An Extinct Breed ?: Great spin bowling allrounders

[Spark]

Ravichandran Ashwin.
It's very very early days, but he looks excellent so far

Ravichandran Ashwin | India Cricket | Cricket Players and Officials | ESPN Cricinfo

Incredibly disappointed at the lack of the "he can bat" jokes first.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Incredibly disappointed at the lack of the "he can bat" jokes first.

Would've made a "has a test hundred" joke but Ashwin killed that one recently

 

[harsh.ag]

Horrible OP. The spin all-rounder has never been a thing per se. Rhodes hardly bowled when he was a good batsman, so take him out. Benaud has an average of 24 as a bat, hardly great all-rounder material (despite his 3 hundreds). In the early era, there were many spin bowlers because of the nature of the pitches. Almost all spinners had a decent record. In fact, Faulkner's bowling record, though impressive by today's standards, was quite lackluster by those standards back then. Hence the cluster of players from that era.

Right now, we have Shakib, Ashwin, Vettori, Hafeez, Jadeja and Smith. Quite a decent crop.

 

[Athlai]

Thread title should be, an extinct breed? Spin bowling allrounders on free to air television excluding Smith

 

[steds]

Sanath Jayasuriya

 

[BoyBrumby]

Sanath Jayasuriya

One for the future, yes.

Seriously tho, it's partly a numbers thing, isn't it? Notwithstanding the Swann/Monty double act at Adelaide, sides playing two specialist spinners is a rarity outside of the subcontinent, so with seamers outnumbering their slow bowler confreres by 3 to 1 in most XIs there's always likely to be more fast bowling all-rounders nowadays.

Back in the day spin twins were de rigueur everywhere.

 

[Migara]

Jayasuriya was a good all rounder in ODIs yeah, but not in tests. Partly it's him to blame as well, because he did not take up the second spinner position regularly in tests. He was good enough to averahe low 30s and pick up 200 test wickets in his career.

 

[JontyPanesar]

On spinning decks that favor him and that offers little support to opposing quicks.

He looked ok in Australia with the bat, though he's clearly an FTB with the lazy footwork and lousy play vs the short ball

 

[the big bambino]

Horrible OP. The spin all-rounder has never been a thing per se. Rhodes hardly bowled when he was a good batsman, so take him out. Benaud has an average of 24 as a bat, hardly great all-rounder material (despite his 3 hundreds). In the early era, there were many spin bowlers because of the nature of the pitches. Almost all spinners had a decent record. In fact, Faulkner's bowling record, though impressive by today's standards, was quite lackluster by those standards back then. Hence the cluster of players from that era.

Right now, we have Shakib, Ashwin, Vettori, Hafeez, Jadeja and Smith. Quite a decent crop.

Thanks for this. Very good post. Hard to make out the record of the Saffer googly bowlers of the era. They did well in England in 1907 but failed in Australia in 10/11 with the exception of Schwarz. I think Faulkner expended all his energy for run making that series which probably explains the lack of spinning ARs. When you bowl for as long as some spinners are required its difficult to commit any left over resources to long stints at the batting crease I'd guess.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

Horrible OP. The spin all-rounder has never been a thing per se. Rhodes hardly bowled when he was a good batsman, so take him out. Benaud has an average of 24 as a bat, hardly great all-rounder material (despite his 3 hundreds). In the early era, there were many spin bowlers because of the nature of the pitches. Almost all spinners had a decent record. In fact, Faulkner's bowling record, though impressive by today's standards, was quite lackluster by those standards back then. Hence the cluster of players from that era.

Right now, we have Shakib, Ashwin, Vettori, Hafeez, Jadeja and Smith. Quite a decent crop.

Smith has a long way to go as a spinner or a batsman, I hope he gets to greatness but I am not sold on him yet. Rhodes may not have put it all together like Giffen did on occasion but if I didn't put a pom in I would be called biased... LOL.... I looked at the guys from back then and paid attention to those who pulled of incredible allrounder figures in a match, like that famous 1st class match of Giffens.. The great Aussie leg spin allrounders were guys you could pick in a team for bowling or their batting alone. Wilfred Rhodes was great. Many allrounders have a period where they stop bowling and concentrate on their batting. They tried at first to use Steve Waugh as a pure all rounder though he just didn't get enough pace on the ball to be a front line bowler, his batting suffered in that period then he concentrated on batting and the true Steve Waugh appeared, a great batsman who could sometimes takes a bag of wickets (but so could Clarke, Border, Chappell).. in the end we realised he was a batsman, and thank christ we did because he made us great as well as making himself great. Maybe some similarities there with Rhodes career. Surely no other test cricketer has gone from no. 11 to opening the batting and being good at it.

 

[SpofforthLohman]

Horrible OP. The spin all-rounder has never been a thing per se. Rhodes hardly bowled when he was a good batsman, so take him out. Benaud has an average of 24 as a bat, hardly great all-rounder material (despite his 3 hundreds). In the early era, there were many spin bowlers because of the nature of the pitches. Almost all spinners had a decent record. In fact, Faulkner's bowling record, though impressive by today's standards, was quite lackluster by those standards back then. Hence the cluster of players from that era.

Right now, we have Shakib, Ashwin, Vettori, Hafeez, Jadeja and Smith. Quite a decent crop.

By the way mate, I hope you were checking the first class stats of players like Faulkner and Armstrong and the others from that era. They didn't play enough test cricket then so using only test records you will only get a 10th of the picture.... what does horrible OP mean ???..... acronyms I aint good at.

 

[Redsok]

Shakib will go down as one of the best.

Unless someone counts Sobers as a spinner, Shakib is the 100% the best spin bowling all rounder. There's no contest.. especially in a batsman favored era. Successful bowling is just that much harder. It's even harder to be a successful spinner, with all the pitch (outside of the subcontinent) being flat and **** these days. Barely any help for the spinners


Vettori was the better bowler, with a lot more variety and trickery... He was also an extremely "underrated" great lower order batsman. The greatest NZ player of all time. He was the heart and soul of the New Zealand cricket team.

It was such a HORSESH*T cricket team and cricket country back then.. that Vettori had to update the NZ cricket websites all by himself as well. Barely got any financial help, or much help on the pitch either. Even as a lower order batsman, he was constantly saving NZ with his batting, then with his bowling.
It was that bad.. If only he could play in today's golden era NZ lineup. If only..




But Shakib is the better overall "All Rounder". Almost an equally great bowler, but a much better batsman in the Top order. Shakib is kind of a batting all rounder TBF, who's also one of the best spinners. That's basically the difference.. He just got unlucky with a **** national team, that never finds enough talent or progresses. Stuck

 

[jimmy101]

With all of this digging your bound to strike oil soon my man.

 

[Athlai]

Yes my point 7 years ago was very good you're right

 

[Fuller Pilch]

Vettori was the better bowler, with a lot more variety and trickery... He was also an extremely "underrated" great lower order batsman. The greatest NZ player of all time. He was the heart and soul of the New Zealand cricket team.

It was such a HORSESH*T cricket team and cricket country back then.. that Vettori had to update the NZ cricket websites all by himself as well. Barely got any financial help, or much help on the pitch either. Even as a lower order batsman, he was constantly saving NZ with his batting, then with his bowling.
It was that bad.. If only he could play in today's golden era NZ lineup. If

I have a lot of time for Vettori, but he isn't close to NZ's best ever player. I'd put him in the 3rd bracket of players:

Hadlee

daylight

Williamson/Crowe

Donnelly/Sutcliffe/Cowie/Reid/Turner/Smith/Cairns/Bond/Vettori/Taylor/McCullum/Watling/Wagner/Boult

 

[Fuller Pilch]

Also, there is more to cricketweb than old debates about all rounders.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Unless someone counts Sobers as a spinner, Shakib is the 100% the best spin bowling all rounder. There's no contest.. especially in a batsman favored era. Successful bowling is just that much harder. It's even harder to be a successful spinner, with all the pitch (outside of the subcontinent) being flat and **** these days. Barely any help for the spinners

Well this is mostly bull****. Not necesarily the "who is better part" but suggesting that Shakib has had a hard time with conditions bowling spin is hilarious. He's played nearly 80% of his Test cricket in Asia which has been as friendly for spin bowling as ever.

 

[Coronis]

Unless someone counts Sobers as a spinner, Shakib is the 100% the best spin bowling all rounder. There's no contest.. especially in a batsman favored era. Successful bowling is just that much harder. It's even harder to be a successful spinner, with all the pitch (outside of the subcontinent) being flat and **** these days. Barely any help for the spinners


Vettori was the better bowler, with a lot more variety and trickery... He was also an extremely "underrated" great lower order batsman. The greatest NZ player of all time. He was the heart and soul of the New Zealand cricket team.

It was such a HORSESH*T cricket team and cricket country back then.. that Vettori had to update the NZ cricket websites all by himself as well. Barely got any financial help, or much help on the pitch either. Even as a lower order batsman, he was constantly saving NZ with his batting, then with his bowling.
It was that bad.. If only he could play in today's golden era NZ lineup. If only..




But Shakib is the better overall "All Rounder". Almost an equally great bowler, but a much better batsman in the Top order. Shakib is kind of a batting all rounder TBF, who's also one of the best spinners. That's basically the difference.. He just got unlucky with a **** national team, that never finds enough talent or progresses. Stuck

Ever hear of Aubrey Faulkner?

 

[Engle]

Or of Vinoo Mankad - fastest to 100 Test wickets and 1,000 Test runs (before being usurped by Botham), other AR feats (231 HS, 13/131 BBM) ?

 

[Daemon]

Vettori had to update the NZ cricket websites all by himself as well

Wait what