The same recycled argument. Away this, away that, anything to not give SC pacers extra home credit. We don't see these excuses when it comes to Kallis at home, everyone takes it at face value.
It's quite simple, are you willing to treat a SC pacers' home career as an independent achievement or not? Do you give them credit to adapting to difficult conditions or not?
No, because I don't believe it was more difficult, I believe it provided different challenges.
Does anyone say that Bumrah deserves extra credit or do they say he's a great bowler. That's because he's really good, and has performed everywhere he's played. He just has to demonstrate that he can maintain it.
Marshall had no dip of performance in Pakistan nor India. The two bowlers referenced had better performances at home that abroad, speaking to home not being more difficult, just different. It posed different problems but offered different solutions.
Lower bounce helps with more LBWs, which was the highest percentage of wickets taken at home by both. It assisted with reverse swing, which was further accentuated by the bowlers, again adding to the lbw threat. So subtracting points?, no. If they had possibly failed at home because of legitimate adverse conditions then sure, but we're subtracting points from the only place he averaged 19? All that does is further highlight the stark difference between his home and away performances.
Your counter argument again makes even less sense. So now we're adding to the averages of Indian spinners because it's easier home conditions? But that's what away tests are for, to add context and to correct imbalances. Plus were not blind, again, the context is allied and comparisons made.
That's the part you're missing, everyone factors in context. Everything is already baked in, but let's give an example.
South Africa is hard to bat in, we know this because that's where where Steyn performed much better and he wasn't as great away. We know this because that's where Smith relatively struggled, while performing better away. But even here we don't add or subtract points we view it in a wider context.
To take it further, you say we should subtract points from Imran's home average because of he had the opportunity to play elsewhere he would have flourished because of adverse conditions, but there's no proof of this because he did play in this conditions and he didn't flourish.
There's anecdotal evidence that Smith would have averaged more if he played for Australia or England and had those as home decks, because he performed better there. Show the similar evidence for Wasim or Imran.
Even ignoring the the insidious, isn't it possible that Imran's (and Wasim's) bowling style was helped by the lower bouncing, reverse swinging conditions that existed in Pakistan and didn't translate well to conditions with less natural abrasion and more bounce? He was an inswing bowler, most of the other greats, outswing. I'll say for Wasim his catching support, linger career etc were greater impedances to his numbers than his home pitches.
So again to answer, no. More emphatically, Hell No. It's all factored in and one ones subtracting anything. This is why context matters and your performances home and away matters. Neither exists in a vacuum.
