This Era Is Awesome

[cnerd123]

This is just a blatant flasehood.

your face is a blatant falsehood

 

[Burgey]

Just like your posts

 

[stephen]

All I'm saying is it's been far too low scoring even though the pitches have been sporting for the most part. You don't want uneven bounce on day one or SL type pitches but the batting capitulations in Dubai, Australia, England and even SA, where it's tough to bat but you get value for shots, have been hilarious. I'll take this over a world where Thilan Samaraweera averages 50, no doubt but that doesn't mean it's some sort of golden era.

I like Samaraweera but it's a farce he averages over 50.

 

[the big bambino]

This is also the era of people actually giving a **** about Associate cricket for once, Day/Night tests are a thing, and the CPL is back and running

what more do you people want

Well a few top order batsmen would be nice.

 

[Starfighter]

what more do you people want

A white ball that swings, and reverse swings. Would improve ODI cricket immensely.

 

[Smudge]

I'm sorry, but if I asked around cricket followers in NZ about how they think Nepal & the Netherlands are going, they'd politely tell me to piss off. They'd have more of a clue about 70-year-old rice-making methods in Hong Kong than the batting strength in these cricketing outposts.

 

[Gnske]

I like Samaraweera but it's a farce he averages over 50.

Thankfully, the man who by the skin of his teeth just managed to keep Matthew Wade's bowling out for six balls only ended up with an average of 48.

Thilan Samaraweera, the poor man's Adam Voges.

 

[subshakerz]

teams are now winning away from home, almost everyone has an excellent attack, almost everyone has some world class batsmen, we've got several atg batsmen and bowlers and almost every team has a couple of guys fighting for their place too. plus this is the era of neil wagner celebrations.

i did notice some sensitive australians and indians trying to project their batting woes onto everyone else in the tour thread, but i venture to suggest the australian silly ban depleted batting order is only stronger than the windies and their like. it'll look much better once smith and warner are back smashing everyone and khawaja, paine etc can fall into the support role. india wise, even nohit can make a random 50 in straya what more do you want you self absorbed cretins?

as long as i've been watching cricket people have been crying how it's secretly not a good era because everyone is bad, good players only look good because of bad players.

stop crying and enjoy it before you're left with nothing but nostalgia*

*unless you're an australian cricketer, indian cricketer, *****, overratedsanity, bijed or mushfiqur rahim. then i hope your days are wasted reading and posting bile in the news and politics subforum like mine are

This era isn't awesome, at least not yet. The rise is competitiveness between teams has masked a general decline in overall global quality of test cricket. Many of the great pacers of the 90s retired in the early 2000s and then batting took the advantage that decade. Many of the greater batters of the late 90s/2000s had retired by mid 2010s and we are at a stage where the batting globally has suffered in quality similar to what happened in early 2000s in pace bowling. While there are many promising world class pacers/spinners around and the high quality odd bat like Kohli, they arent at the ATG level yet. Steyn is only the true ATG operating now and he is shadow of himself.

Just to put the general lack of quality in perspective, when I began watching cricket in the mid-90s, there were at least three teams who to me were clearly superior to this current India no.1 (South Africa, Australia and Pakistan). Even WI at that time, considered a weaker team, would be one of the stronger teams today.

Forget even the mid-90s, almost none of the teams today in my mind are stronger than their versions in the mid-2000s. That includes India, would produced better results in the mid-2000s with a stronger batting lineup

 

[OverratedSanity]

This era isn't awesome, at least not yet. The rise is competitiveness between teams has masked a general decline in overall global quality of test cricket. Many of the great pacers of the 90s retired in the early 2000s and then batting took the advantage that decade. Many of the greater batters of the late 90s/2000s had retired by mid 2010s and we are at a stage where the batting globally has suffered in quality similar to what happened in early 2000s in pace bowling. While there are many promising world class pacers/spinners around and the high quality odd bat like Kohli, they arent at the ATG level yet. Steyn is only the true ATG operating now and he is shadow of himself.

Prime example of the bowlers aren't good because the batsmen aren't good because the bowlers aren't good because... thing that Flem is taking about.

You don't play a bowler's reputation. You play how's he's actually bowling. And there are a hell of a lot of bowlers who are bowling as well as any ATGs of the past. Cummins, Rabada, Anderson, Abbas, Bumrah, dare I say even ishant have had brilliant years where they've consistently bowled at a very high level. Whether they eventually end up ATG or not is completely irrelevant to the quality of the bowling at the moment.

If Cummins God forbid breaks his back and turns into a trundler for the remainder of his career, it doesn't somehow make him retroactively not difficult to face in 2018. I'm fine with people saying that batting standards are a tad low but the bowling attacks have been superb for a good 3-4 years now and the fact that no one seems to want to admit it grinds my gears a bit.

 

[trundler]

Yeah the bowling has been truly superb, entertaining and by all means great. Oh and another example of not playing a player's reputation is that whilst there are certainly some talented batsmen around today, batting has been woeful judging by results.

 

[vcs]

This era isn't awesome, at least not yet. The rise is competitiveness between teams has masked a general decline in overall global quality of test cricket. Many of the great pacers of the 90s retired in the early 2000s and then batting took the advantage that decade. Many of the greater batters of the late 90s/2000s had retired by mid 2010s and we are at a stage where the batting globally has suffered in quality similar to what happened in early 2000s in pace bowling. While there are many promising world class pacers/spinners around and the high quality odd bat like Kohli, they arent at the ATG level yet. Steyn is only the true ATG operating now and he is shadow of himself.

Just to put the general lack of quality in perspective, when I began watching cricket in the mid-90s, there were at least three teams who to me were clearly superior to this current India no.1 (South Africa, Australia and Pakistan). Even WI at that time, considered a weaker team, would be one of the stronger teams today.

Forget even the mid-90s, almost none of the teams today in my mind are stronger than their versions in the mid-2000s. That includes India, would produced better results in the mid-2000s with a stronger batting lineup

That '90s Pakistan team is wildly overrated. Great personnel, but some pretty average results. They lost to the likes of Zimbabwe, SL, NZ etc at home. (I know this because Robelinda has uploaded highlights from many of those series on YouTube, pure gold)

 

[OverratedSanity]

That '90s Pakistan team is wildly overrated. Great personnel, but some pretty average results. They lost to the likes of Zimbabwe, SL, NZ etc at home. (I know this because Robelinda has uploaded highlights from many of those series on YouTube, pure gold)

They lost to SL at home twice. One of the most overrated teams ever. Misbah's Pakistan were far better.

 

[subshakerz]

That '90s Pakistan team is wildly overrated. Great personnel, but some pretty average results. They lost to the likes of Zimbabwe, SL, NZ etc at home. (I know this because Robelinda has uploaded highlights from many of those series on YouTube, pure gold)

That's true (though they never lot a series against NZ at home). But weirdly they were more successful outside. They won in England and New Zealand, drew in SA, won a test in Australia. Won the Asian Test Championship.

My general point is decline in cricket standards. Compare that Pakistani side to this one.

 

[subshakerz]

They lost to SL at home twice. One of the most overrated teams ever. Misbah's Pakistan were far better.

Is that the same Misbah team that was whitewashed in SA, NZ and Australia? The 90s Pakistan team were a mess at home largely due to infighting, etc but were at least talented enough to compete overseas.

 

[subshakerz]

Prime example of the bowlers aren't good because the batsmen aren't good because the bowlers aren't good because... thing that Flem is taking about.

You don't play a bowler's reputation. You play how's he's actually bowling. And there are a hell of a lot of bowlers who are bowling as well as any ATGs of the past. Cummins, Rabada, Anderson, Abbas, Bumrah, dare I say even ishant have had brilliant years where they've consistently bowled at a very high level. Whether they eventually end up ATG or not is completely irrelevant to the quality of the bowling at the moment.

If Cummins God forbid breaks his back and turns into a trundler for the remainder of his career, it doesn't somehow make him retroactively not difficult to face in 2018. I'm fine with people saying that batting standards are a tad low but the bowling attacks have been superb for a good 3-4 years now and the fact that no one seems to want to admit it grinds my gears a bit.

I would say that bowling standards this past year have been exceptionally good. Bumrah has come into the picture, Cummins is back full force, Abbas has emerged, etc. But one year is not enough to suggest an era.

Anyways, bowling is only one side of the picture. Like I said, compare the overall strengths of the teams now with how they were in the mid-2000s, I dont think its right to call it a great era.

 

[trundler]

Shannon Gabriel was also pretty solid at home. As were the BD spinners. Regardless of the names, bowling was superb in reality.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Shannon Gabriel was also pretty solid at home. As were the BD spinners. Regardless of the names, bowling was superb in reality.

BD spinners: Taijul and others

 

[akilana]

Prime example of the bowlers aren't good because the batsmen aren't good because the bowlers aren't good because... thing that Flem is taking about.

You don't play a bowler's reputation. You play how's he's actually bowling. And there are a hell of a lot of bowlers who are bowling as well as any ATGs of the past. Cummins, Rabada, Anderson, Abbas, Bumrah, dare I say even ishant have had brilliant years where they've consistently bowled at a very high level. Whether they eventually end up ATG or not is completely irrelevant to the quality of the bowling at the moment.

If Cummins God forbid breaks his back and turns into a trundler for the remainder of his career, it doesn't somehow make him retroactively not difficult to face in 2018. I'm fine with people saying that batting standards are a tad low but the bowling attacks have been superb for a good 3-4 years now and the fact that no one seems to want to admit it grinds my gears a bit.

Few years back the leading bowlers were Steyn, Anderson, Broad, Philander, Morkel, Graeme Swan, Roundess...so I don’t see how bowling has improved from previous years. Batting wise, there aren’t many great batsman these days.
Kallis, Smith, Amla, AB, KP, Strauss, Cook, Clarke, Hussey, Sanga, Jeyawardene, Chanderpaul, Younis Khan etc were the main batsmen for teams.
Now, you have Kohli, Smith, Root, Kane, and who. There are some decent batsmen like Elgar, Mathews, Warner.. that’s about it.

Only Aus and Indian attacks have improved but the rest of the attacks around the world have gotten worse or stayed the same.

 

[randycricfreak]

All I'm saying is it's been far too low scoring even though the pitches have been sporting for the most part. You don't want uneven bounce on day one or SL type pitches but the batting capitulations in Dubai, Australia, England and even SA, where it's tough to bat but you get value for shots, have been hilarious. I'll take this over a world where Thilan Samaraweera averages 50, no doubt but that doesn't mean it's some sort of golden era.

I like Samaraweera but it's a farce he averages over 50.

What was actually wrong with Samraweera?

He played one of the best knocks by SL batsman abroad.

His 100 at Durban was one of the most influential knocks of all time IMO.

SL's only win so far in SA was Durban 2012, and Samraweera's 100 was one of the top knocks imo.

Plus he scored runs in difficult situations. He struggled in Australia, YES. But what about Jaywardena? Samraweera IMO is one of the most underrated players. He started of as an off-spinner and then became country's finest MOBs.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

I would like to think that our bowling has improved over the years:

Gabriel- average of 29.73
Holder- average of 28.50
Roach- average of 28.61