The ATG Teams General arguing/discussing thread

[Red]

Just looked up Alderman's stats when playing in England. Average of 19, SR of 42.

What stands out most is that he took 83 wickets in England in 12 tests. At a rate of basically 7 wickets per test.

For some clarity, he took 83 wickets in 12 tests in England, but took only 68 in 20 tests in home conditions.

 

[fredfertang]

He didn't look all that special though Alderman, but he kept on taking wickets with alarming frequency - every time I got up to go and take a leak the bastard took another one - I even tried giving up drinking, but that didn't work - 'twas very strange

 

[trundler]

Too harsh on Laker for sure. Often considered the best off spinner ever to bowl with an unquestionably legitimate action, Laker was the first cricketer to win the BBC sports personality of the year award and was voted in The Cricketer magazine's World Test team of the 20th Century. As he proved in 1950 and 1956, when conditions favoured him Laker was as destructive as any bowler ever. Far from a one trick pony, he was accurate, adaptable and dynamic enough to average low 20s on the unresponsive Australian pitches and to concede less than 1.7 runs per over in South Africa.

Ken Barrington, Clyde Walcott and Bill Johnston are other potential candidates. Their stats are up with the best in history but they pretty much never get considered for all time XIs.

I thought I made a post about Walcott but it didn't post.. Weird. It's noteworthy that Walcott averaged 60 on dead home pitches and 40 away.

 

[Coronis]

I thought I made a post about Walcott but it didn't post.. Weird. It's noteworthy that Walcott averaged 60 on dead home pitches and 40 away.

All 3 W's struggled relatively away iirc.

 

[h_hurricane]

Too harsh on hayden, sehwag and laker

Replace with cook, warner and ashwin

Warner and Ashwin are not close to retirement hence miss out. Hayden and Sehwag are very good players (close to great) but an average of close to 50 flatters a bit. Cook averages only 45 and I think he was a good enough player to average than much.

Laker was indeed one of the best off spinners of all time, but was he as good as what an average of 21 suggests ? If yes, he would be making most all time 11s ahead of Warne or Murali. I thought about Kumble and Qadir, but they averaged 30 and 33 respectively and it might be a bit unfair to say they did not even deserve those averages.

Digging further, I am shocked to see that Qadir averaged 61 in Aus, 41 in Eng, close to 70 in Ind, 52 in NZ. Those are pitiful returns. Can some one throw some light on why he is rated so highly. Is it because of his bag of tricks ? He seems to be a good enough candidate to replace Laker.

 

[trundler]

All 3 W's struggled relatively away iirc.

Maybe true but Walcott has one of the biggest gaps in home and away averages ever.

 

[Starfighter]

Digging further, I am shocked to see that Qadir averaged 61 in Aus, 41 in Eng, close to 70 in Ind, 52 in NZ. Those are pitiful returns. Can some one throw some light on why he is rated so highly. Is it because of his bag of tricks ? He seems to be a good enough candidate to replace Laker.

Yes. Having fancy variations in your armoury excites people because they provide some visual evidence of genius or something like that, however when it comes down to actually playing the game having two wrong 'uns is no substitute for accuracy and consistency.

 

[Flem274*]

it's time to annoy the forum again with my seperation of evenly matched 50+ batsmen and <25 bowlers by who can add value with the other disciplines, like what happens in the real world when selecting real teams. it will annoy the proletariat even more when i say mcgrath is the goat but he doesn't make this team.

hobbs
hutton
bradman
sachin
sobers
kallis
gilchrist
imran
hadlee
marshall
warne

viv and wasim/davidson quite close to this team. viv because i think his strike rate given the license to come in at #5 or #6 would be funny and cruel, and the latter two for that handy left arm angle.

 

[bagapath]

English writers created, groomed and popularized cricket literature for decades. So performances against the England were glorified by them for years. Qadir never belonged in the category of greats except against the inept English middle order and in home conditions where the local umpires were dodgy. Indians treated him the way they always treat leg spinners, with no respect, and that is the true reflection of his abilities. His fame comes from a few English writers exaggerating his skills just because he got the wickets of some weak English batsmen again and again. Had there been good cricket writers from other countries, they would've, probably, written the counter angle challenging the English perspective which is assumed to be the truth

 

[trundler]

it's time to annoy the forum again with my seperation of evenly matched 50+ batsmen and <25 bowlers by who can add value with the other disciplines, like what happens in the real world when selecting real teams. it will annoy the proletariat even more when i say mcgrath is the goat but he doesn't make this team.

hobbs
hutton
bradman
sachin
sobers
kallis
gilchrist
imran
hadlee
marshall
warne

God I wish I could angry react to posts. Let's take this a step further:

Mitchell
Goddard
Kallis
Hammond
Miller
Sobers
Gilchrist
Botham
Imran
Hadlee
Shakib

 

[Flem274*]

God I wish I could angry react to posts. Let's take this a step further:

Mitchell
Goddard
Kallis
Hammond
Miller
Sobers
Gilchrist
Botham
Imran
Hadlee
Shakib

pretty handy team tbh, only let down by catering too much to balanced allrounders rather than greats in one field who could bring more to the table.

that would legit be such an annoying team to play against though. at least with a conventional ATG team once you're into the tail, you're into the tail depending on who got picked. and there's only going to be 4-5 main bowlers to get used to.

that team you made can just keep coming at you.

 

[Prince EWS]

it's time to annoy the forum again with my seperation of evenly matched 50+ batsmen and <25 bowlers by who can add value with the other disciplines, like what happens in the real world when selecting real teams. it will annoy the proletariat even more when i say mcgrath is the goat but he doesn't make this team.

hobbs
hutton
bradman
sachin
sobers
kallis
gilchrist
imran
hadlee
marshall
warne

I love this side tbh. I'd probably try to find a spot for Hammond, especially since history has probably been less kind to his bowling than it should have been, but aside from that I'm on board. I'm even on board with "McGrath was probably the best of all time but I'm not picking him".

 

[trundler]

pretty handy team tbh, only let down by catering too much to balanced allrounders rather than greats in one field who could bring more to the table.

that would legit be such an annoying team to play against though. at least with a conventional ATG team once you're into the tail, you're into the tail depending on who got picked. and there's only going to be 4-5 main bowlers to get used to.

that team you made can just keep coming at you.

Point taken.

Benaud in, Shakib out. Chappell in, Miller out. Proctor for Botham.

Goddard
Mitchell
Hammond
Chappell
Kallis
Sobers
Gilchrist
Proctor
Imran
Hadlee
Benaud

 

[ankitj]

Top 11 batsmen

Grace
Trumper
Hammond
Bradman
Headley
Hutton
Sobers
Pollock
Richards
Tendulkar
Lara

Kohli & Smith will be up for consideration when they retire. This list seems pretty water tight, is there anyone you can think of who could break into this echelon?

These would be my elite 11 batsmen without considering Grace who is just impossible to properly rank because he didn't play much test cricket.

Don Bradman
Sachin Tendulkar
Gary Sobers
Viv Richards
Jack Hobbs
Graeme Pollock
Brian Lara
Wally Hammond
George Headley
Len Hutton
Greg Chappell

Gavaskar just missing out. Find it hard to split him and Chapell.

 

[trundler]

I personally don't think there's much splitting Lara and Ponting tbh.

 

[trundler]

I love this side tbh. I'd probably try to find a spot for Hammond, especially since history has probably been less kind to his bowling than it should have been, but aside from that I'm on board. I'm even on board with "McGrath was probably the best of all time but I'm not picking him".

Maybe you can argue Hammond would make a better #5 or 6. Assuming you get young and aggressive Hammond.

 

[h_hurricane]

I personally don't think there's much splitting Lara and Ponting tbh.

Ponting was notoriously poor against spin. Averages 26 in India after a very big sample size. He was a better player of pace than Lara but that does not mean Lara was poor against pace. Ponting was an ATG as well but will be just outside top 10 for many.

 

[trundler]

Almost every great batsman sucked in a couple of countries. Ponting wasn't even bad against spin. It was just Harbhajan who had the wood over him bizarrely. He did well enough against Kumble and Murali. Ponting being bad against spin is a meme and no more.

 

[h_hurricane]

Ponting got dismissed 25 times in India. I am sure there are other spinners who troubled him. Harbhajan humiliated him but Kumble, Raju,Karthik, Mishra troubled him. Most great batsman have some holes in their career but Ponting has a bit more, certainly more than the top 10 batsmen ever. I would put somewhere around 12-15 in the list of ATG batsmen.

 

[Coronis]

Honestly I thought it was Ishant and Zaheer.