Imran Khan vs Shane Warne (as bowlers)

[trundler]

The past two weeks you've made it a point to come after everything I post, Subz and I have agreements but we keep it respectful and about substance while you apparently try not to. And it's always the same topic because I'm not allowed to have a different opinion about Imran than you. The only difference in my list than everyone here is no Imran or Miller, everyone's else the same.
But you make it a point to again try to shame the guy who doesn't think Imran is top 3, when outside of this site that isn't close to a consensus.
Yours doesn't include Marshall, who at least a plurality of members on this site have as the greatest ever and at worst top 2, and everyone else have included in their lists. I don't care nor would I go after you for it, because it's your ****ing list and I don't ****ing care, but for some reason I should conform to how you think, because God forbid I don't bow at the foot of your favorite player.

This doesn't change the fact that your list sucked and was inconsistent.

 

[Prince EWS]

This doesn't change the fact that your list sucked and was inconsistent.

Imagine if it did though.

 

[trundler]

Imagine if it did though.

 

[peterhrt]

Haha. CMJ and Woodcock both definitely had great cricket minds and were terrific servants of the game in their own right but certainly struggled to avoid English bias in these lists, as a lot of English journalists typically do. How the hell is John justifying Frank Woolley over Imran Khan?

John Woodcock's list was subjected to The Times' editors. Around that time the same publication had Brian Glanville's Top 100 footballers with 34 from the British Isles.

Woodcock apparently watched more Test matches than anyone, apart possibly from Benaud. English writers like Martin-Jenkins and himself also attended a lot of county cricket. The Daily Telegraph used to send reporters to every county match and readers expected analysis, not just stats and updated scores which were provided elsewhere. To many of these writers the county championship was second in importance only to The Ashes.

And when county cricket opened up to overseas players in the late 1960s, some of those players took it just as seriously, if not more so, than their Test commitments. Hadlee liked setting himself targets. His target for 1984 was the double in English domestic cricket, which hadn't been achieved since the reduction in fixtures during the 1960s. With meticulous planning he duly achieved it. Ever since he shortened his run-up, there were suspicions back in New Zealand that Hadlee was saving something for Notts. It was one of the reasons he fell out with Coney.

Commitment to the county game impressed English critics and affected their rating of cricketers. At one point during the 1980s Wisden claimed that the world's leading all-rounder was none of the famous four, but Clive Rice.

During the modern era 100 wickets by an overseas bowler in an English season commanded respect. Six of them did it twice: Procter, Bedi, Hadlee (including double in 1984), Marshall (134 wickets in 1982), Walsh and Mushtaq Ahmed. Mushtaq also took over 90 wickets in two further seasons; Hadlee, Marshall and Walsh in one. The contrast with Warwickshire skipper Bob Willis giving himself half a dozen overs with the new ball then spending the rest of the day standing in the slips was duly noted.

EW Swanton once made a case for Frank Woolley being the greatest cricketer, in that he had given more pleasure to spectators over the years than anyone else: 58959 runs (second most) at close to a run a minute, 2066 wickets and 1017 catches (144 more than nearest rival). His Test record was of secondary importance.

The old joke about Steve Waugh not being the best batsman in his own family was not a joke in Essex.

 

[The Sean]

John Woodcock's list was subjected to The Times' editors. Around that time the same publication had Brian Glanville's Top 100 footballers with 34 from the British Isles.

Woodcock apparently watched more Test matches than anyone, apart possibly from Benaud. English writers like Martin-Jenkins and himself also attended a lot of county cricket. The Daily Telegraph used to send reporters to every county match and readers expected analysis, not just stats and updated scores which were provided elsewhere. To many of these writers the county championship was second in importance only to The Ashes.

And when county cricket opened up to overseas players in the late 1960s, some of those players took it just as seriously, if not more so, than their Test commitments. Hadlee liked setting himself targets. His target for 1984 was the double in English domestic cricket, which hadn't been achieved since the reduction in fixtures during the 1960s. With meticulous planning he duly achieved it. Ever since he shortened his run-up, there were suspicions back in New Zealand that Hadlee was saving something for Notts. It was one of the reasons he fell out with Coney.

Commitment to the county game impressed English critics and affected their rating of cricketers. At one point during the 1980s Wisden claimed that the world's leading all-rounder was none of the famous four, but Clive Rice.

During the modern era 100 wickets by an overseas bowler in an English season commanded respect. Six of them did it twice: Procter, Bedi, Hadlee (including double in 1984), Marshall (134 wickets in 1982), Walsh and Mushtaq Ahmed. Mushtaq also took over 90 wickets in two further seasons; Hadlee, Marshall and Walsh in one. The contrast with Warwickshire skipper Bob Willis giving himself half a dozen overs with the new ball then spending the rest of the day standing in the slips was duly noted.

EW Swanton once made a case for Frank Woolley being the greatest cricketer, in that he had given more pleasure to spectators over the years than anyone else: 58959 runs (second most) at close to a run a minute, 2066 wickets and 1017 catches (144 more than nearest rival). His Test record was of secondary importance.

The old joke about Steve Waugh not being the best batsman in his own family was not a joke in Essex.

Woodcock also made a point in his introduction that he considered the 100 he chose to have been the "very finest" rather than objectively the "greatest" which I suppose gave him some flexibility to overload on those English cricketers who gave him so much pleasure and played the game the way he wanted it played.

As for your line "The contrast with Warwickshire skipper Bob Willis giving himself half a dozen overs with the new ball then spending the rest of the day standing in the slips was duly noted." It was a similar story in Sussex, wasn't it? From everything I have seen and read, the perception was always that John Snow put a lot more effort into bowling for England than he did for his Sussex, who I believe actually dropped him at least once for not trying hard enough.

 

[peterhrt]

As for your line "The contrast with Warwickshire skipper Bob Willis giving himself half a dozen overs with the new ball then spending the rest of the day standing in the slips was duly noted." It was a similar story in Sussex, wasn't it? From everything I have seen and read, the perception was always that John Snow put a lot more effort into bowling for England than he did for his Sussex, who I believe actually dropped him at least once for not trying hard enough.

Yes that's right. Snow made little effort to hide his lack of interest.

 

[_00_deathscar]

Under no circumstances? Really? What if he toured there raw and early in his career, got injured halfway through the second and had one final tour when he got diarrhea. 32 and 36 are not "unrealistic" averages for any bowler to have in a country lmao. No one has any idea what his numbers would've been in a hypothetical like that.

Or got a broken toenail every time he toured

 

[shortpitched713]

I'll use this as a segue to post my most nuclear current opinion:

CW simultaneously overrates people who had a minimal impact with their secondary skill (someone who batted 8 or lower or bowled <20 overs per game) while underrating cricketers who actually contribute meaningfully with bat and ball (Miller, Botham, even Cairns) just because of prettier averages for the former.

Agreed, to an extent. But Miller's numbers are very pretty.

 

[Patience and Accuracy+Gut]

1. Bradman
2. Sobers
3. Imran
4. O’Reilly
5. Marshall
6. Hobbs
7. McGrath
8. Hadlee
9. Hammond
10. Richards

 

[_00_deathscar]

I don't try to be funny. There are plenty of monkey posters here who do that.

MODS. Ban this racist!

 

[The Sean]

Further to the discussion above about the pro-England bias inherent in the rankings of CMJ and (especially) Woodcock, for the sake of balance I should point out that it isn't an exclusively English thing. The late former off-spinner and respected cricket writer Ashley Mallett picked his World XI of the 20th Century, and included six Australians - plus a seventh Aussie as 12th Man!

 

[Coronis]

Yeah there is always some sort of bias amongst these lists - whether it be nationalistic/nostalgic.

Even someone from say Canada or some place would have some sort of bias towards players they first watched/inspired them.

 

[kyear2]

This doesn't change the fact that your list sucked and was inconsistent.

Have you ever wondered though, if Imran was so universally revered and a Slam dunk top 5 player or top 10 player, why in Wisden's list Sobers got 90 votes and Imran 15? Someone pointed out that each country had 11 votes, so out of the 89 non partisan votes that Imran got 4.I know it was potentially biased and all that, but 4? My list being horrible and inconsistent basically because I didn't have Imran at 3 (and yes Sobers at 1 is a big call, but if you're possibly the 2nd best batsman ever, the greatest fielder ever and a test level bowler..., but yeah that's not set in stone) you would think that more than a handful of 100 former captains and journalists who saw him play would agree?
Spent some time reading over the last Sobers v Imran thread (which Sobers won 99 - 38 btw) and reading some of the posts was quite revealing. One asked if when Imran retired was he widely acclaimed as the best all rounder ever, or even second best? The answer was a surprising no, he was seen as one of the four of the era and not even universally the best. Hadlee was seen as the best bowler of the group and many preferred both Botham and Kapil as batsmen. That basically all of this acclaim was revisionist history and spreadsheet driven. I think Bagapath said that don't mention that he averaged 50 with the bat for a time, because he was there for most of it and his batting was "insipid" for most of his career, including the peak years.
I posted a video discussion between Chappelli and Procter (one of the greatest all rounders ever) from when Kallis retired (I think) and they were asked to name their top 5 all rounders and both rated Imran as 4th (all two had him behind Kallis btw).

Now I personally believe that Imran is a great player, I voted and advocated for him in this very poll, he makes at the very worst my 2nd XI.
Both in actual matches and these imaginary contests, I see the value in lower order batting, you always want the tail to scratch out as much runs, hopefully as quickly as possible to have more time to bowl out the opposition, or even hold on for a draw if that's the best case scenario. But not at the expense of their primary skill. Additionally I also see the value in slip catching, and nothing is more demoralizing to a team that to create opportunities to see the the ball on the ground.
Now where you and I split is that I (and outside of Peterhrt, only I) believe slip fielding is a more valuable skill than lower order batting. Not terribly more so, but it ranks above for me. That added to than a bowling all rounder is at best an ATG batsman and an average to mediocre test batsman, while a Sobers or Hammond is an ATG batsman and ATG in the second discipline as well.

So the fact that you seek to invalidate my list and opinions because it's idiocy, blasphemy or shame worthy to not have Imran in any top three is no where near the universal certainty and disqualifying posture that you believe that it is.

But carry on.

 

[Adorable Asshole]

I think Bagapath said that don't mention that he averaged 50 with the bat for a time, because he was there for most of it and his batting was "insipid" for most of his career, including the peak years.

I think Sobers is a better allrounder than Imran but this is just wrong and has been debunked countless times

All-round records | Test matches | Cricinfo Statsguru | ESPNcricinfo.com

stats.espncricinfo.com

 

[The Sean]

Have you ever wondered though, if Imran was so universally revered and a Slam dunk top 5 player or top 10 player, why in Wisden's list Sobers got 90 votes and Imran 15? Someone pointed out that each country had 11 votes, so out of the 89 non partisan votes that Imran got 4.I know it was potentially biased and all that, but 4? My list being horrible and inconsistent basically because I didn't have Imran at 3 (and yes Sobers at 1 is a big call, but if you're possibly the 2nd best batsman ever, the greatest fielder ever and a test level bowler..., but yeah that's not set in stone) you would think that more than a handful of 100 former captains and journalists who saw him play would agree?

Just on this, every country very much didn't get 11 votes. As per Wisden themselves:

" To reflect the pattern of cricket history, we established an electorate of 100, from all nine Test-playing countries but weighted to reflect each country's role in international cricket over the century, judged - very roughly - on the number of Tests played. So there were 28 English voters, 20 from Australia and so on down the line to just one from Zimbabwe. "

EDIT - I checked up on the full voter allocation and it was as follows:

28 England
20 Australia
11 South Africa
11 West Indies
10 India
8 New Zealand
8 Pakistan
3 Sri Lanka
1 Zimbabwe

 

[subshakerz]

Have you ever wondered though, if Imran was so universally revered and a Slam dunk top 5 player or top 10 player, why in Wisden's list Sobers got 90 votes and Imran 15? Someone pointed out that each country had 11 votes, so out of the 89 non partisan votes that Imran got 4.I know it was potentially biased and all that, but 4? My list being horrible and inconsistent basically because I didn't have Imran at 3 (and yes Sobers at 1 is a big call, but if you're possibly the 2nd best batsman ever, the greatest fielder ever and a test level bowler..., but yeah that's not set in stone) you would think that more than a handful of 100 former captains and journalists who saw him play would agree?
Spent some time reading over the last Sobers v Imran thread (which Sobers won 99 - 38 btw) and reading some of the posts was quite revealing. One asked if when Imran retired was he widely acclaimed as the best all rounder ever, or even second best? The answer was a surprising no, he was seen as one of the four of the era and not even universally the best. Hadlee was seen as the best bowler of the group and many preferred both Botham and Kapil as batsmen. That basically all of this acclaim was revisionist history and spreadsheet driven. I think Bagapath said that don't mention that he averaged 50 with the bat for a time, because he was there for most of it and his batting was "insipid" for most of his career, including the peak years.
I posted a video discussion between Chappelli and Procter (one of the greatest all rounders ever) from when Kallis retired (I think) and they were asked to name their top 5 all rounders and both rated Imran as 4th (all two had him behind Kallis btw).

Now I personally believe that Imran is a great player, I voted and advocated for him in this very poll, he makes at the very worst my 2nd XI.
Both in actual matches and these imaginary contests, I see the value in lower order batting, you always want the tail to scratch out as much runs, hopefully as quickly as possible to have more time to bowl out the opposition, or even hold on for a draw if that's the best case scenario. But not at the expense of their primary skill. Additionally I also see the value in slip catching, and nothing is more demoralizing to a team that to create opportunities to see the the ball on the ground.
Now where you and I split is that I (and outside of Peterhrt, only I) believe slip fielding is a more valuable skill than lower order batting. Not terribly more so, but it ranks above for me. That added to than a bowling all rounder is at best an ATG batsman and an average to mediocre test batsman, while a Sobers or Hammond is an ATG batsman and ATG in the second discipline as well.

So the fact that you seek to invalidate my list and opinions because it's idiocy, blasphemy or shame worthy to not have Imran in any top three is no where near the universal certainty and disqualifying posture that you believe that it is.

But carry on.

There are few reasons Imran's peer rating isn't as higher:

- He was one of four of the era and hence the acclaim was split, with Botham getting much of the earlier plaudits and many commentators are begrudging on giving Imran his full due at Botham's expense

- Imran was clearly the best bowler in the world in the early 80s but injury cut his pace peak short before he could get higher acclaim. By the time he returned, Marshall had taken the mantle even though Imran was about as successful.

- Imran tends to get recognized as a captain first, often overshadowing even his bowling exploits

- Imran's batting wasn't the bombastic or stylish variety of other top all-rounders like Botham, Sobers, Miller, and goes under the radar.

 

[The Sean]

Further to the discussion above about the pro-England bias inherent in the rankings of CMJ and (especially) Woodcock, for the sake of balance I should point out that it isn't an exclusively English thing. The late former off-spinner and respected cricket writer Ashley Mallett picked his World XI of the 20th Century, and included six Australians - plus a seventh Aussie as 12th Man!

Actually just thinking about this and realised that Bradman's all-time team was even more extreme - seven Aussies in the XI!

 

[kyear2]

There are few reasons Imran's peer rating isn't as higher:

- He was one of four of the era and hence the acclaim was split, with Botham getting much of the earlier plaudits and many commentators are begrudging on giving Imran his full due at Botham's expense

- Imran was clearly the best bowler in the world in the early 80s but injury cut his pace peak short before he could get higher acclaim. By the time he returned, Marshall had taken the mantle even though Imran was about as successful.

- Imran tends to get recognized as a captain first, often overshadowing even his bowling exploits

- Imran's batting wasn't the bombastic or stylish variety of other top all-rounders like Botham, Sobers, Miller, and goes under the radar.

That's all good to know, but that wasn't my point. My point is that he's not nor hasn't been the automatic top 3 player that Trundler believes he is.
The man is one of the greatest players who ever lived, but it's not a crime or disqualifying to have a list that doesn't include him at the very top, and he should stop pretending like that's the case. He free to believe it if he wants, but stop acting like it's gospel.

 

[trundler]

That's all good to know, but that wasn't my point. My point is that he's not nor hasn't been the automatic top 3 player that Trundler believes he is.
The man is one of the greatest players who ever lived, but it's not a crime or disqualifying to have a list that doesn't include him at the very top, and he should stop pretending like that's the case. He free to believe it if he wants, but stop acting like it's gospel.

You keep bringing up peer reputation as an argument but you don't believe Lillee and Akram are the greatest ever so it's very much cherry picking. You asserted that Imran should be a top 3 player previously but "isn't" when that's literally the opposite of CW consensus. Having Sobers over Bradman but then leaving out the GOAT bowling all rounder is a hilarious contradiction. If you didn't have either in the list and truly prioritised specialists (Murali didn't even make the list) I wouldn't have a problem. So yeah leaving Imran out is as ridiculous as not having Marshall in your top 3 quicks and you should feel bad. The bloke that thinks Hayden is better than Tendulkar can't catch a break for it either. Ridiculous opinions should be ridiculed by definition

 

[trundler]

Anyway, more lists have been posted in this thread and they're all valid too. Except the first one obviously.