CW's Ranking of Batsmen (Tests)

[CricAddict]

I am not actually sure if Kohli will get into top 50.

 

[PlayerComparisons]

I am not actually sure if Kohli will get into top 50.

Look Kohli/Root/Williamson are great players but its kinda hard to rank them right now, so I'd rather vote for the retired greats at the moment. I have no doubt they will make like top 30 by the time they retire though. Kohli or Root could possibly sneak into the top 50 though.

 

[Nikhil99.99]

Stan McCabe

 

[OverratedSanity]

Flower

 

[Fuller Pilch]

It might be good to do a separate openers' poll after this one. It is perhaps the hardest job in the game and it seems this list is dominated too much by middle order players.

 

[HookShot]

He's a great player but no lmao

Well about the same time that Steve Smith was learning how use to use sand-paper Virat Kohli was guiding India to its longest ever unbeaten streak of 19 Test matches, and scoring 1784 runs at 64 runs per innings while doing it.

Plus he scored those runs in classic style without the need to wander all over the crease. Only in his dreams could Smith hit a cover-drive that looks this good.....

 

[Fuller Pilch]

Well about the same time that Steve Smith was learning how use to use sand-paper Virat Kohli was guiding India to its longest ever unbeaten streak of 19 Test matches, and scoring 1784 runs at 64 runs per innings while doing it.

Plus he scored those runs in classic style without the need to wander all over the crease. Only in his dreams could Smith hit a cover-drive that looks this good.....

1,784 runs in 19 tests at 64 is okay, but it is hardly a long streak/peak. That's pretty similar to Joe Root's 2021 year (England obviously play a stupidly high no of tests, but never mind).

Williamson has averaged about 64 since the start of 2014. 5,478 runs at 63.69 in 57 tests (20 100s) while developing a team that is better than Kohli's India.

 

[Coronis]

Sure Smith has the better average but Kohli is equally as good, if not better.

Perfect technique, great to watch, high impact, all class.

I’ve often thought a perfect technique equates to a 10 point average difference.

 

[PlayerComparisons]

Williamson has averaged about 64 since the start of 2014. 5,478 runs at 63.69 in 57 tests (20 100s) while developing a team that is better than Kohli's India.

You'd think Williamson was averaging like 60 away from home like Smith with an average like that, but its pretty inflated by his average of 74 at home where batting conditions are pretty easy. His away stats are better during this time though so I guess you could genuinely make a case for Williamson over Kohli. Roots away stats are just as good though and better against the top teams. His only crime is that he averages like 53 instead of 74 at home where batting conditions are pretty tough and he usually comes in as an opener against very good fast bowlers.

Not sure I agree with removing parts of their career though when comparing them. It's going to be really interesting to see how they all do during the next 5 years.

 

[PlayerComparisons]

Plus he scored those runs in classic style without the need to wander all over the crease. Only in his dreams could Smith hit a cover-drive that looks this good.....

You have a good point. Scoring runs in classic style does make up for a difference in overall average of 10 and a difference in away average of 15.

 

[PlayerComparisons]

Simpson

Let's get the openers in. Greenidge and G.Smith next.

 

[HookShot]

You have a good point. Scoring runs in classic style does make up for a difference in overall average of 10 and a difference in away average of 15.

Well that's what many Australian commentators thought after having watched both Trumper and Bradman bat. And there ended up being about a 60 point difference.

I also feel the same way about David Gower and Chanderpaul. Chanderpaul's average was over 50 and Gower's under 45, and both were left-handers; but I still reckon that Gower was the better batsman, and the player I'd much rather watch.

Cricket is just as much an art form as it is a sport, so aesthetics play a major part.

 

[Burgey]

The Trumper > Bradman myth was largely perpetrated by Jack Fingleton, who hated Bradman and went to the point of writing a book about it in which he drew some ridiculously long bows. IIRC he was the one who started the idea that Trumper would make a ton then get out deliberately because he was some sort of decent bloke or whatever.

 

[Burgey]

I think it's 56, but that might (?) be reduced due to 1978.

Batted in the middle order in 78 iirc.

 

[Spark]

Well that's what many Australian commentators thought after having watched both Trumper and Bradman bat. And there ended up being about a 60 point difference.

I also feel the same way about David Gower and Chanderpaul. Chanderpaul's average was over 50 and Gower's under 45, and both were left-handers; but I still reckon that Gower was the better batsman, and the player I'd much rather watch.

Cricket is just as much an art form as it is a sport, so aesthetics play a major part.

There's a huuuuuge difference between negating a difference an average of 7 runs per completed innings between players who played in totally different eras (and in particular when the higher-averaging player mostly played in the most batting friendly era in generations) and a 10 run an innings difference between two players whose careers are more or less contemporaneous and when actual performances home and away correlate with the raw statistics (by which I mean Smith has the big away series performances to back up his output).

It's fine to say "I prefer this player because I like watching him bat more". But "I think this player is actually better (despite every piece of actual evidence pointing decisively otherwise) because I like watching him bat more" is ridiculous and a species of punditry that needs to just die already. This is elite level competitive sport; the point is to excel competitively. The "art form" is a very very distant second; if you just want aesthetics then Netflix is always available.

 

[HookShot]

The Trumper > Bradman myth was largely perpetrated by Jack Fingleton, who hated Bradman and went to the point of writing a book about it in which he drew some ridiculously long bows. IIRC he was the one who started the idea that Trumper would make a ton then get out deliberately because he was some sort of decent bloke or whatever.

Bradman never really understood Trumper's genius. He would ask the likes of Alan Kippax and Arthur Mailey why they thought so highly of him. "How can you speak so glowingly of a batsman who averaged 39?"

Cardus saw both Trumper and Bradman at their best, but he maintained that you could not compare a batsman or a bowler purely on figures alone. Perhaps it was Cardus who could have best answered Bradman's question. "I am concerned with Trumper as an artist, not as a scorer of match-winning runs," he wrote. "You will no more get an idea of the quality of Trumper's batsmanship by adding up his runs than you will get an idea of the quality of Shelley's poetry by adding up the number of lines written by Shelley."

Never another like Victor

Trumper the cricketer was a genius, Trumper the man touched Australia's collective soul

www.espncricinfo.com

 

[Burgey]

Yes, but keep in mind Cardus also thought Bradman should be more aggressive from the get go and trade run scoring for entertaining.

Also keep in mind Jack Fingleton came a long a lot earlier than Ashley Mallett. The fact Mallett kept the myth going doesn't detract from Fingleton getting it going to start with.

 

[Xix2565]

I do wonder, just how much credit/criticisms should modern Test bats get for playing now, with all the changes that have affected batting at the present? Not just with regards to Fab4 placements in this ranking but in general. Same would apply to bowlers, but that's for other threads.

 

[Line and Length]

The negativity towards Bradman stems from a number of factors.

In the case of Cardus, Bradman declined his invitation to dinner and Cardus may have felt slighted.

Bradman's Freemasonry clashed with the likes of Fingleton who was a Roman Catholic. Fingleton also was prepared to accept Bodyline and Greg Growden's book "The Man Who Stood up to Bradman" explains this and other differences.

There were many who criticised Bradman's lack of war service with players such as Keith Miller sometimes taunting him in this regard. This is well documented in Malcolm Knox's excellent book "Bradman's War".

In South Australia there was a stigma about his name in the business community following his involvement in the collapsed HW Hodgetts stockbroking firm. "People accused Bradman of stealing the goodwill of the company and basically they were right," said Tom Phillips, a former long-serving Adelaide stock exchange president.

However, there can be no denying Bradman's enormous talents as a batsmen, and many criticisms might fall under the "tall poppy syndrome".

 

[HookShot]

There's a huuuuuge difference between negating a difference an average of 7 runs per completed innings between players who played in totally different eras (and in particular when the higher-averaging player mostly played in the most batting friendly era in generations) and a 10 run an innings difference between two players whose careers are more or less contemporaneous and when actual performances home and away correlate with the raw statistics (by which I mean Smith has the big away series performances to back up his output).

It's fine to say "I prefer this player because I like watching him bat more". But "I think this player is actually better (despite every piece of actual evidence pointing decisively otherwise) because I like watching him bat more" is ridiculous and a species of punditry that needs to just die already. This is elite level competitive sport; the point is to excel competitively. The "art form" is a very very distant second; if you just want aesthetics then Netflix is always available.

“No matter how many runs Bradman makes, Vic Trumper’s name comes up time and again, and his great deeds are discussed. He took a hold on the hearts and minds of the people in England as no other batsman has done.” - CB Fry

For the most part, admiration for Vic Trumper was because of Vic Trumper himself rather than due to any great antipathy toward Bradman, although there were obviously a few vocal detractors.

Point is, people from every culture recognise genius when they see it which is why a German from Munich could watch Brian Lara bat and work-out that he is an all-time-great batsman.

Personally, I watched Virat Kohli bat quite a lot during his tours to Australia and concluded that he was one of the absolute best because of the way he played some of the best bowlers in my life-time, on their home turf - Harris, Johnson, Cummins, Hazlewood, Stark, Lyon etc.

And the stats back me up.....

From 2012 to 2019 Kohli scored 1352 runs over 13 Test matches at an average of 54.08; and all at a strike rate of 53.14

Could Steve Smith have done any better? Probably, possibly. (Joe Root and Kane Williamson certainly didn’t). But we’ll never know.

But I do know that Kohli’s skill is on a par with Smith and I’m not going to pigeon hole him with some raw numbers like some boring accountant.