Best Players that You have Watched Play

[Thala_0710]

A lot of rankings of players in general are based on the eye test (those you have watched play), stats, general perception, reviews of contemporaries. Most of us rank players such as Bradman, Hobbs, Grace etc very very highly (and rightly so) but have watched very little of them.
Here I wanted to rank the best (Top 15) batsmen and bowlers you have watched live or have seen decent amount of footage of (10+ tests minimum).
I'll start:

Top 15 Batsmen
1. Sachin
2. Lara
3. Richards
4. Smith
5. Gavaskar
6. Ponting
7. Chappell
8. Kallis
9. Waugh
10. Border
11. Dravid
12. Root
13. Sanga
14. Miandad
15. ABD

Top 15 Bowlers
1. Marshall
2. McGrath
3. Hadlee
4. Akram
5. Imran
6. Warne
7. Murali
8. Steyn
9. Ambrose
10. Donald
11. Garner
12. Holding
13. Waqar
14. Walsh
15. Bumrah

 

[capt_Luffy]

I am sticking with only those whom I have watched live, after I can say I started to understand the game well. So, Test only eye Test:

Batsmen:

1. Steve Smith
2. Kumar Sangakkara
3. A B de Villiers
4. Virat Kohli
5. Joe Root
6. Kane Williamson
7. Younis Khan
8. Hashim Amla
9. Shivnarine Chanderpaul
10. Alaistar Cook
11. Michael Clarke
12. Kevin Pietersen
13. Cheteshwar Pujara
14. Michael Hussey
15. Ross Taylor

Bowlers:

1. Dale Steyn
2. Pat Cummins
3. Ravichandran Ashwin
4. James Anderson
5. Jasprit Bumrah
6. Kagiso Rabada
7. Vernon Philander
8. Nathan Lyon
9. Stuart Broad
10. Ravindra Jadeja
11. Josh Hazlewood
12. Neil Wagner
13. Mohammad Shami
14. Trent Boult
15. Morne Morkel

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

For a start, Ramesh Powar

 

[FBU]

Stubbs
Steyn
Anderson

 

[centurymaker]

Srinath
Dravid
Ponting

 

[social]

I was lucky enough to play with & against some test players as the schedule never used to be as packed so they played grade

Allan Border was insanely talented and much better than the Waughs imo

Shame that he played in such a terrible Australian team for much of his career as he was forced to play defensively as nobody else could bat

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Ramnaresh Sarwan
Shivnarine Chanderpaul
The Prince
Gayle
Carl Hooper (the best batsman I've ever seen)

 

[sayon basak]

Alfred Mynn

 

[Burgey]

Purely from guys I’ve seen play
live
Batsmen (no particular order)

Tendulkar
Lara
Richards
Smith
Border

Bowlers (no particular order and much harder to split imo)

Hadlee
Marshall
McGrath
Lillee
Akram/ Ambrose/ Steyn/ Bumrah/ Cummins

honestly, I can’t rank either Warne or Murali in the top five compared with those quicks, as great as they were.

 

[ashley bach]

Was able to watch endless amounts of Paddles as a kid, he was a treat to observe.
Remember being at Eden park to see Ponting get a ton when he was in his prime, just made it look completely effortless.

 

[_00_deathscar]

I was lucky enough to play with & against some test players as the schedule never used to be as packed so they played grade

Allan Border was insanely talented and much better than the Waughs imo

Shame that he played in such a terrible Australian team for much of his career as he was forced to play defensively as nobody else could bat

Maybe the coward should have tried batting higher up the order instead of hiding

 

[_00_deathscar]

Going for “most exciting” players I’ve seen - in no particular order. A few of them just happen to be the very best too.

Lara
Sachin
Donald
Wasim
Steyn
Pant
Bumrah

 

[Coronis]

Maybe the coward should have tried batting higher up the order instead of hiding

I think @Burgey may have already addressed this at some point but that’s more Waugh than Border. Border actually batted the most at 4, and spent a decent amount of time at 3 as well.

 

[capt_Luffy]

I think @Burgey may have already addressed this at some point but that’s more Waugh than Border. Border actually batted the most at 4, and spent a decent amount of time at 3 as well.

He batted at both 5 and 6 almost as much as 4 though.

 

[Coronis]

He batted at both 5 and 6 almost as much as 4 though.

The post was calling out him “hiding down the order” clearly not true.

 

[capt_Luffy]

The post was calling out him “hiding down the order” clearly not true.

I do think him batting 141 times below 4 in a quite weak batting line-up atleast not pron to partial criticize.

 

[govinda indian fan]

Started watching from 2007
Sachin
Sanga
Yk
Smith
Kohli
Root
Kane
Pant
Styen
Bumrah
Rabada
Cummins
Anderson
Boult
Murali
Ashwin
Lyon
Jadeja

 

[social]

Maybe the coward should have tried batting higher up the order instead of hiding

Now do Tendulkar

 

[Chubb]

I’ve been lucky to see many great players from the last 30 years at the ground, but not all of them made runs or took wickets when I was there.

For example, the only time I ever saw Jacques Kallis and AB de Villiers they both got ducks – AB got a golden. The only time I saw Sanath Jayasuriya he got a golden duck as well. I saw Ponting once and he only got 9.

The two best innings I’ve seen in the flesh were Sangakkara’s 203 at Wellington in 2015 and McCullum’s 302 (at least the first 100 runs of it). The innings I enjoyed most, though, were Brendan Taylor’s hundred against India in 2015 and Sikandar Raza’s 80 v Ireland at Hobart.

Kane Williamson, Sangakkara and Kohli are the best batsmen I saw live.

The best spells I’ve seen were McGrath’s 5-53 v England at Lords and of all people Chris Martin’s 4-56 against South Africa at Dunedin, when he got Kallis and de Villiers for ducks in the same over. McGrath and Warne are the best bowlers I’ve ever seen live. But Boult is up there.

I did see Aravinda de Silva and even Graham Gooch but I was too young to remember it well.

 

[social]

Not an atg but best innings I have seen as a spectator was Shastri’s 206 on Warne’s debut

Doesn’t get talked about but Warne actually bowled a lot of good balls in that game