CW's 100 Greatest Cricketers Poll

[AndrewB]

Have you got a video of Pele with blatantly terrible technique?

 

[Brook's side]

Yes there is. He is middling every ball with the bat; the very pinnacle of technique. And I have seen Pele going to dribble past defenders; who nowadays will just not go for the final tackle, block him and force him to make a shot. They literally used to play with a 2-3-5 formation.....

I'm not changing my view on the technique in that video, as it's absolutely clear to see.

I will row back on my comments to some extent though.
There are videos in the late 1930s where clearly the standard of play is high. Stan McCabe for one. He could bat. And clearly there was a high standard of bowling by then.

I recognise that Hobbs must have been a decent player, because nobody was saying that the players in the 1930s were light years ahead of Hobbs.
I can only guess that he fell off a cliff around 1930 (was still scoring for fun in 1928 aged 45), and maybe lost his marbles as well or something, but there are still very strange things about that video, for instance the forward lunge amongst others. I also generally remain somewhat skeptical about the standard of play prior to say 1930.

 

[capt_Luffy]

I'm not changing my view on the technique in that video, as it's absolutely clear to see.

I will row back on my comments to some extent though.
There are videos in the late 1930s where clearly the standard of play is high. Stan McCabe for one. He could bat. And clearly there was a high standard of bowling by then.

I recognise that Hobbs must have been a decent player, because nobody was saying that the players in the 1930s were light years ahead of Hobbs.
I can only guess that he fell off a cliff around 1930 (was still scoring for fun in 1928 aged 45), and maybe lost his marbles as well or something, but there are still very strange things about that video, for instance the forward lunge amongst others. I also generally remain somewhat skeptical about the standard of play prior to say 1930.

As I said prior, that video was pretty much just a show. There was hardly much substance in it to make such presumptuous claims. Hobbs was the World's best batsman until 1928 and played international cricket till 1930. His last FC match was in 1934. His career overlapped with McCabe's and I imagine not McCabe's could had claimed her son to be superior. If you believe the change in quality of the game Hobbs and McCabe played was significant, I would say that's very questionable. And as of technique, Hobbs was regarded as technically the perfect specimen of batsmanship by everyone, even ahead of Bradman; and he himself shared that view. Hobbs was dubbed "The Master" for a reason.

 

[BazBall21]

21. Dennis Lillee
22. Bill O'Reilly
23. Curtly Ambrose
24. George Headley
25. Dale Steyn
26. Steve Smith
27. Ray Lindwall
28. Sunil Gavaskar
29. Ian Botham
30. Fred Trueman.

 

[Brook's side]

And as of technique, Hobbs was regarded as technically the perfect specimen of batsmanship by everyone, even ahead of Bradman; and he himself shared that view. Hobbs was dubbed "The Master" for a reason.

You: everyone said Hobbs had brilliant technique
Me: (show you a video of Hobbs where his technique's terrible)
You: that's brilliant technique
Me: it's terrible technique
You: everyone said Hobbs had brilliant technique

REPEAT

completely pointless 'conversation'

 

[capt_Luffy]

You: everyone said Hobbs had brilliant technique
Me: (show you a video of Hobbs where his technique's terrible)
You: that's brilliant technique
Me: it's terrible technique
You: everyone said Hobbs had brilliant technique

REPEAT

completely pointless 'conversation'

Yep. This conversation is more pointless than the Whitney one. And really don't want this thread to be filled with posts about Hobbs' techniques..... I though showed you that he has results backing him in every condition against every kind of attack; you showed me a 100 second clip of him sleep walking through throw downs.

 

[howitzer]

Steyn
Smith
Ambrose
Gavaskar
O'Reilly
Botham
Lillee
Donald
Border
Lindwall (over Garner for his batting...hey hum)

 

[Flametree]

Gavaskar
Procter
Ambrose
Steyn
Trueman
O'Reilly
Chappell G
Headley
Worrell
Sutcliffe H

 

[Line and Length]

@Brook's side - you are like a dog with a bone when it comes to posting your opinions. Give us a break. It happened in the now closed music thread and now you are overloading this thread with your views. There have been plenty of explanations regarding the initial clip yet you continue your over-the-top attack.

Back to the voting:

Gavaskar
Steyn
Ambrose
Lillee
O'Reilly
Trueman
Headley
Botham
Sutcliffe
Lindwall

 

[capt_Luffy]

6 hours to go.... 2-3 more votes will make it more well rounded.

 

[MexicanRiver]

Ambrose
Steyn
Lillee
Smith
Lindwall
O'Reilly
Botham
Chappell
Sangakkara
Sutcliffe

 

[kyear2]

Ambrose
Steyn
Smith
Gavaskar
Lillee
Chappell
Headley
O'Reilly
Trueman
Border

 

[srbhkshk]

Here is a clip with some actual substance of Hobbs batting..... The idea that Hobbs was technically inferior and Pele wasn't is complete bogus to me.

That's genuinely terrible stuff, how in the hell is this technique better than root. Coupled with the keeper making out with the stumps while supposedly keeping to a pacer, idk if it proves anything close to what you wanted to prove.

 

[capt_Luffy]

That's genuinely terrible stuff, how in the hell is this technique better than root. Coupled with the keeper making out with the stumps while supposedly keeping to a pacer, idk if it proves anything close to what you wanted to prove.

I genuinely wanted to prove nothing. His output describes his techniques pretty aptly. The clip is there just to show something which actually matters, unlike the previous one. And keepers in the ol' days used to stand to stumps to the medium pacers.

 

[srbhkshk]

I genuinely wanted to prove nothing. His output describes his techniques pretty aptly. The clip is there just to show something which actually matters, unlike the previous one. And keepers in the ol' days used to stand to stumps to the medium pacers.

Also known as express pacers during those times.

 

[capt_Luffy]

Also known as express pacers during those times.

Nope. Larwood genuinely bowled deliveries at 150+

 

[sayon basak]

Keepers didn't stand next to the stumps while keeping Larwood.
Some footage from the bodyline series:-

And don't really get how hobbs got into all of these.

 

[subshakerz]

Nope. Larwood genuinely bowled deliveries at 150+

How do you know that?

 

[capt_Luffy]

19 voters concludes this round. This round went quite as expected despite the drop in votes and the top 10 stood clear. Though it should be mentioned that ranks 11-14 were very closely, teasing a tight 4th Round.
Here are the results:

Players	Points	Votes
Curtly Ambrose	145	19
Dale Steyn	131	18
Sunil Gavaskar	114	15
Steve Smith	97	12
Dennis Lillee	91	14
Bill O'Reilly	87	14
George Headley	54	11
Greg Chappell	41	10
Ian Botham	36	10
Fred Trueman	30	7
Allan Donald	24	7
Herbert Sutcliffe	23	8
Joel Garner	23	4
Kumar Sangakkara	22	7
Ricky Ponting	18	5
Shaun Pollock	15	4
Graeme Pollock	14	3
Ray Lindwall	12	4
Allan Border	11	3
Mike Procter	9	1
Allan Knott	9	1
Ken Barrington	9	1
Everton Weekes	8	1
Steve Waugh	6	1
Kapil Dev	5	1
K S Ranjitsinhji	4	1
A B de Villiers	4	1
Barry Richards	3	1
Frank Worrell	2	1
Waqar Younis	2	1
Rahul Dravid	1	1

Here are the results of Top 30:

Rank	Players
1	Don Bradman
2	Garry Sobers
3	Imran Khan
4	W G Grace
5	Sachin Tendulkar
6	Richard Hadlee
7	Jack Hobbs
8	Malcolm Marshall
9	Viv Richards
10	Glenn McGrath
11	Shane Warne
12	Mutthiah Muralitharan
13	Jacques Kallis
14	Keith Miller
15	Brian Lara
16	Wally Hammond
17	Len Hutton
18	Adam Gilchrist
19	Wasim Akram
20	Sydney Barnes
21	Curtly Ambrose
22	Dale Steyn
23	Sunil Gavaskar
24	Steve Smith
25	Dennis Lillee
26	Bill O'Reilly
27	George Headley
28	Greg Chappell
29	Ian Botham
30	Fred Trueman

 

[capt_Luffy]

I know commence the beginning of Round 4. Please vote for players not already ranked for spots 31-40. Open for 48 hours.

I will begin with:

Shaun Pollock
Joel Garner
Allan Donald
Kumar Sangakkara
Herbert Sutcliffe
Allan Border
Graeme Pollock
Ray Lindwall
K S Ranjitsinhji
Michael Holding