Best Attack

[reyrey]

That's actually where Imran and Hadlee have potentially the most value. Just sticking around as Sobers or Gilly take attack apart. Can't believe Kyear can't see this.

Also if Sobers or Gilly get out after getting some runs then Imran or Hadlee who would have already played themselves in can continue the offensive.

 

[kyear2]

The objection is not to the quality/compatibility of the bowlers. It's the fact that you are going in short the equivalent of a bat by picking them. You don't like it when people go in short a bat by picking 5 bowlers. Why are you happy losing a comparable amount of quality in batting by picking bowlers who can't bat?

This is the perfect post to highlight how diametrically apart we are on the issue.

I don't have an issue with striving to achieve balance, but that's not what your objective is.

You are selecting a bowling attack, whose primary job is to take 20 wickets. Yet your opening statement intimates that it's less important to find the best combination, than it is to find the combination that can score the most runs.

I cannot be the only person who finds that to be absolutely insane.

This is crazy to me, I'm not making this about names, but listen to what you're proposing.
The primary job for your no. 6 is batting, but you also want someone who can contribute with the ball. The primary job of I through 11 is to bowl out the opposition.

But you literally want to base your selection of the no. 6 purely on their bowling, actively removing an ATG batsman from the scenario for someone who will hardly bowl and at best an average test batsman.
And then for the guys who's actual job is to take wickets, you want to select them based on batting.

The reasoning, two lower order batsmen, who are down there because they aren't good batsmen, will consistently out produce an ATG batsman.
I would like to have someone tell me how many match winning hundreds Imran, Hadlee and even Pollock have combined. The empty stats obsession is totally out of hand.

The reason their averages are so low is because they are unreliable, considerably more so than regular, far less ATG batsmen. When they do score, it's primarily in favorable conditions and piling on. Yet in this kind of scenario, you believe they will be consistent and impactful. Yes, the gods of batting will struggle, but they will somehow strive and be scoring runs.

Respectfully quality trump's quantity Sir.

As someone mentioned a few posts above, they could possibly understand Steyn over Imran, but not McGrath over Hadlee, so why not do like Coronis and choose both. You get easily the best 3 bowlers and the viable no. 8. It's not my preference but at least it makes sense and the best compromise of bowling and batting acumen.

But to think that we're chosing a bowling attack that will have to bowl out an equally strong opponent and to think that chosing the best bowlers is secondary to chosing which are better batsmen is not only counter initiative, but compromising the attack in a match they can't win unless you take 20 wickets.

Not to add, you're not going to get any thing close to consistent or impactful production from them. They are lower order batsmen, think we've convinced ourselves that they come in every innings and will score a solid 30, they're not.

The favorable conditions aren't going to exist here, and when they do, the top 6 will make the most of these situations. Remember them? Hobbs, Bradman, Tendulkar, Sobers, Richards? What you'll conveniently omit is that lower order batting has predominantly featured in teams with inconsistent or poor middle orders, again, not the case here. With the lineup we have, there's no need to not chose the best bowlers. Compromise to get a viable no 8 who's / once of equal quality, I can acquiesce to that in a selection meeting.

Marshall and McGrath are opening though...

 

[kyear2]

The story came from an old TV debate about all-rounders. Wasim argued that the physical strain of being a regular all-rounder was not widely understood and that it was virtually impossible to bat for long periods without a detrimental effect on one's bowling.

Mike Procter offered an alternative view that when not fit to bowl his batting suffered because he felt under more pressure to score runs.

Wasim made a persuasive case that the all-rounder who always wanted to be in the game could harm his team's chances, especially if he were captain.

I 100% believe this. You either manipulate the batting orders to suit you or over bowl yourself. Which then is a detriment to your batting and the team.

 

[subshakerz]

I 100% believe this. You either manipulate the batting orders to suit you or over bowl yourself. Which then is a detriment to your batting and the team.

Which ARs are you talking about who did this? Botham and Miller?

 

[kyear2]

Also if Sobers or Gilly get out after getting some runs then Imran or Hadlee who would have already played themselves in can continue the offensive.

How often do you think Imran and Hadlee scored critical runs to win tests? How many of the hundreds or fifties win matches?

How consistent do you think they were from a match to match basis?

And on a strong team where you already have the best batting line up ever assembled, and you have to make a sacrifice for the bowling selections, the bowlers who you are relying on to win the match by taking 20 wickets, you're more willing to make that sacrifice on their batting or bowling?

 

[subshakerz]

You are selecting a bowling attack, whose primary job is to take 20 wickets. Yet your opening statement intimates that it's less important to find the best combination, than it is to find the combination that can score the most runs.

You are strawmanning his position.

We can equally say that that primary job of your batting lineup is to score runs, so therefore we should ignore a 5th bowler option like Kallis.

We can say that the primary job of your wicketkeeper is to take catches, so therefore we should ignore a keeper bat like Gilly.

We don't do that because we acknowledge a role for secondary roles. Having a no.8 who can bat is a perfectly respectable position. It is time you made peace with it.

Many if not most of us are not comfortable with four bunnies in the tail that will will likely be blown away in most innings in a high stakes ATG game the way you are.

 

[subshakerz]

How often do you think Imran and Hadlee scored critical runs to win tests? How many of the hundreds or fifties win matches?

Kyear2, you are a seasoned cricket watcher, you are setting up an unreasonable standard for bowling ARs here if you expect them to have to win games from batting no.7 or 8. You yourself know that clutch situations where lower order runs are the determining winning factor will be rarer than down the order, but still significant enough that over the course of a career.

I would say in the latter half of Imran's career he was fairly consistent with the bat and several games with hundreds and fifties.

His first hundred against the WI quartet in 80 saved the game.
Match-saving set of fifties against Lillee in 84/85.
His wonderful Adelaide hundred in 90 saved the game from a ditch, followed with bailing out Pakistan in the next test with an unbeaten 80 odd
Another match-saving fifty in the last test against WI in 1990.

Hadlee from what I can remember has the WI hundred and several key fifties too.

How consistent do you think they were from a match to match basis?

They just need to be significantly more consistent than a tailender no.8

And on a strong team where you already have the best batting line up ever assembled, and you have to make a sacrifice for the bowling selections, the bowlers who you are relying on to win the match by taking 20 wickets, you're more willing to make that sacrifice on their batting or bowling?

Yeah, most here wouldnt consider Imran for Steyn or Hadlee for McGrath to be a 'sacrifice' for bowling. That's an exaggeration.

 

[kyear2]

So I've looked through every single ATG XI listed on the first page of Google search, each of you can do the same to verify the results.

Cricinfo
Wasim, Marshall, Warne, Lillee.

Wisden
Wasim, Marshall, Warne, Barnes

CWeb
Imran, Marshall, Warne, McGrath

Armstrong
Imran, Marshall, Warne, Barnes

Benaud
Imran, Warne, Lillee, Barnes

Cricketbet.au
Wasim, Marshall, Warne, McGrath

Bleacher Report
Imran, Marshall, Warne, Murali, McGrath

I've also included this one team by a gentleman on Quora, just because 1. It popped up on the first page and 2. he gave reasoning for each of his selections and the logic is sound. And yes he talks about batting.

I'll leave a link...

What is the best test team for World XI of all time?

Answer (1 of 5): I would make world test XI on the basis of players I have watched/seen 1. Greame Smith (5279 runs with 54.98 avg + 56.78 SR in away venues) 2. Vivian Richards - (5404 runs with 50.50 avg in away venues) 3. Sachin Tendulkar - (7760 runs with 56.64 average + 55.35 SR in away venu...

www.quora.com

Hadlee, Marshall, Warne, McGrath


Obviously only Wisden and the Cricinfo team are collaborative efforts and none of us will agree with most, far less all of them. But in none of them is there an all in, bat deep philosophy referenced or selected.

This is a philosophy that is fully born and exists only here.

 

[shortpitched713]

I disagree with all premises of the great subshakerz vs kyear2 "More taste, less filling" "Lower order batting, absolute best bowling" debate.

For one, I think the all time games would be higher scoring, not less. And my reasoning is that as you go up all levels (controlling for pitches, of course), two innings cricket styled like Tests and FC, average match scores always go up as you increase level, not down.

But I still think you need the batting of Imran and Hadlee in your team to have the best possible one. These two both have cases to be the single best bowler ever, period which cannot be dismissed out of hand without in depth comparisons of evidence, comparative nitpicking of records, etc. It just so happens that they are a really solid bat, and more than handy with one respectively which could give the appearance that the debate is about really meaningful differences between bat and ball among lower order players. It's not, you're just getting free runs, and it's more or less just a quirk of history that this would be the case, as all-rounder quality S class bowlers are really, really rare in most of the decades that they didn't play in.

 

[kyear2]

As subz doesn't think I'm capable of concession or that I have unexplained reasons for some of my picks.

Yes, Hadlee is a better pick than Steyn. He makes sense from the perspective that he can bat and he's literally the better bowler. But there are two reasons why I'm hesitant to commit to it. And if I'm being honest, don't think reverse swing features heavily into either.

1. Era, and this one is multifaceted.
Hadlee not only played in the same era as Maco but even more consistently in bowling friendly conditions. I prefer to have guys from different eras the same way some do for batting. Yes Steyn has equally helpful home conditions, but away from home was way more difficult. And yes, I just love Steyn's outright and relentless aggression.

2. And this will get the most criticism, and this is also why Pidge is an absolute lock for me.
I want match winners, guys who had experience in consistently winning matches and elevating teams to greatness.
McGrath was the best player, the spear head and the primary reason Australia became one of the two best teams of all time. That's just facts and Marshall took the team, despite talent drain, from the best team of the era, to the greatest team ever. That's intangibles that can not only not be denied, but invaluable. Steyn was similar and took his team to a position that's arguably the 3rd best team of our lifetimes if not post war.

They had that killer instinct aggression and intangibles that I want in such a team. Think that's invaluable, but I also acknowledge that Hadlee has just as good a case.



Next consession, the one main thing that I noticed going through those teams above, Gavaskar was selected about half the time along with Hutton. Yes, they mainly referenced his WI away record, but he seems to be rated somewhere around just as viable for the team as Hutton.

 

[subshakerz]

Obviously only Wisden and the Cricinfo team are collaborative efforts and none of us will agree with most, far less all of them. But in none of them is there an all in, bat deep philosophy referenced or selected.

I mean, did any of them mention the pure bowler philosophy? I think those selecting Imran may have already assumed his batting is a factor.

Yet in all of those listed, Hadlee, Wasim and Imran have that batting ability to fill that role. There isn't one where you have four pure bowlers like Lillee, Marshall, Warne, McGrath, doesnt that give a hint maybe?

 

[subshakerz]

1. Era, and this one is multifaceted.
Hadlee not only played in the same era as Maco but even more consistently in bowling friendly conditions. I prefer to have guys from different eras the same way some do for batting. Yes Steyn has equally helpful home conditions, but away from home was way more difficult. And yes, I just love Steyn's outright and relentless aggression.

2. And this will get the most criticism, and this is also why Pidge is an absolute lock for me.
I want match winners, guys who had experience in consistently winning matches and elevating teams to greatness.
McGrath was the best player, the spear head and the primary reason Australia became one of the two best teams of all time. That's just facts and Marshall took the team, despite talent drain, from the best team of the era, to the greatest team ever. That's intangibles that can not only not be denied, but invaluable. Steyn was similar and took his team to a position that's arguably the 3rd best team of our lifetimes if not post war.

They had that killer instinct aggression and intangibles that I want in such a team. Think that's invaluable, but I also acknowledge that Hadlee has just as good a case.

These are fine reasons, I would argue Hadlee made his team unbeatable at home and took a minnow side to number three in the world, but heck I also prefer McGrath as bowler. It is logically inconsistent though to say McGrath is a lock but Hadlee has just as good a case.

But your perspective is bonkers if you are ignoring Hadlee's batting and have a long tail.

 

[Bolo.]

This is the perfect post to highlight how diametrically apart we are on the issue.

I don't have an issue with striving to achieve balance, but that's not what your objective is.

You are selecting a bowling attack, whose primary job is to take 20 wickets. Yet your opening statement intimates that it's less important to find the best combination, than it is to find the combination that can score the most runs.

I cannot be the only person who finds that to be absolutely insane.

This is crazy to me, I'm not making this about names, but listen to what you're proposing.
The primary job for your no. 6 is batting, but you also want someone who can contribute with the ball. The primary job of I through 11 is to bowl out the opposition.

But you literally want to base your selection of the no. 6 purely on their bowling, actively removing an ATG batsman from the scenario for someone who will hardly bowl and at best an average test batsman.
And then for the guys who's actual job is to take wickets, you want to select them based on batting.

The reasoning, two lower order batsmen, who are down there because they aren't good batsmen, will consistently out produce an ATG batsman.
I would like to have someone tell me how many match winning hundreds Imran, Hadlee and even Pollock have combined. The empty stats obsession is totally out of hand.

The reason their averages are so low is because they are unreliable, considerably more so than regular, far less ATG batsmen. When they do score, it's primarily in favorable conditions and piling on. Yet in this kind of scenario, you believe they will be consistent and impactful. Yes, the gods of batting will struggle, but they will somehow strive and be scoring runs.

Respectfully quality trump's quantity Sir.

As someone mentioned a few posts above, they could possibly understand Steyn over Imran, but not McGrath over Hadlee, so why not do like Coronis and choose both. You get easily the best 3 bowlers and the viable no. 8. It's not my preference but at least it makes sense and the best compromise of bowling and batting acumen.

But to think that we're chosing a bowling attack that will have to bowl out an equally strong opponent and to think that chosing the best bowlers is secondary to chosing which are better batsmen is not only counter initiative, but compromising the attack in a match they can't win unless you take 20 wickets.

Not to add, you're not going to get any thing close to consistent or impactful production from them. They are lower order batsmen, think we've convinced ourselves that they come in every innings and will score a solid 30, they're not.

The favorable conditions aren't going to exist here, and when they do, the top 6 will make the most of these situations. Remember them? Hobbs, Bradman, Tendulkar, Sobers, Richards? What you'll conveniently omit is that lower order batting has predominantly featured in teams with inconsistent or poor middle orders, again, not the case here. With the lineup we have, there's no need to not chose the best bowlers. Compromise to get a viable no 8 who's / once of equal quality, I can acquiesce to that in a selection meeting.

Marshall and McGrath are opening though...

A team's job is to score runs and take wickets. It doesn't matter who gets it done. Pick the players who are most likely to get both jobs done. Don't worry about what you consider to be traditional composition. Picking exactly 4 best bowlers without regard to batting strength is something that teams without access to top quality ARs have done. The guys who get left out are bits and pieces players who are nowhere near making it in on either discipline.

Stuff like 100s is a meaningless argument. You know 3* scores of 34 is more runs than 1*100? Why do you seem to care about who is scoring them than the total amount of runs scored? Do you think it's more plausible that the ARs score at just under their career average, or that someone like Viv basically doubles his?

I'm not arguing for playing 5 bowlers in an attack that is including a batting AR regardless of the number of other bowlers. It's just a way of showing Imran and Hadlee's quality. A specialist bat (or even the poor pick of a specialist bowler) will give you a stronger team than Steyn and Mcgrath too.

 

[subshakerz]

I disagree with all premises of the great subshakerz vs kyear2 "More taste, less filling" "Lower order batting, absolute best bowling" debate.

For one, I think the all time games would be higher scoring, not less. And my reasoning is that as you go up all levels (controlling for pitches, of course), two innings cricket styled like Tests and FC, average match scores always go up as you increase level, not down.

But I still think you need the batting of Imran and Hadlee in your team to have the best possible one. These two both have cases to be the single best bowler ever, period which cannot be dismissed out of hand without in depth comparisons of evidence, comparative nitpicking of records, etc. It just so happens that they are a really solid bat, and more than handy with one respectively which could give the appearance that the debate is about really meaningful differences between bat and ball among lower order players. It's not, you're just getting free runs, and it's more or less just a quirk of history that this would be the case, as all-rounder quality S class bowlers are really, really rare in most of the decades that they didn't play in.

I think this is an interesting argument. Is there evidence that average FC scores in country are lower than intl scores? I thought the WSC scores were lower on average, for example.

But I agree, I think the case for Imran and Hadlee is strong regardless.

 

[Coronis]

I disagree with all premises of the great subshakerz vs kyear2 "More taste, less filling" "Lower order batting, absolute best bowling" debate.

For one, I think the all time games would be higher scoring, not less. And my reasoning is that as you go up all levels (controlling for pitches, of course), two innings cricket styled like Tests and FC, average match scores always go up as you increase level, not down.

But I still think you need the batting of Imran and Hadlee in your team to have the best possible one. These two both have cases to be the single best bowler ever, period which cannot be dismissed out of hand without in depth comparisons of evidence, comparative nitpicking of records, etc. It just so happens that they are a really solid bat, and more than handy with one respectively which could give the appearance that the debate is about really meaningful differences between bat and ball among lower order players. It's not, you're just getting free runs, and it's more or less just a quirk of history that this would be the case, as all-rounder quality S class bowlers are really, really rare in most of the decades that they didn't play in.

tbf as you go up in all levels (even from fc to tests) the match duration also increases, which may be a factor.

 

[kyear2]

A team's job is to score runs and take wickets. It doesn't matter who gets it done. Pick the players who are most likely to get both jobs done. Don't worry about what you consider to be traditional composition. Picking exactly 4 best bowlers without regard to batting strength is something that teams without access to top quality ARs have done. The guys who get left out are bits and pieces players who are nowhere near making it in on either discipline.

Stuff like 100s is a meaningless argument. You know 3* scores of 34 is more runs than 1*100? Why do you seem to care about who is scoring them than the total amount of runs scored? Do you think it's more plausible that the ARs score at just under their career average, or that someone like Viv basically doubles his?

I'm not arguing for playing 5 bowlers in an attack that is including a batting AR regardless of the number of other bowlers. It's just a way of showing Imran and Hadlee's quality. A specialist bat (or even the poor pick of a specialist bowler) will give you a stronger team than Steyn and Mcgrath too.

While it doesn't matter who does it, some so it much better than others.

I didn't reference hundreds, I referenced impactful hundreds. Impactful scores that wins matches compared to hundreds scored in meandering draws.

The absence of diminished returns seems to be omitted here.

Also we have differing views on the comparable virtues of the bowlers being discussed.

And no, the west indies and Australia haven't been selecting the best possible bowlers because they weren't bowling all rounders available. Not everyone has the same philosophy that you do. Lloyd decided to find the best and faster 4 bowlers he could find and go hunt.

I literally listed some examples of different AT teams that were chosen by multiple persons and entities, none of them chose the combination that you are advocating , literally none.
You have to choose at least some of the guys based on bowling.

 

[subshakerz]

While it doesn't matter who does it, some so it much better than others.

I didn't reference hundreds, I referenced impactful hundreds. Impactful scores that wins matches compared to hundreds scored in meandering draws.

Nobody is expecting hundreds from a no.8. This is just a nonsense criteria.

We are expecting someone who can regularly hang around long enough for a middle order bat to build a bigger score against ATG bowling, survive enough overs to bat out a draw, or hit out against a tired attack for runs towards the end. Imran and even Hadlee are capable of that, not so Marshall or Warne given the level of bowling.

 

[kyear2]

I disagree with all premises of the great subshakerz vs kyear2 "More taste, less filling" "Lower order batting, absolute best bowling" debate.

For one, I think the all time games would be higher scoring, not less. And my reasoning is that as you go up all levels (controlling for pitches, of course), two innings cricket styled like Tests and FC, average match scores always go up as you increase level, not down.

But I still think you need the batting of Imran and Hadlee in your team to have the best possible one. These two both have cases to be the single best bowler ever, period which cannot be dismissed out of hand without in depth comparisons of evidence, comparative nitpicking of records, etc. It just so happens that they are a really solid bat, and more than handy with one respectively which could give the appearance that the debate is about really meaningful differences between bat and ball among lower order players. It's not, you're just getting free runs, and it's more or less just a quirk of history that this would be the case, as all-rounder quality S class bowlers are really, really rare in most of the decades that they didn't play in.

Sell me the case that Imran is the best or greatest bowler ever.

There are 3 bowlers who can make legitimate arguments to be the best, 4 if you want to include Murali.

The guy we have consistently voted 8th in bowling rankings who's away performances are more relatable to Lara's than anyone's else's, and that's just been trashed and argued to be disqualifying to be in the best after Bradman tier.

I'm listening.

 

[subshakerz]

Sell me the case that Imran is the best or greatest bowler ever.

Certainly a case for the greatest bowler at their peak.

The guy we have consistently voted 8th in bowling rankings who's away performances are more relatable to Lara's than anyone's else's, and that's just been trashed and argued to be disqualifying to be in the best after Bradman tier.

If Lara's away record is not disqualifying you from saying he is the best you saw, neither should Imran's. Though I dont consider them directly comparable.

 

[kyear2]

As subz doesn't think I'm capable of concession or that I have unexplained reasons for some of my picks.

Yes, Hadlee is a better pick than Steyn. He makes sense from the perspective that he can bat and he's literally the better bowler. But there are two reasons why I'm hesitant to commit to it. And if I'm being honest, don't think reverse swing features heavily into either.

1. Era, and this one is multifaceted.
Hadlee not only played in the same era as Maco but even more consistently in bowling friendly conditions. I prefer to have guys from different eras the same way some do for batting. Yes Steyn has equally helpful home conditions, but away from home was way more difficult. And yes, I just love Steyn's outright and relentless aggression.

2. And this will get the most criticism, and this is also why Pidge is an absolute lock for me.
I want match winners, guys who had experience in consistently winning matches and elevating teams to greatness.
McGrath was the best player, the spear head and the primary reason Australia became one of the two best teams of all time. That's just facts and Marshall took the team, despite talent drain, from the best team of the era, to the greatest team ever. That's intangibles that can not only not be denied, but invaluable. Steyn was similar and took his team to a position that's arguably the 3rd best team of our lifetimes if not post war.

They had that killer instinct aggression and intangibles that I want in such a team. Think that's invaluable, but I also acknowledge that Hadlee has just as good a case.



Next consession, the one main thing that I noticed going through those teams above, Gavaskar was selected about half the time along with Hutton. Yes, they mainly referenced his WI away record, but he seems to be rated somewhere around just as viable for the team as Hutton.

Just want to point out the highlighted point.

Yes, a line up of Hadlee, Marshall, Warne, McGrath is probably the best one and hits all the requirements.

Steyn though.....