Best match winning innings you have seen?

[GIMH]

I'm the only person to speak out against it; if more people thought about it they'd realise how silly it is as well. As the off-spin\leg-spin thing demonstrates though, people in cricket are often happy with inadequate terminology if it's time-honoured.

Not even slightly comparable, I'm out

 

[zaremba]

I'm the only person to speak out against it; if more people thought about it they'd realise how silly it is as well. As the off-spin\leg-spin thing demonstrates though, people in cricket are often happy with inadequate terminology if it's time-honoured.

Like the half-wits who describe swing bowlers as "seamers"?

 

[Richard]

A swing bowler is a seamer; a seamer is not neccessarily a swing bowler.

"Seamer" is usually just an anatonym for "seam-up bowler".

 

[wpdavid]

1926 I imagine, because that's the only home Ashes England won during Hobbs and Sutcliffe's time.

And it's no coincidence that the match is far better remembered for the match-winning bowling of Larwood and Rhodes.

Oddly, I'd always heard much more about the batting of Hobbs & Sutcliffe. Here's Wisden's account of the game.

Wisden - England v Australia 1926

Apparently a thunderstorm had made the wicket 'very difficult', so to put on 172 and set up an eventual target of 415 was pretty impressive stuff. Add the scenario of being the Ashes decider, and they have to be right up there for mine.

 

[L Trumper]

Yeah. It was remembered for their exceptional batting skills rather than larwood's bowling. As far as their opening stands considered this was rated as the best. From what I read and heard I'd rate it as the best opening partnership ever.

 

[Richard]

I wouldn't disagree, but I'm surprised if that's others' experiences, as it isn't mine.

I haven't, I admit, read or watched (it predated sound-film by 4 years) a tremendous amount about that match, but what I have has tended to centre on "youngster Larwood and veteren Rhodes bowled England to victory" rather than "Hobbs and Sutcliffe's sensational stand took England to an unassailable position where victory was a near-formality".

BTW that Test would surely have been a timeless Test? In such games, though they're of course long-gone, it would of course be fair to describe batting as match-winning. I match which is not finite will be won by whoever makes most runs, full-stop.

 

[Manee]

A swing bowler is a seamer; a seamer is not neccessarily a swing bowler.

"Seamer" is usually just an anatonym for "seam-up bowler".

You really should create a wikipedia full of this sort of stuff, could really inform the outsider about the minor details involved in cricket.

 

[Richard]

In the words of my politics\law\OB lecturer: "wikipedia is not a credible source".

I've enough CW writing to be doing without trying to create pages on a free-for-all service TBH.

 

[Bahnz]

As a Kiwi fan I'd have to rate Cairn's 80 in the 4th test of the 99 series in England. Took us from about 40/6 to a lead of about 200, and included some of the most exhilarating hitting I've seen.

As a neutral, Sehwag's 200 against SL in 2008 was pretty special, and of course there are the obvious candidates like Laxman, Flintoff etc.

 

[KiWiNiNjA]

A few of Bevan's innings would be good shouts for ODIs.

World XI match.

 

[wpdavid]

I wouldn't disagree, but I'm surprised if that's others' experiences, as it isn't mine.

I haven't, I admit, read or watched (it predated sound-film by 4 years) a tremendous amount about that match, but what I have has tended to centre on "youngster Larwood and veteren Rhodes bowled England to victory" rather than "Hobbs and Sutcliffe's sensational stand took England to an unassailable position where victory was a near-formality".

BTW that Test would surely have been a timeless Test? In such games, though they're of course long-gone, it would of course be fair to describe batting as match-winning. I match which is not finite will be won by whoever makes most runs, full-stop.

Yes, I think I read somewhere in the Wisden piece that it would be timeless.

 

[Cevno]

As a Kiwi fan I'd have to rate Cairn's 80 in the 4th test of the 99 series in England. Took us from about 40/6 to a lead of about 200, and included some of the most exhilarating hitting I've seen.

As a neutral, Sehwag's 200 against SL in 2008 was pretty special, and of course there are the obvious candidates like Laxman, Flintoff etc.

To get 201 not out in a innings of 329 for the whole team is pretty special indeed and it was a first innings match winner if ever there was one.

 

[wpdavid]

Back on topic, Trescothick's annihilation of SA's attack in the 4th test 2004/05 to set up Hoggard's coup-de-grace was also pretty special.

Another great knock from an English pov was Greig's hundred in, iirc, the 2nd test in India during the 1976/77 tour. I think he batted all day against Bedi, Chandra et al to set up what was eventually a comfortable win. I don't think anyone else made many.

 

[Richard]

As a Kiwi fan I'd have to rate Cairn's 80 in the 4th test of the 99 series in England. Took us from about 40/6 to a lead of about 200, and included some of the most exhilarating hitting I've seen.

Certainly about the most heart-sinking on-the-spot-transformation of a match I've ever experienced.

Within the space of barely over an hour England went from in a very strong position for likely victory to seriously against-the-odds. And it truly was almost all on the basis of one bat.

And the sixes he hit, which just kept going further and further (will never forget him murmering "that's better" when he finally timed the last one perfectly and it went up at the com-box), were really quite something. With hindsight you have to admire it, even though at the time it was merely a FFS matter.

 

[Richard]

Another great knock from an English pov was Greig's hundred in, iirc, the 2nd test in India during the 1976/77 tour. I think he batted all day against Bedi, Chandra et al to set up what was eventually a comfortable win. I don't think anyone else made many.

For all Greig's betrayal of the team in the Packer affair, he truly played some sensational knocks (and, once, produced a spell of bowling) that no-one else really looked like playing\delivering.

That one, the famous 'Gabba '74/75 innings, the spell at QPO in 1974, the double at Headingley in 1976... list goes on.

 

[wpdavid]

Pondering the best match winning innings for England in my time ... has to take into account quality of opposition & match situation (so no Gower from 1985 or Gooch vs India in 1990), state of the series (ditto Butcher in 2001): i.e there must be something significant and heroic about the innings.

The top 2 were played at Leeds - Gooch in 1991 & Botham 10 years previously. Beefy's other ton in that series gets there too - we were reasonably ahead when he came in, but Aus did make over 400 in their 4th innings.

Greig at Calcutta in 1976/77 as mentioned previously. Tresco's 4th test knock in SA 2004/05, as also mentioned previously. Fred at Edgbaston in 2005 as Martyn wrote.

Boycott's 2 innings in the final Caribbean test in 1973/74 (counts as one for the purpose of this thread). Thorpe in the 3rd test in SL 2001. Nasser's 200 at Edgbaston in 2007 - it's tempting to write off doubles as being too easy, but we'd shot out Aus for not much over 100 and had lost 3 quick wickets in reply,

One more needed. I'll resist the temptation to include Hoggard's 2nd innings at Trent Bridge in 2005. Maybe Hussain's 1st test 100 in NZ when the drop-in pitch was still lethal. Or Pietersen's innings in the 3rd test last time we were in NZ and had been in all sorts of trouble: an all-too-easily forgotten innings imo. Or Hussain's 80-odd in the deciding test against SA at Leeds in 2008, or his 100 in the 2nd SL test of 2000/01. Or Tres against SA at the Oval in 2003. That'll do for the moment. Obviously at this level there are loads that are too close to call. It was probably unfair to leave out Boycott's 190 against Aus at leeds in 1977, but there you go.

 

[Dano.85]

Bothams 149 in that famous ashes test for me. I also think hussain and thrope in pakistan in the dark was very impressive.

 

[wpdavid]

Bothams 149 in that famous ashes test for me.

I think it's fair to say that there's a fair bit of daylight between Beefy's 149 / Gooch's 154 and the rest.

 

[Dano.85]

I think it's fair to say that there's a fair bit of daylight between Beefy's 149 / Gooch's 154 and the rest.

Cant really coment on goochs ings i never saw it, i have only seen bothams ings on espn classics.

 

[Richard]

Bothams 149 in that famous ashes test for me. I also think hussain and thrope in pakistan in the dark was very impressive.

Hussain only really applied the finishing touches; it was the partnership between Thorpe and Hick which really pulled England towards victory.

And superb and thrilling though that stand was, it's easily forgotten that only the last little bit was played in the dark.