AB de Villers vs Michael Bevan vs Sachin Tendulkar

[Gob]

One of my unpopular opinions here

Lee at least as good as McGrath

 

[subshakerz]

Just because he got 2003 player of the tournament out in the first over of the final.

Man of the series in his last match in World Cup 2007.

 

[Teja.]

I think there's a problem in not recognising ATG ODI bowlers from the last fifteen years because it's hard to find that many traditionally great solo bowling performances due to how batting friendly ODI cricket has become. Performances where you take 2-50 in a 360 par match with great death bowling are not as eye catching as 5/36 in a 220 par match from the early 90s.

These are the pacers post-2010 with 100+ wickets ordered by bowling average. A lot of the below pacers apart from Starc don't get any recognition in discussions of great ODI bowlers even though they are amongst the absolute best bowlers in a terrible era for pace bowling. This seems very unfair to me.

 

[subshakerz]

One of my unpopular opinions here

Lee at least as good as McGrath

Certainly didn't seem that way when they bowling in tandem.

 

[OverratedSanity]

I think there's a problem in not recognising ATG ODI bowlers from the last fifteen years because it's hard to find that many traditionally great solo bowling performances due to how batting friendly ODI cricket has become. Performances where you take 2-50 in a 360 par match with great death bowling are not as eye catching as 5/36 in a 220 par match from the early 90s.

These are the pacers post-2010 with 100+ wickets ordered by bowling average. A lot of the below pacers apart from Starc don't get any recognition in discussions of great ODI bowlers even though they are amongst the absolute best bowlers in a terrible era for pace bowling. This seems very unfair to me.

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Bumrahs economy is incredible. Especially when you consider how much he bowls at the death.

 

[trundler]

One of my unpopular opinions here

Lee at least as good as McGrath

No

 

[ankitj]

When Lee came to bowl it always felt like some freebies will be on offer. McGrath on the other hand just asphyxiated scoring.

 

[ankitj]

Bumrahs economy is incredible. Especially when you consider how much he bowls at the death.

Starc + Bumrah would be a great combination in a hypothetical world XI.

 

[Himannv]

McGrath is the GOAT bowler in both ODIs and Tests IMO. I used to think it was Akram in ODIs and Marshall in Tests but those unenlightened days are behind me.

 

[Calm_profit]

on topic Ab de villers

 

[Chrish]

McGrath actually has the best case to be no.1 ODI bowler of all time.

Akram, McGrath and Garner should all walk in.

Wasim is GOAT odi bowler..

 

[Pap Finn Keighl]

Mate I don't care if Lara averages 4 runs more at number 3 the point being Ponting played, as you showed, thrice as much at number 3 and played many many clutch knocks certainly far more than Lara. Ponting was ahead of Lara in ODIs by the same amount Lara was ahead of Ponting in tests.

Its not just 4 runs.. Lara's SR much higher too. All these when batting was tougher than Ponting time.
Lara's top order numbers are easily better than Ponting's and 160 innings is not a small sample size either.
I consider Lara to be the 6th greatest odi batsman of alltime just ahead of Ponting at 7th.
Also Lara ranked number 1 longer than anyone bar Viv.

And
Even if you think Ponting is better than Lara, in this particular case Lara + Dhoni still makes better combination than Gilly + Ponting.

 

[Migara]

Bumrahs economy is incredible. Especially when you consider how much he bowls at the death.

Mathews says "Am I joke with the economy?"

Absolutely brilliant from him as a containing bowler. 4.6 RPO. If he was not breaking down that often . . .

 

[_00_deathscar]

Mathews says "Am I joke with the economy?"

Absolutely brilliant from him as a containing bowler. 4.6 RPO. If he was not breaking down that often . . .

Ok

 

[stephen]

Now just do the same for Tendulkar.

What would be more appropriate would be to compare Tendulkar's matches during Bevan's career. That would give a very good idea.

Bevan from 14.04.1994 to 29.02.2004: 53.6 @ 74.2 - Avg * SR -> 39.8
Tendulkar during same period: 48.1 @ 88.4 Avg * SR -> 42.5

Break down of the stats is very similar too. Tendulkar Averaged poor in NZ and Pakistan in this time (number of matches in Pakistan is only 3), and Bevan averaged poorly in SL.

This is way too simplistic of an approach, especially given their different roles. And anyway, I did era adjust Tendulkar's career to the modern era as well.

My main point here is that due to Australia playing their cricket predominantly on lower scoring grounds, the batting averages/ strike rates of their top 6 tend to be lower. You can see that when you look at their home/ away/ neutral stats.

 

[TheJediBrah]

One of my unpopular opinions here

Lee at least as good as McGrath

If we're talking ODIs, they are definitely a lot closer than people think. Lee was pretty incredible with the new ball. He could be pretty arse at the death though and was used pretty **** by Ponting sometimes which did him no favours. A decent proportion of the runs scored off him in ODIs would have been edges past/over the keeper. Very frustrating to watch.

 

[Shady Slim]

I think there's a problem in not recognising ATG ODI bowlers from the last fifteen years because it's hard to find that many traditionally great solo bowling performances due to how batting friendly ODI cricket has become. Performances where you take 2-50 in a 360 par match with great death bowling are not as eye catching as 5/36 in a 220 par match from the early 90s.

These are the pacers post-2010 with 100+ wickets ordered by bowling average. A lot of the below pacers apart from Starc don't get any recognition in discussions of great ODI bowlers even though they are amongst the absolute best bowlers in a terrible era for pace bowling. This seems very unfair to me.

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really surprised to see steyn there!! and with that economy too!! always felt as if he was a step behind in the short formats but clearly i was el wrongo

 

[TheJediBrah]

Also possible that there just wasn't that many great ODI fast bowlers in the 2010s, regardless of the conditions

 

[subshakerz]

Wasim is GOAT odi bowler..

Close, but McGrath just has a better record, including in World Cups and a tougher batting era.

 

[Pap Finn Keighl]

Close, but McGrath just has a better record, including in World Cups and a tougher batting era.

Better fielding support too.