Best 3rd down Test batsman of all time

[weldone]

Among the ones I saw play live, Steven Roger Waugh by a country mile...

 

[zaremba]

Waugh was purpose-built for the role.

Anyway, it's an interesting question for an All-Time XI - do you just pick your best 3 or 4 middle-order batsmen and squeeze them in where you can, or do you try to pick specialists in each position? If you're going for specialists, then Waugh might well get in a lot more all-time XIs.

Good to see Thorpe up there. Pretty amazed, really, I always thought of him as a number 4, even though I know he played a lot at 5. His performance at 5 is outstanding. England would have been so sunk without him during the dark years.

 

[Teja.]

Azhar - WAFG.

 

[Jarquis]

Waugh was purpose-built for the role.

Anyway, it's an interesting question for an All-Time XI - do you just pick your best 3 or 4 middle-order batsmen and squeeze them in where you can, or do you try to pick specialists in each position? If you're going for specialists, then Waugh might well get in a lot more all-time XIs.

Good to see Thorpe up there. Pretty amazed, really, I always thought of him as a number 4, even though I know he played a lot at 5. His performance at 5 is outstanding. England would have been so sunk without him during the dark years.

1. Jack Hobbs
2. Herbert Sutcliffe
3. Don Bradman
4. Jacques Kallis
5. Steve Waugh
6. Shivnarine Chanderpaul
7. Adam Gilchrist
8. Ian Botham (3)
9. Malcolm Marshall (1)
10. Muttiah Muralitharan (4)
11. Sydney Barnes (2)

Top 7 are the best in their positions, 8-11 I took the best bowlers 1-4 and sorted by batting average. The number 8 spot probably the most contentious as I gave Botham the not ahead of Warne and others because of the balance it gives the side.
Obviously it could be argued that 1=2 for both batting and bowling, but thought I'd mix it up.

Kallis, WAFG

 

[marc71178]

Stunned to see Kallis with the greatest percentage of not outs of anyone batting 4.

 

[Maximus0723]

Waugh was purpose-built for the role.

Anyway, it's an interesting question for an All-Time XI - do you just pick your best 3 or 4 middle-order batsmen and squeeze them in where you can, or do you try to pick specialists in each position? If you're going for specialists, then Waugh might well get in a lot more all-time XIs.

Good to see Thorpe up there. Pretty amazed, really, I always thought of him as a number 4, even though I know he played a lot at 5. His performance at 5 is outstanding. England would have been so sunk without him during the dark years.

I like the idea of specialist more because they know how to adapt to different situations.
Waugh is total clutch in clutch situations. He has also played with gg batting order much like AT XI.

 

[Faisal1985]

Yousuf and Abbas...! Nice.

 

[Jono]

Azhar - WAFG.

Think you meant what a ****ing prick tbh.

 

[Howe_zat]

Specialist's XI definately an interesting idea. I'm surprised Clive Lloyd hasn't been mentioned yet.

Here's a side with each spot's top run-scorer.

Gavaskar
Hayden
Ponting
Tendulkar
S Waugh
S Waugh
Gilchrist
Vettori
Vettori
Waqar Younis
Muralitharan

A pretty strong side, though I'm not convinced that the three spinners would be effective on all wickets. Plus, there would be unrest in the camp as to which Steve Waugh would be captain, leading to Steve Waugh likely undermining Steve Waugh's authority on the pitch.

 

[Burgey]

Waugh was purpose-built for the role.

Anyway, it's an interesting question for an All-Time XI - do you just pick your best 3 or 4 middle-order batsmen and squeeze them in where you can, or do you try to pick specialists in each position? If you're going for specialists, then Waugh might well get in a lot more all-time XIs.

Good to see Thorpe up there. Pretty amazed, really, I always thought of him as a number 4, even though I know he played a lot at 5. His performance at 5 is outstanding. England would have been so sunk without him during the dark years.

Ian Chappell was on the radio the other day here discussing just that WRT ESPN's all time XI.

He made the point with the keeper, as an example, that he'd have Knott there and not Gilchrist, simply because "when you've got a bloke called Bradman at number three, runs are not your concern. But if you're captain you've got to explain to a Dennis Lillee or a Tiger O'Reilly why the keeper just dropped a catch, and when you say he's there for his batting, it won't go over too well with them".

 

[Athlai]

Specialist's XI definately an interesting idea. I'm surprised Clive Lloyd hasn't been mentioned yet.

Here's a side with each spot's top run-scorer.

Gavaskar
Hayden
Ponting
Tendulkar
S Waugh
S Waugh
Gilchrist
Vettori
Vettori
Waqar Younis
Muralitharan

A pretty strong side, though I'm not convinced that the three spinners would be effective on all wickets. Plus, there would be unrest in the camp as to which Steve Waugh would be captain, leading to Steve Waugh likely undermining Steve Waugh's authority on the pitch.

Got to love the clones.

 

[Prince EWS]

I absolutely hate the argument that you don't to balance all-time teams properly because the quality is so high and that you'll be able to rely on the top six batsmen and best four bowlers to get the job done all the time. Who says the theoretical team this all-time is playing isn't actually superior? We're picking a team for a level above Test cricket - so Test cricket effectively becomes First Class domestic cricket and First Class domestic cricket becomes club cricket. Would you think someone who averaged 32 with the bat in First Class cricket and 29 with the bat in club cricket would be a good choice to bat seven at Test level? Because that's what picking Knott in any sort of world eleven would be like. Gilchrist was hardly Matt Prior in any rate - he was a good keeper.

 

[Burgey]

I absolutely hate the argument that you don't to balance all-time teams properly because the quality is so high and that you'll be able to rely on the top six batsmen and best four bowlers to get the job done all the time. Who says the theoretical team this all-time is playing isn't actually superior? We're picking a team for a level above Test cricket - so Test cricket effectively becomes First Class domestic cricket and First Class domestic cricket becomes club cricket. Would you think someone who averaged 32 with the bat in First Class cricket and 29 with the bat in club cricket would be a good choice to bat seven at Test level? Because that's what picking Knott in any sort of world eleven would be like. Gilchrist was hardly Matt Prior in any rate - he was a good keeper.

All right mate, well go and tell Ian Chappell for all I care. He comes from an era where you picked your best keeper. You don't.

 

[Prince EWS]

All right mate, well go and tell Ian Chappell for all I care. He comes from an era where you picked your best keeper. You don't.

I don't have any problem with him valuing wicket keeping highly, but that wasn't entirely his point. His point about the strength the batting and bowling annoys me because strength is relative to the unknown opposition.

 

[Janki_Jasoos]

Inzi wins this one easily.

 

[Jono]

Prince I've started using your point when discussing ESPN's AT XI with a mate, i.e. assume they a playing a Martian XI. A team from another planet.

So you have to put your overall best team. That means there is an occasion where Bradman will fail, or you'll need to rely on your fourth bowler because Marshall and Lillee have copped a pounding.

 

[kingkallis]

Waugh, Azhar, Inzamam!

 

[Prince EWS]

Prince I've started using your point when discussing ESPN's AT XI with a mate, i.e. assume they a playing a Martian XI. A team from another planet.

So you have to put your overall best team. That means there is an occasion where Bradman will fail, or you'll need to rely on your fourth bowler because Marshall and Lillee have copped a pounding.

Yay!

 

[Teja.]

Think you meant what a ****ing prick tbh.

That too, He is one of the human beings I have least respect for, but my god was he a beautiful bat.

 

[Teja.]

Prince I've started using your point when discussing ESPN's AT XI with a mate, i.e. assume they a playing a Martian XI. A team from another planet.

So you have to put your overall best team. That means there is an occasion where Bradman will fail, or you'll need to rely on your fourth bowler because Marshall and Lillee have copped a pounding.

Yeah, AWTA. That's why even if Miller/Pollock are negligibly worse bowlers compared to say Lillee/Marshall, There's so much better batsman, There's no.discussion, for me.