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The Greatest Test Match Batsmen Analysis Results

Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
I didn't do the profiles in this paper for some reason (possibly as the best bit of them in the other papers had been the photographs, until I realised they may have been copyrighted).

Instead I'll share a bit more detail on the results of the analysis in different categories.

NOTE THIS IS AN ANALYSIS OF 55 SELECTED LEADING PLAYERS. THE PRE-QUALIFICATION WAS CONSISTENT HEAVY RUN SCORING IN ALL REGIONS THAT THE PLAYER PLAYED TEST CRICKET.
THE 55 PLAYERS ARE LISTED IN MY SUBSEQUENT POST ON THIS THREAD.

ADJUSTED AVERAGE
1. Bradman
2. Everton Weekes
3. Ken Barrington
4. RG Pollock
5. George Headley
6. Hobbs
7. Sutcliffe
8. Sobers
9. S Smith
10. Paynter
11. Hammond
12. Hutton
13. Duleepsinhji
14. Sangakarra
15. Kallis

CONSISTENCY IN ALL CONDITIONS
1. Barrington
2. S Smith
3. G Chappell
4. Border
5. Tendulkar
6. Root
7. Dexter
8. Kallis
9. Boycott
10. Dravid
11. Kanhai
12. Damian Martyn
13. De Villiers
14. Hobbs
15. Bradman

ADJUDSTED STRIKE RATES
1. Ranjitsinhji
2. Glichrist
3. Viv
4. Weekes
5. SJ McCabe
6. RG Pollock
7. Bradman
8. Sobers
9. Lloyd
10. Lara
11. Ponting
12. Kanhai
13. S Smith
14. G Chappell
15. Nourse

OVERALL RESULTS
1. Bradman
2. Barrington
3. S Smith
4. Pollock
5. Weekes
6. Chappell
7. Hobbs
8. Sobers
9. Tendulkar
10. Kallis
11. Border
12. Headley
13. Root
14. Sutcliffe
15. Hammond
16. IVA Richards
17. Ranjitsinhji
18. Paynter
19. Hutton
20. Lara
21. Dravid
22. Kanhai
23. Sangakarra
24. Duleepsinhji
25. Ponting
26. McCabe
27. Dexter
28. Boycott
29. Gavaskar
30. De Villiers
31. Worrell
32. Inzamam
33. Younis Khan
34. Nourse
35. Martyn
36. Harvey
37. Gilchrist
38. Morris
39. Javed
40. S Waugh

LIST CORRECTED (Sorry, copied from the wrong chart)
 
Last edited:
Coronis

Coronis

International Coach
Why is Ranji at the top of adjusted strike rates? Where have you sourced this data for him? Even Charles Davis seems to have been unable to find ball by ball data for him. How does Trumper not make that list? How does Sehwag not, but Gilchrist does?
 
Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
Coronis said:
Why is Ranji at the top of adjusted strike rates? Where have you sourced this data for him? Even Charles Davis seems to have been unable to find ball by ball data for him. How does Trumper not make that list? How does Sehwag not, but Gilchrist does?
Click to expand...
You didn't think it was appropriate to give me the opportunity to address your concerns, before applying an angry smiley?
 
Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
*
"The cells shaded in a very pale grey are against players for whom there is no official recorded strike rate. For these, I had to go into their records and pull out matches where balls faced were recorded as well as runs, and calculate an average scoring rate based on those . There were 4 players (Weekes, Nourse, Headley and Ranjitsinhji) for whom there were no or almost no balls faced records. In those cases I used minutes batted, and checked the typical ratio of minutes batted/balls faced with other players of the same period for whom there was information available, and adjusted them pro rata (actually, prior to at least the 1970s, a ball a minute per batsman is a very good guide, i.e. 20 overs an hour bowled!). Although initially I was concerned that this would not be satisfactory, I’m confident that my findings are a good indication of each of these players’ scoring rates . If I had not been able to achieve that confidence then I would have abandoned the exercise and gone only with my first 2 means of assessment.
Out of interest, McCabe once scored 232 in 4 and a half hours. In his 26 innings in test cricket, Ranjitsinhji (by all accounts an astonishing player for the era) scored 175 in under 4 hours and also 154 in a shade over 3 hours.
Having established a base scoring rate/strike rate for each batsmen, I then undertook as similar exercise as was done as for the adjusted averages. I didn’t go into so much detail this time, and instead calculated the average runs per 100 balls in each decade only, as below, and applied these to the span of the batters’ careers pro rata (so if a player’s career spanned the whole of one decade and half of the next, then I calculated the adjustment factor accordingly). For information, I benchmarked these against 0.46, although the benchmark could have been anything."

*
Trumper is not one of the players I analysed. From memory (without reading the whole paper again) I was analysing those players who seemed to have a realistic shout of being amongst the greatest ever test batsmen

*It appears I didn't select Sehwag either. The players I analysed are:
KF Barrington (ENG)
SPD Smith (AUS)
GS Chappell (AUS)
AR Border (AUS)
SR Tendulkar (IND)
JE Root (ENG)
ER Dexter (ENG)
JH Kallis (SA)
G Boycott (ENG)
R Dravid (IND)
RB Kanhai (WI)
DR Martyn (AUS)
AB de Villiers (SA)
JB Hobbs (ENG)
DG Bradman (AUS)
RG Pollock (SA)
SM Gavaskar (IND)
IVA Richards (WI)
Inzamam-ul-Haq (PAK)
RT Ponting (AUS)
Younis Khan (PAK)
WR Hammond (ENG)
H Sutcliffe (ENG)
GC Smith (SA)
KC Bland (SA)
AR Morris (AUS)
EH Hendren (ENG)
SJ McCabe (AUS)
KS Ranjitsinhji (ENG)
AD Nourse (SA)
L Hutton (ENG)
ED Weekes (WI)
KS Duleepsinhji (ENG)
RN Harvey (AUS)
BC Lara (ICC/WI)
GS Sobers (WI)
FMM Worrell (WI)
SR Waugh (AUS)
AN Cook (ENG)
AC Gilchrist (AUS)
GA Headley (WI)
E Paynter (ENG)
A Flower (ZIM)
CG Greenidge (WI)
KC Sangakkara (SL)
DM Jones (AUS)
CH Lloyd (WI)
DI Gower (ENG)
Javed Miandad (PAK)
V Kohli (IND)
DR Jardine (ENG)
JL Langer (Aus)
AL Hassett (AUS)
S Chanderpaul (WI)

AHA!!!!! I know why. Because there was a pre-selection criteria of scoring well in different parts of the world.
Without looking again, I suspect Sehwag did not fulfill this criteria? (I no longer look at Cricinfo since they introduced mandatory cookies).
 
Coronis

Coronis

International Coach
Brook's side said:
*
"The cells shaded in a very pale grey are against players for whom there is no official recorded strike rate. For these, I had to go into their records and pull out matches where balls faced were recorded as well as runs, and calculate an average scoring rate based on those . There were 4 players (Weekes, Nourse, Headley and Ranjitsinhji) for whom there were no or almost no balls faced records. In those cases I used minutes batted, and checked the typical ratio of minutes batted/balls faced with other players of the same period for whom there was information available, and adjusted them pro rata (actually, prior to at least the 1970s, a ball a minute per batsman is a very good guide, i.e. 20 overs an hour bowled!). Although initially I was concerned that this would not be satisfactory, I’m confident that my findings are a good indication of each of these players’ scoring rates . If I had not been able to achieve that confidence then I would have abandoned the exercise and gone only with my first 2 means of assessment.
Out of interest, McCabe once scored 232 in 4 and a half hours. In his 26 innings in test cricket, Ranjitsinhji (by all accounts an astonishing player for the era) scored 175 in under 4 hours and also 154 in a shade over 3 hours.
Click to expand...
I would not consider this reliable at all.
 
ataraxia

ataraxia

International Coach
lmao @ this

I was going to **** on Brook's side because:
  • 2 of the 3 lists are abjectly silly criteria ("consistency in all conditions" would be fine but for the fact that it really means "consistency in average across countries")
  • The one that isn't a terrible criterion, adjusted average, has Weekes 2nd out of 55 while the accepted meta has him 20th out of 55
Then I saw that these three lists were combined with presumably equal weighting into One Definitive Ranking. :lol: Gilchrist > Ponting.
 
Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
Burgey said:
Hardly. He's got Border > Tendulkar for one, which everyone who knows the firs thing about cricket agrees on. Good starting point.
Click to expand...
I adjusted all averages based on average averages during the players' career span.

Tendulkar's adjusted average was 18th out of the 54 players I assessed.

Border's was lower, but he came 4th in consistency. His lowest country average was 37 and next lowest 45 (I disregarded countries where a player had played less than 3 matches). This is a huge factor in my scoring.
Tendulkar did come 5th in consistency.
Tendulkar came 21st in adjusted scoring rates (although Border came 48th)


Actually, I have got the list wrong. Sachin came 9th and Border 11th. I will recheck and correct the list.
 
F

Fuller Pilch

Hall of Fame Member
Burgey said:
Hardly. He's got Border > Tendulkar for one, which everyone who knows the firs thing about cricket agrees on. Good starting point.
Click to expand...
I like and improve of the bowling one that has Jack Cowie ahead of Dennis Lillee, Michael Holding, and all the Pakistani quicks.
 
Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
shortpitched713 said:
Barrington and Weekes making top 5 is nice, but then I see Pollock in that same list and I :(
Click to expand...
I know it's a small sample, but Pollock has an adjusted average of 61, which puts him 4th in that category.

His consistency scores are also very good:
Aus 57
SAfrica 68.6
England 48.5

I used 3 regions, which from memory I think were
Eng & NZ
Aus, WI, SA
Asia
The biggest scorers in consistency had high averages in all 3 zones. Pollock was missing scores in Asia, but his country scores were very high.

He also came 6th in adjusted strike rate.
 
Brook's side

Brook's side

International Regular
ataraxia said:
lmao @ this

I was going to **** on Brook's side because:
  • 2 of the 3 lists are abjectly silly criteria ("consistency in all conditions" would be fine but for the fact that it really means "consistency in average across countries")
  • The one that isn't a terrible criterion, adjusted average, has Weekes 2nd out of 55 while the accepted meta has him 20th out of 55
Then I saw that these three lists were combined with presumably equal weighting into One Definitive Ranking. :lol: Gilchrist > Ponting.
Click to expand...
It doesn't mean consistency in average across countries. It means reward is given for having a high average in all zones, and even more if in all countries. If someone averages 55 in 7 countries, they won't be marked down (in fact the opposite) if they average 80 somewhere else.

It isn't a silly criteria, it's the mark of an all round batsman, which other analyses tend to ignore.

Regards Weekes, the overall test match average up to the date of assessment was 32.03*, whereas Weekes' era average was 30.14. This gave him an adjusted average of 62.3 (from 58.6). Tendulkar's era average was 33.41, giving him an adjusted average of 51.6 (from 53.8).
Bradman's was 95.6 Barrington 61.2, Pollock 61.0, Headley 60.0, Hobbs, Sutcliffe and Sobers 59.something and S Smith 58.0.

Gilchrist and Ponting's total scores were almost identical (72.8 v 72.6). Gilchrist for some reason was one of the few players I awarded 5 bonus points???.....for...

"essentially for a consistent record of match winning or saving innings and/or for notable feats of batting bravery. I also gave the bonus to Len Hutton for playing much of his career whilst effectively partly disabled and unable to turn his wrists after an accident during the war, and to Ranjitsinhji for being arguably the first superstar of the game who drew crowds in their thousands whenever he batted, and who developed the art of batsmanship considerably."

At least my detailed and original work gave you the opportunity to laugh your ass off anyway.


* • I extracted from Cricinfo’s Statsguru database, the runs scored and wickets taken (and balls faced) in all test cricket, in each year from 1880-2019. I set these out in an Excel worksheet.
• In the worksheet I then divided the runs in each year by the wickets. Strictly this does not precisely reflect the average batting average during that year, because some unknown number of the runs were not scored by batsmen but were ‘extras’ or ‘sundries’, for example no-balls, wides, byes and leg byes. It is felt however that these numbers give a good indication of trends in batting averages, and these facts and simple calculations form the basis of the averages adjustments.
• I then set up another Excel worksheet (extract below). The first column listed each year since 1880, with one year referenced on each row. In the 2nd row I placed alongside the year reference, the average score per wicket in that year of test cricket. Along the top of the remaining rows, I put the name of each of the 55 players and underneath the name, I put the first and last year in which they played test cricket.
• In the same worksheet I then copied from the 2nd column, the runs per wicket average from each calendar year of the player’s career, under each player’s name. At the bottom of the spreadsheet, for each column I counted the number of entries, added the aggregate of the applicable yearly averages, and divided that number by the number of entries to arrive at an average test match cricket average during the player’s career. This is imperfect as I did not investigate the extent to which the player played (if at all) in any particular year of his career, however it is felt that this was an acceptable level of detail for the purposes of coming up with a weighting to reflect the period in which the player played.
• I also calculated the overall average (32.03) in test cricket up to the current date 3 August 2023.
 
Coronis

Coronis

International Coach
Brook's side said:
It doesn't mean consistency in average across countries. It means reward is given for having a high average in all zones, and even more if in all countries. If someone averages 55 in 7 countries, they won't be marked down (in fact the opposite) if they average 80 somewhere else.

It isn't a silly criteria, it's the mark of an all round batsman, which other analyses tend to ignore.

Regards Weekes, the overall test match average up to the date of assessment was 32.03*, whereas Weekes' era average was 30.14. This gave him an adjusted average of 62.3 (from 58.6). Tendulkar's era average was 33.41, giving him an adjusted average of 51.6 (from 53.8).
Bradman's was 95.6 Barrington 61.2, Pollock 61.0, Headley 60.0, Hobbs, Sutcliffe and Sobers 59.something and S Smith 58.0.

Gilchrist and Ponting's total scores were almost identical (72.8 v 72.6). Gilchrist for some reason was one of the few players I awarded 5 bonus points???.....for...

"essentially for a consistent record of match winning or saving innings and/or for notable feats of batting bravery. I also gave the bonus to Len Hutton for playing much of his career whilst effectively partly disabled and unable to turn his wrists after an accident during the war, and to Ranjitsinhji for being arguably the first superstar of the game who drew crowds in their thousands whenever he batted, and who developed the art of batsmanship considerably."

At least my detailed and original work gave you the opportunity to laugh your ass off anyway.


* • I extracted from Cricinfo’s Statsguru database, the runs scored and wickets taken (and balls faced) in all test cricket, in each year from 1880-2019. I set these out in an Excel worksheet.
• In the worksheet I then divided the runs in each year by the wickets. Strictly this does not precisely reflect the average batting average during that year, because some unknown number of the runs were not scored by batsmen but were ‘extras’ or ‘sundries’, for example no-balls, wides, byes and leg byes. It is felt however that these numbers give a good indication of trends in batting averages, and these facts and simple calculations form the basis of the averages adjustments.
• I then set up another Excel worksheet (extract below). The first column listed each year since 1880, with one year referenced on each row. In the 2nd row I placed alongside the year reference, the average score per wicket in that year of test cricket. Along the top of the remaining rows, I put the name of each of the 55 players and underneath the name, I put the first and last year in which they played test cricket.
• In the same worksheet I then copied from the 2nd column, the runs per wicket average from each calendar year of the player’s career, under each player’s name. At the bottom of the spreadsheet, for each column I counted the number of entries, added the aggregate of the applicable yearly averages, and divided that number by the number of entries to arrive at an average test match cricket average during the player’s career. This is imperfect as I did not investigate the extent to which the player played (if at all) in any particular year of his career, however it is felt that this was an acceptable level of detail for the purposes of coming up with a weighting to reflect the period in which the player played.
• I also calculated the overall average (32.03) in test cricket up to the current date 3 August 2023.
Click to expand...
I’m sure he thanks you for this extra material to laugh at too.
 
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