The “Fab” 3

[Coronis]

Since Smith ended up being the only successful member of the Fab Four and this topic came up in another thread how do you rate the rest of the guys?

 

[GIMH]

Assuming Tests only, Root clearly the best of the three

 

[Aidan11]

Root ahead of Kohli.

 

[Red_Ink_Squid]

They're all pretty good.

Let's see when they've retired.

 

[Athlai]

From age 23-present

Tests (total)

Williamson 6739 @ 64.79
Smith 9061 @ 60.40
Root 10461 @ 52.04
Kohli 8600 @ 50.29

Tests (Away/Neutral only)

Williamson 3005 @ 56.69
Smith 4833 @ 55.55
Root 4951 @ 49.51
Kohli 4456 @ 43.68

ODI (total)

Kohli 11231 @ 62.74 SR 96
Williamson 5543 @ 52.79 SR 82
Root 5896 @ 48.87 SR 87
Smith 5013 @ 46.41 SR 87

ODI (Away/Neutral only)

Kohli 6083 @ 60.41 SR 94
Williamson 2833 @ 57.81 SR 82
Root 2857 @ 46.83 SR 84
Smith 2546 @ 37.44 SR 82


Williamson always gets stats-owned from the amount of matches he played as a very young player for a very weak nation. His figures from 23 onwards are as good or better than all of them (though I still think Smith's sheer weight of Test runs is more impressive)

I think Root/Smith/Williamson are much of a muchness in ODIs and Kohli faaaaar ahead. Root and Kohli both behind as Test bats but Kohli overall gets the nod over Root for being an ODI ATG.

 

[PlayerComparisons]

Yea I had Kane fourth in tests a few years ago but his recent form makes him clearly second

His last 3 years: 15 games - 1648 runs @ 78.47, 7 hundreds

 

[Daemon]

Root > KW > Kohli

KW’s never been good away against the top 4 nations which to me puts him below Root. I think he’s only got 3 tons against them away from home in all and he’s failed in the vast majority of such series.

Obv still a gun though and Kohli’s garbage last few years means he’s last.

 

[Athlai]

Root > KW > Kohli

KW’s never been good away against the top 4 nations which to me puts him below Root. I think he’s only got 3 tons against them away from home in all and he’s failed in the vast majority of such series.

Obv still a gun though and Kohli’s garbage last few years means he’s last.

(Age 23 onwards)
KW averages 48 vs Australia, 37 vs England, 39 vs India and 66 vs SA

54 in Aus, 29.5 in India (3 matches), 34 in England and 42 in SA (2 matches)


I think he'd improve on that India number quite a lot if given more chances.

Kane in England is genuinely the biggest hole in his record IMO. Consistently would get himself in and then give it away to ****ing Swann/Stokes or Ali

 

[Daemon]

Not the biggest fan of chopping away his worst bits - playing international cricket early in his career helped him become better. Same reason why people don’t always do it for Tendulkar. Many other players don’t start off red hot either but we don’t lop that part off.

Don’t want to get into the details of his big overseas series because of the sample size but it’s really quite lacklustre for an ATG even after you start counting from 23.

Sadly he’s not got enough of a good body of work against the best away from home. Been sample size owned and that’s just bad luck. Can’t say he’d improve his record given time and then rate him higher based on what’s essentially a forecast.

Overall phenomenal record and I think in between Root and Kohli is fair.

 

[CricAddict]

Since Smith ended up being the only successful member of the Fab Four and this topic came up in another thread how do you rate the rest of the guys?

Quite harsh to say that Smith is the only successful member of Fab four when the other three have all occupied the top 5 or at the least top 10 rankings consistently.

 

[Athlai]

Not the biggest fan of chopping away his worst bits - playing international cricket early in his career helped him become better. Same reason why people don’t always do it for Tendulkar. Many other players don’t start off red hot either but we don’t lop that part off.

Don’t want to get into the details of his big overseas series because of the sample size but it’s really quite lacklustre for an ATG even after you start counting from 23.

Sadly he’s not got enough of a good body of work against the best away from home. Been sample size owned and that’s just bad luck. Can’t say he’d improve his record given time and then rate him higher based on what’s essentially a forecast.

Overall phenomenal record and I think in between Root and Kohli is fair.

It's an unusual scheduling thing. NZ play so few Tests compared to Ind/NZ/Eng except for this brief period. It weighs far more heavily on his record than it normally would, even for the fairly unusual instance of a player getting Test matches 22 and younger.

 

[Burgey]

Root is awful. Worst of these three by a large margin. If he disowned Yorkshire, England and his own abhorrent racism, together with that ridiculous, woeful dab cut which gets him out here at the drop of a hat, I would have more time for him. Not a lot, but more.

But he won't and I don't.

 

[Flem274*]

Not the biggest fan of chopping away his worst bits - playing international cricket early in his career helped him become better. Same reason why people don’t always do it for Tendulkar. Many other players don’t start off red hot either but we don’t lop that part off.

Don’t want to get into the details of his big overseas series because of the sample size but it’s really quite lacklustre for an ATG even after you start counting from 23.

Sadly he’s not got enough of a good body of work against the best away from home. Been sample size owned and that’s just bad luck. Can’t say he’d improve his record given time and then rate him higher based on what’s essentially a forecast.

Overall phenomenal record and I think in between Root and Kohli is fair.

You're essentially marking KW down for playing earlier (and being worse earlier) than others though. He also has 2 more tons than Root in Aus from far less games.

It's pretty fair to rank KW 4th because aside from Smith being the clear best I don't think you can pick a wrong #2. I'd probably take Root at #2 right now.

England is probably his major hole, though a ton at Lord's and the WTC final performance is still decent.

 

[Athlai]

27% of Kane's Test career is before turning 23.
32% of his overall away game record is aged 20-22.

This is over 10 years ago. 10 years! 10 years ago Steve Smith was a spin bowler batting at ****ing #8

I mostly just wish we played 10-12 Tests a year so Kane would be at 130 odd Tests by now instead of still in the 90s. He probably peaked as a player when NZ play 6-7 matches a year. It's really frustrating as a NZ fan.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Williamson has continued to have poor tours to to India, Australia, SA, England even after his early years. You don't even have to look at the numbers. He's just been underwhelming in many of these away series.

Here's his away record since 2014. It's a pretty looking overall average but I don't like how much it's been pumped up by the weaker countries. The only good overseas tours he's had against good teams is australia in 2015 and a couple of uae/pakistan. Stop pretending this thing is fake ffs.

https://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/e...4;spanval1=span;template=results;type=batting

He's still better than kohli, but not as good as Root.

 

[Athlai]

He averages 54 in Australia in that timeframe and 40+ in SA ffs

 

[Prince EWS]

Assuming Tests only, Root clearly the best of the three

Should probably get Kane's consent before carrying out this activity.

 

[HouHsiaoHsien]

If Kohli gets his form back in test cricket, like he has in LOI’s, he will go past the others

 

[OverratedSanity]

Not the biggest fan of chopping away his worst bits - playing international cricket early in his career helped him become better. Same reason why people don’t always do it for Tendulkar.

It's not even the same reason. For guys like Wasim Akram, Tendulkar, etc it somewhat makes sense because they were playing cricket as teenagers when their bodies aren't even fully developed and when most of their peers are busy masturbating at home.

Williamson played 8-10 tests before turning 22 (the age at which root and kohli debuted). It's not some massive skew as is being portrayed.

 

[Athlai]

It's not even the same reason. For guys like Wasim Akram, Tendulkar, etc it somewhat makes sense because they were playing cricket as teenagers when their bodies aren't even fully developed and when most of their peers are busy masturbating at home.

Williamson played 8-10 tests before turning 22 (the age at which root and kohli debuted). It's not some massive skew as is being portrayed.

Its nearly a third of his matches played!