The ATG Teams General arguing/discussing thread (white ball edition)

[jimmy101]

West Indies ODI ATXI

Gordon Greenidge
Chris Gayle
Vivian Richards
Brian Lara
Clive Lloyd*
Carl Hooper
Shai Hope+
Malcolm Marshall
Curly Ambrose
Michael Holding
Joel Garner

A few tough decisions here. I could go either way on Haynes/Gayle to partner Greenidge, but the brute power of tha Universe Boss swayed it for me (would put him in charge of all media commitments as well). The middle order wasn't all that difficult to select. I went with Hoops at #6 as I always admired his big hitting, plus along with Viv & tha Universe Boss, the three of them could squeeze out 10 overs of spin.

Hope's selection might surprise a few people, but he's been killing it in ODI's lately. I also feel the bowling attack was pretty straight forward, with Ian Bishop probably the bloke who is unluckiest to miss out.

 

[mr_mister]

After facing McGrath, Garner, Akram and Saqlain, facing Symonds? Batsmen will be licking their lips. Doesn't cut it. Sorry. I personally won't even take someone like Klusener because bowling attack of an ATG attack should be relentless not "adequate".

So who's a relentless 5th bowling option you can stuff in the top 7 who will be better than adequate with the bat?

 

[sunilz]

Kapil Dev or Flintoff. Both were very hard to go after as suggested by their economy rate. And both could be explosive with the bat if needed for 4 to 5 overs .

 

[stephen]

Kapil Dev or Flintoff. Both were very hard to go after as suggested by their economy rate. And both could be explosive with the bat if needed for 4 to 5 overs .

Flintoff fits the bill better I think. Kapil for an AT side is not good enough to bat top 7. He was basically Afridi level with the bat. Sometimes he would pay off and often he wouldn't. Klusener/Symonds were both several classes up with the bat.

 

[stephen]

West Indies ODI ATXI

Gordon Greenidge
Chris Gayle
Vivian Richards
Brian Lara
Clive Lloyd*
Carl Hooper
Shai Hope+
Malcolm Marshall
Curly Ambrose
Michael Holding
Joel Garner

A few tough decisions here. I could go either way on Haynes/Gayle to partner Greenidge, but the brute power of tha Universe Boss swayed it for me (would put him in charge of all media commitments as well). The middle order wasn't all that difficult to select. I went with Hoops at #6 as I always admired his big hitting, plus along with Viv & tha Universe Boss, the three of them could squeeze out 10 overs of spin.

Hope's selection might surprise a few people, but he's been killing it in ODI's lately. I also feel the bowling attack was pretty straight forward, with Ian Bishop probably the bloke who is unluckiest to miss out.

In recent times I've changed my mind on the openers. Personally Gayle is first pick. He's one of the best ODI openers ever and we kinda forget it because he can't run any more because he's so old. I'd pick Haynes to partner him, who I always felt was better at ODIs.

 

[h_hurricane]

Flintoff fits the bill better I think. Kapil for an AT side is not good enough to bat top 7. He was basically Afridi level with the bat. Sometimes he would pay off and often he wouldn't. Klusener/Symonds were both several classes up with the bat.

Best value at no.7 lies in how consistently you can get quickfire 20s, 30s and 40s. Kapil was a master in doing that. For instance in 1992 WC, some of his scores were 21(21), 35(26), 33(22), 42(29). Of course he had the ability to blast hundreds coming in at 6/30 as Zimboks figured out in 1983 WC or against SA in that Port Elizabeth test match.

There is no comparison with Afridi as Kapil is a country mile better as a bowler.

Symonds will be wasted as a batsman at no.7. You won't be needed to bat more than 8-10 overs 80% of the time. His part-time spin or slow medium pace will be exposed every single match if you rely on him to bowl 8-10 overs.

 

[ankitj]

So who's a relentless 5th bowling option you can stuff in the top 7 who will be better than adequate with the bat?

Imran or Flintoff. Latter has better bowling record than most realize. Kapil and Pollock will weaken the batting so disqualified.

 

[ankitj]

Although Kapil was chosen in the ATG ODI XI by cw. So the forum rates him higher than I do.

 

[sunilz]

Imran Khan is simply unsuited for no.7 role as ODI batsman. His SR is very low for a lower order batsman.

 

[h_hurricane]

If equal weightage is given to average and strike rate and a metric (Batting avg * SR)/ (Bowling avg * economy rate) is used, below is the metric for the five allrounders discussed here.

Andrew Flintoff - 1.59
Lance Klusener - 1.58
Imran Khan - 1.40
Kapil Dev - 1.33
Andrew Symonds - 1.18

Flintoff has the best stats. He retired very early, I am not sure how his stats would have looked if he had played another 3-4 years. Still would be mighty impressive one could bet.

Klusener too has impressive stats. Retired(or rather dumped) early like Flintoff. Winning a WC or an ICC Championship trophy would have strengthened his legacy imo.

Kapil and Imran are the best ODI allrounders for me. Won multiple global or near global tournaments (Kapil - 1983 WC, 1985 WCC, 1993 Hero Cup Imran - 1992 WC, 1989 Nehru Trophy) and played crucial roles in them when it mattered. Great longevity of 15+ years as well.

Symonds has great stats and was part of many WC victories. He really should be batting at no.5 or 6 though(find place in my second ATG XI) and shouldn't be bowling ahead of better options.

 

[stephen]

After facing McGrath, Garner, Akram and Saqlain, facing Symonds? Batsmen will be licking their lips. Doesn't cut it. Sorry. I personally won't even take someone like Klusener because bowling attack of an ATG attack should be relentless not "adequate".

Well you also have Viv who can contribute a few overs as well.

The problem that I have with selecting your fifth bowler based on their bowling rather than batting ability is that there's 10-20 overs in ODI cricket where taking wickets is nigh on impossible.

 

[sunilz]

Symonds averaged around 20@ 6/7 batting position. Why are we discussing him for first XI ? Unless you consider him a better batsman than Dhoni/ Bevan , he is simply misfit for first XI

 

[OverratedSanity]

Symonds and Kapil both horribly overrated here for different reasons. Symonds' bowling is nowhere near good enough for an ATG xi. Klusener I'm willing to buy as good enough, atlesst way better suited to that than Symonds.

And Kapil averaged ****ing 23. In an era where he played 60 over games, that strike rate was probably useless when there were so many overs to bat through and the dude would slog 30(20) and get out.

 

[Red]

Symonds averaged around 20@ 6/7 batting position. Why are we discussing him for first XI ? Unless you consider him a better batsman than Dhoni/ Bevan , he is simply misfit for first XI

Firstly, you're wrong. He averaged over 30 in the 6/7 batting positions.

Secondly, isolating batting position stats in ODI is pretty dumb. If you're batting at 7 it's more likely you're going to have to come in and accelerate immediately, which is gonna effect average.

Nonetheless, since you bought it up, he averaged 41 at a SR of 101 at #6. So, yeh.

 

[sunilz]

Gilchrist/Rohit
Sachin
Richards
Kohli
Devilliers
Dhoni/Bevan
Symonds ( ???)

No way is Symonds batting above 7 in the above ODI team.And he averages 20 there. It is better to have a bowling all rounder in that team. He is simply wasting a spot in that team.

 

[Migara]

I hate to be the guy who wants Dilhara Fernando in his ATG white ball SL team. Freaking guy was lethal...better than Pushpakumara.

The deliveries he produced to get top batsmen were Marshall esque. In the middle of it he bowled utter tripe. However there was a couple of seasons he was very quick, touching 150k, and looked very good in those two years.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Symonds averaged around 20@ 6/7 batting position. Why are we discussing him for first XI ? Unless you consider him a better batsman than Dhoni/ Bevan , he is simply misfit for first XI

I know it's sunilz but just thought I'd point out that this is a really stupid thing to say. Of course he averaged poorly at no. 6/7, he played there early in his career when he was no where near as good as he was for most of it. When he became good he batted almost exclusively at no. 5. Extrapolating that to assume that he would bat significantly worse at 6/7 than he would at 5 is not accurate.

 

[Migara]

West Indies ODI ATXI

Gordon Greenidge
Chris Gayle
Vivian Richards
Brian Lara
Clive Lloyd*
Carl Hooper
Shai Hope+
Malcolm Marshall
Curly Ambrose
Michael Holding
Joel Garner

A few tough decisions here. I could go either way on Haynes/Gayle to partner Greenidge, but the brute power of tha Universe Boss swayed it for me (would put him in charge of all media commitments as well). The middle order wasn't all that difficult to select. I went with Hoops at #6 as I always admired his big hitting, plus along with Viv & tha Universe Boss, the three of them could squeeze out 10 overs of spin.

Hope's selection might surprise a few people, but he's been killing it in ODI's lately. I also feel the bowling attack was pretty straight forward, with Ian Bishop probably the bloke who is unluckiest to miss out.

A second XI

Desmond Haynes
Phil Simmons (5)
Richie Richardson (c)
Ramnarsh Sarwan
Shivnarine Chanderpaul
Marlon Samuels (6)
Dwayne Bravo (4)
Jason Holder (3)
Ridley Jacobs (wk)
Ian Bishop (2)
Courtney Walsh (1)

 

[Migara]

So who's a relentless 5th bowling option you can stuff in the top 7 who will be better than adequate with the bat?

Kallis, Kapil, Imran, Klusener and Shakib.

If you are looking to fit the definition then Kallis / Shakib

 

[Daemon]

Yeah, I think he'd be a fair bit better. But of course this is the ATG team we're talking about so we probably shouldn't be picking players based on how we think they'd go in a position they didn't really play in.