wickets as their counterparts. It is also important to reward players who were quality over a long period of time rather than playing for 3 or 4 years at their peak. But players should also be penalized for being unavailable for matches, so a 2:1 ratio seems right to me.

There will be no more changes. Let's crack on.

33 IT Botham 778
34 RJ Harris 774
35 GA Lohmann 774
36 Fazal Mahmood 772
37 M Ntini 755
38 MG Johnson 753
39 RGD Willis 749
40 Mohammad Asif 749
41 RR Lindwall 748
42 JA Snow 744
43 PM Pollock 743
44 AME Roberts 740
45 IR Bishop 738
46 CEH Croft 732
47 D Gough 731
48 Yasir Shah 731
49 DL Underwood 729
50 WW Hall 728
51 SCJ Broad 728
52 BS Chandrasekhar 728
53 N Kapil Dev 726
54 CJ McDermott 726
55 AR Caddick 725
56 JR Thomson 724
57 ARC Fraser 722
58 H Trumble 720
59 M Morkel 719
60 Harbhajan Singh 719
61 GP Swann 717
62 NAT Adcock 716
63 LR Gibbs 715
64 Saeed Ajmal 715
65 R Benaud 715
66 MA Starc 709
67 CTB Turner 708
68 JH Wardle 701
69 TM Alderman 700
70 JB Statham 700
71 GD McKenzie 700
72 SR Clark 699
73 JN Gillespie 698
74 MW Tate 694
75 FH Tyson 694
76 KR Miller 694
77 B Lee 685
78 MG Hughes 684
79 SCG MacGill 683
80 GF Lawson 682
81 Saqlain Mushtaq 681
82 BS Bedi 681
83 CL Cairns 674
84 TA Boult 672
85 JR Hazlewood 672
86 HH Streak 671
87 MJ Hoggard 670
88 WA Johnston 670
89 PM Siddle 669
90 Z Khan 668
91 H Verity 667
92 N Wagner 667
93 SE Bond 665
94 WPUJC Vaas 663
95 BA Reid 656
96 GAR Lock 655
97 EAS Prasanna 655
98 Danish Kaneria 654
99 NM Lyon 651
100 BR Taylor 649

 

[Days of Grace]

No.32

Hugh Tayfield (South Africa) 783

Quality Points: 721
Career Points: 61

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DrH3BN3J2k

Career: 1949-1960
Wickets: 170
Gold Performances: 7
7/23 vs. Australia at Durban 1950 (18.17)
6/84 vs. Australia at Melbourne 1952 (15.96)
7/81 vs. Australia at Melbourne 1952 (17.71)
6/13 vs. New Zealand at Johannesburg 1954 (17.49)
8/69 vs. England at Durban 1957 (15.91)
9/113 vs. England at Johannesburg 1957 (20.04)
6/78 vs. England at Port Elizabeth 1957 (16.00)
Silver Performances: 2
Bronze Performances: 4

Overall Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 24.74 (25.91) 65.48 (79.81) 5.83
50 Innings Peak Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings (1952-1960): 22.35 63.40 6.35
Non-Home Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 24.64 62.53 6.16
Quality Opposition Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 25.91 65.10 5.95

South Africa's best ever spinner. No-one else comes close. Hugh Tayfield has seven gold performances, including an incredible 3 against England in 1956-57 to rescue the series for South Africa after being 0-2 down. His star burned extremely brightly in that series but by the time South Africa toured to England in 1960 he had lost form. He subsequently lost his place in the side at the young age of 31. Considering that spinners normally mature late, it is surprising that South Africa didn't stick with him for longer. Does anyone have any explanation?

 

[Bolo]

It's interesting to see Ntini and Botham, with nearly 400 wickets each, split by 3 guys with just over 100 each and nobody else. This is a whole lot closer to (what I suspect many would regard as) a common sense evaluation than what I would expect from a statistical one given two distinct groups of stats.

 

[NUFAN]

Awesome DoG, didnt expect you to revert back but im glad you did. Happy with Tayfield at number 32.

 

[Days of Grace]

No.31

Alec Bedser (England) 784

Quality Points: 715
Career Points: 69

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZO05oLSWLb4

Career: 1946-1955
Wickets: 236
Gold Performances: 3
7/58 vs. South Africa at Manchester 1951 (15.28)
7/55 vs. Australia at Nottingham 1953 (16.19)
7/44 vs. Australia at Nottingham 1953 (16.63)
Silver Performances: 9
Bronze Performances: 2

Overall Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 24.21 (24.90) 57.89 (67.45) 5.04
50 Innings Peak Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings (1949-1954): 18.68 48.04 6.19
Non-Home Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 30.72 74.61 4.41
Quality Opposition Average/Strike-Rate/Points Per Innings: 24.64 53.88 6.08

England's go-to-bowler during the difficult post-war years and the one who held the touch before the likes of Trueman and Laker made England the best side in the world in the mid-1950s. Bedser had a superb peak as the home pitches became less friendly for batsmen and England in turn merged into a stronger unit. With his style of bowling (very similar I would have thought to Fazal Mahmood) he struggled relatively away from home.

 

[Adders]

I am slightly disappointed that the countdown got updated during the process. Harder to get excited by the list now that we know that the list can change at any moment.

I know how time consuming this is and how seriously you take the changes in the quest to make it perfect, but still.

Did Siddle drop a spot or something with the adjustment

 

[ankitj]

Probable 30:

McGrath, Warne, Lillee, O'Reilly, Grimmett, Davidson,
Marshall, Ambrose, Walsh, Holding, Garner,
Steyn, Donald, S. Pollock, Rabada, Philander
Barnes, Trueman, Andersen, Laker,
Imran, Wasim, Waqar,
Kumble, Ashwin,
Muralitharan, Herath,
Hadlee.

That's 28. Who am I missing? May be some of the pre-WWI bowlers? Turner and Spofforth?

 

[Days of Grace]

We are about to enter the top 30.

Who will end up in slots 21-30?

 

[Starfighter]

That's 27. Who am I missing? May be some of the pre-WWI bowlers?

Racking my brains over this one. I'm surprised Shoaib hasn't appeared though his best performances were against NZ. I wouldn't have thought Cowie would have enough wickets, nor would the opposition be quality enough for Spofforth.

We are about to enter the top 30.

Who will end up in slots 21-30?

<must resist urge to post Monty Python gif>

 

[ankitj]

It's 28 now with inclusion of Laker who I earlier missed out.

I doubt Spofforth and Turner can be ranked higher than Lohman. So other probables are Akhtar, Jadeja (!), Cowie. Unless I am missing someone very obvious.

 

[mr_mister]

Wouldn't all Spofforths matches be against 'quality opposition'? Though it's a loose term to use for that period where there were only two teams

 

[Starfighter]

Jadeja and Ashwin out to prove that the world is unfair.

 

[ankitj]

Jadeja and Ashwin out to prove that the world is unfair.

...to them

 

[Starfighter]

...to them

Were it fair they;d have played a lot more overseas and have much higher averages. And the oppo bats could actually play spin like they could from 1900 up to 2010-ish.

 

[Bolo]

Probable 30:

McGrath, Warne, Lillee, O'Reilly, Grimmett, Davidson,
Marshall, Ambrose, Walsh, Holding, Garner,
Steyn, Donald, S. Pollock, Rabada, Philander
Barnes, Trueman, Andersen, Laker,
Imran, Wasim, Waqar,
Kumble, Ashwin,
Muralitharan, Herath,
Hadlee.

That's 28. Who am I missing? May be some of the pre-WWI bowlers? Turner and Spofforth?

From later comments, Akhtar has to be there. No way on spofforth or Cowie. Jadeja seems likely. But he doesn't have many wickets, crap away, crap strike rate. Not sure about him appearing at all.

We may still see a mystery appearance or two like Yasir.

Coming up pretty soon- Herath, Davidson, Akhtar, Philander, Barnes (!!), Grimmett, Rabada, Kumble

 

[Days of Grace]

worst thing about botham, how much he sucks in cricket games.

all cricket games seem to base players ratings entirely off of their career averages and as a result botham often sucks.

he was the biggest gun slinger england has ever produced. an absolute g.

Another great thing about Ian Botham is that he is one of only two players in test cricket history to achieve a rating of 600 or more in both batting and bowling. Can you guess the other one?

 

[trundler]

Sobers certainly