An Ageing Indian Side

[Nate]

I would rather see a bowler who isn't rubbish in tests.

id hardly call him rubbish!! a bad series against india and hes rubbish?

 

[Dasa]

^He has been bowling quite poorly for a few years now.
first 17 tests: 72 wickets at 24.47
last 20 tests: 67 wickets at 39.40

 

[Arjun]

Brett Lee is a lower-order hitter.

And a clean hitter. We have seen several top-order batsmen who have to play artificial, manufactured, premeditated shots to get their runs in sixes. Brett Lee sticks to clean cricket shots.

 

[marc71178]

id hardly call him rubbish!! a bad series against india and hes rubbish?

More than just one bad series.

 

[luckyeddie]

And a clean hitter. We have seen several top-order batsmen who have to play artificial, manufactured, premeditated shots to get their runs in sixes. Brett Lee sticks to clean cricket shots.

As in 'clean bowled by Darren Gough' or 'hoiking clean over the top of a yorker'?

(kidding)

 

[SJS]

Gavaskar, Sehwag and Sidhu are the most successful Indian openers of all time in the sense that they have the best average as openers in tests and the maximum centuries and half centuries for matches played.

Who are the next two ? All time mind you ?

 

[Arjun]

Gavaskar, Sehwag and Sidhu are the most successful Indian openers of all time in the sense that they have the best average as openers in tests and the maximum centuries and half centuries for matches played.

Who are the next two ? All time mind you ?

Chetan Chauhan comes to mind- he and Sunny formed a very good partnership.

 

[Jono]

India on the other hand can rest assured on the bowling front , atleast agewise , with the new bowlers all being less than 25 years old . Only Kumble will be missed .

That's a good point. What's unfortunate however is, by the time these bowlers (if they do, big if) become great bowlers such as Balaji and Pathan, India's main crop of batting will probably be exiting or about to. It saddens me that such an awesome batting line-up cant coincide with an equally great bowling line-up.

But I am optimistic, and if we can mould Pathan, Balaji and others into great bowlers it'd be brilliant for Indian cricket.

 

[tooextracool]

Sehwag (26), Yuvraj (23) and Kaif(24) are younger but only Sehwag has seemed like a world class player so far and he too has limitations.

dont see what kaif has done wrong though......

 

[FRAZ]

Now FRAZ, start your daily hororscope page

Awwwww man yet another Frazism came true . England in the finals ..... Waoh . And yet another prediction that Pak Eng final and he who wins the toss wins the heart .
Thanx and stay kool my friend !!!!!!!!!!

 

[Waughney]

And a clean hitter. We have seen several top-order batsmen who have to play artificial, manufactured, premeditated shots to get their runs in sixes. Brett Lee sticks to clean cricket shots.

His hitting isn't entirely clean, a lot of his big sixes are slicing drives outside off stump (e.g. six off Balaji in the VB series)

 

[SJS]

Chetan Chauhan comes to mind- he and Sunny formed a very good partnership.

Surprise, surprise, surprise.

The best openers after Gavaskar, Sehwag and Sidhu have been Sadgopan Ramesh (average 38.0) and SS Das (34.9 )!!

Sardesai (34.0 as opener), Jaisimha (33.6), Engineer (32.9), Pankaj Roy, Chauhan, Contractor and Anshuman Gaekwad (all between 30 and 32) and Srikkath below 30 are those who have opened more frequently for India.

Both Ramesh and Das have two centuries each. Only Pankaj Roy with 4, of those named above, has more and all these guys opened in many more tests.

Ramesh was consistency personified with 11 scores above fifty and a score above 40 on 17 occasions !!

Ramesh played his last series in SriLanka and scored 42 & 2, 47 & 31, 46 & 55 in the three tests and never played again ! No one even bothers to ask why !

Das in his last series in Windies fared poorly scoring only three scores above 30 in eight innings but he had averaged 40 plus in 18 tests played till then. Surely he merited another chance.

Even the media and the public doesnt ask questions when the player concerned lacks glamour, persona, style and what have you.

 

[SJS]

dont see what kaif has done wrong though......

No he hasnt done very badly but nor he set the Thames on fire in Test matches. Mind you we are talkking in terms of filling in the boots of the four big guns who are in their early thirties.

Kaif has had only 4 tests so far. Not too many I agree but an average of 20 and a top score of 37 in 8 innings is not awe inspiring. He may still make it big but we are talking as on date.

 

[Deja moo]

Ramesh was consistency personified with 11 scores above fifty and a score above 40 on 17 occasions !!

Ramesh played his last series in SriLanka and scored 42 & 2, 47 & 31, 46 & 55 in the three tests and never played again ! No one even bothers to ask why !

Das in his last series in Windies fared poorly scoring only three scores above 30 in eight innings but he had averaged 40 plus in 18 tests played till then. Surely he merited another chance.

Even the media and the public doesnt ask questions when the player concerned lacks glamour, persona, style and what have you.

But Ramesh is a subcontinent-only player...no footwork.

Das is a different kettle of fish....I remember he made 250 in a tour game in Aus .Still Ganguly got Sehwag to open , he made 195 , and Das was forgotten.

 

[Arjun]

But Ramesh is a subcontinent-only player...no footwork.

Das is a different kettle of fish....I remember he made 250 in a tour game in Aus .Still Ganguly got Sehwag to open , he made 195 , and Das was forgotten.

SS Das lacked power. Otherwise he was a good opening batsman. But not great. He didn't last very long, either. If he was not considered as an opener, I doubt if he would make it to the Indian Test team, as one of the team's best batsmen. Same for Ramesh. Sehwag is not a genuine opener, but he is one of the better batsmen in India. Chopra is good enough for an India cap, and he opens the batting. Gambhir can also be considered, but he doesn't have as much focus as Chopra, but is more aggressive.

 

[Arjun]

His hitting isn't entirely clean, a lot of his big sixes are slicing drives outside off stump (e.g. six off Balaji in the VB series)

I still remember that 50 in a VB Series match in 2001, where he hit a few sixes off Allan Donald, no less.

 

[SJS]

But Ramesh is a subcontinent-only player...no footwork.

Yes. No footwork. This is what we hear when we want to drop a batsman. The people who matter talk about it and the media and then the public takes it up.

His lack of footwork is no worse than Laxman's or Ganguly's. I am not saying he is as good a batsman as them. I am just commenting on whether footwork is important or results.

We keep changing the selection criteria depending on what we want to do. A Ramesh can be dropped for not being technically correct though he gets runs and plays all strokes. SS Das can be dropped for not playing strokes though he too gets runs and is tewchnically correct !

With an average of about 38 in the 19 tests he played, Ramesh is head and shoulders above all openers EVER to play for India in performance except Gavaskar, Sehwag and Sidhu. If that doesnt justify his being in the side, I dont know what does. Nearly a dozen others have played twice as many tests as him and not performed as well.

What technique and footwork did Srikkanth have for test matches and he played 43 tests averaging under 30.

Chetan Chauhan could hardly play any strokes in front of the wickets.

Sehwag is not opening for India because he has great footwork.

If Ramesh's footwork was a problem, bowlers would have sorted him out and his string of scores sould not have read :- 43 & 5, 60 & 96, 79 & 40, 143 & 30, 0 & 73, 83 & 5, 110 & 16, 2 & 28, 4 & 26no, 58 & 1, 13 & 0, 48, 2 & 44, 0 & 30, 61 & 25, 2 & 17, 42 & 2, 47 & 31, 46 & 55.

Its difficult to find tests in which he failed altogether. The only thing that can be held against him is that he seemed to have the bowling by the scruff of the neck and then would apparently throw away his wicket. He has never appeared to struggle on the crease.

 

[Dasa]

I was disappointed when Das was discarded - because he shares my surname. Other than that, he did look like a very good opening batsman. Technically correct, and he would fit in well with someone like Sehwag down the other end. Much like a more successful Chopra, of course Chopra could still has time to do well.

 

[aussie_beater]

Surprise, surprise, surprise.

The best openers after Gavaskar, Sehwag and Sidhu have been Sadgopan Ramesh (average 38.0) and SS Das (34.9 )!!

Well, surprise surprise !! The most successful opener after Gavaskar and Sehwag was Ravi Shastri who averaged 44 as an opener in 17 test matches with 4 hundreds and 3 fifties.

But I agree about Ramesh. He wasn't tried much outside the sub-continent, except the Aus series of 1999 in which everyone failed anyway.And the same is with SS Das who failed in one series in WI and he was chucked. Yes it made sense in bringing Sehwag in, but India could have persisted with one of these two guys as Sehwag's partner and seen whether they could deliver or not.Ramesh and Sehwag won't make a good pair IMO, because both are too aggressive and would give less solidity to the batting, but I would say SS Das with his very good technique can do a better job then Akash Chopra in partnering Sehwag....but that's all conjecture.

 

[tooextracool]

No he hasnt done very badly but nor he set the Thames on fire in Test matches. Mind you we are talkking in terms of filling in the boots of the four big guns who are in their early thirties.
Kaif has had only 4 tests so far. Not too many I agree but an average of 20 and a top score of 37 in 8 innings is not awe inspiring. He may still make it big but we are talking as on date.

err isnt this thread about ODI matches though? i mean its kind of stupid to assume that the indian test side is ageing when they've won the last test series that they've played....poor ODI form is no indication how good a test side they are.....