Best test match number 3 since 1970?

[Daemon]

With 5 minutes' thought:

Haynes
Sehwag
Viv (c)
Lara
Pietersen
K Miller
Flintoff
Marsh (+)
Warne
Ambrose
Lillee

h_hurricane to list Kapil, Migara to refer to Vaas and Murali (the latter's fielding in particular)

Current Beta XI

Renshaw
Brathwaite
Pujara
Root
Hope
Woakes
Saha
Bhuvi
Southee
Abbas
Leach

 

[h_hurricane]

With 5 minutes' thought:

Haynes
Sehwag
Viv (c)
Lara
Pietersen
K Miller
Flintoff
Marsh (+)
Warne
Ambrose
Lillee

h_hurricane to list Kapil, Migara to refer to Vaas and Murali (the latter's fielding in particular)

Surprised that TOTAB is missing from the list. Such a non- Burgey thing to do.

Also refreshing to see that you have finally posted something after "5 minutes' thought".

 

[Burgey]

****, that was really worth clicking on the notifications link to read....

 

[honestbharani]

Surprised that TOTAB is missing from the list. Such a non- Burgey thing to do.

Also refreshing to see that you have finally posted something after "5 minutes' thought".

You and Migara live in his head rent-free. Hope its pleasant up there.

 

[h_hurricane]

You and Migara live in his head rent-free. Hope its pleasant up there.

You know for sure the kind of place one gets to stay if it is rent free right

 

[sumantra]

Ponting very undersold here. Wouldn't take Sangakkara over him at all, unless it was to keep. Was the best batsman in an era of great batsmen for Australia. His two closest contemporaries preferred other positions in the batting order.

Unless we're playing in India. Then I'd take someone else.

What happens in England? In fact, be it in the Sub-Continent or England or New Zealand or West Indies Dravid has a superior average... Ponting only did better than him in S.A and of course in his own land...that said, Dravid did much better in Australia than what Ponting did in India...it's quite surprising that Ponting is easily considered much better than Dravid here...though in reality, it's much much harder to pick between the two...

 

[Flem274*]

Current Beta XI

Renshaw
Brathwaite
Pujara
Root
Hope
Woakes
Saha
Bhuvi
Southee
Abbas
Leach

southee absolutely slays and i heard on reddit (so it absolutely must be true) that in his younger years he was a bit of a dick. whatever you think of his medium pacers, the man is alpha.

 

[stephen]

What happens in England? In fact, be it in the Sub-Continent or England or New Zealand or West Indies Dravid has a superior average... Ponting only did better than him in S.A and of course in his own land...that said, Dravid did much better in Australia than what Ponting did in India...it's quite surprising that Ponting is easily considered much better than Dravid here...though in reality, it's much much harder to pick between the two...

Dravid was very good but you'll have a very hard time convincing any non Indian who actually watched them play that Dravid was in the same class as Ponting at 3.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Tempted to make a “Is Viv a myth” thread

I tested the water in the early days of my CW life. Some of it was quite funny.

Sir Vivian Richards - master or myth?

I have never seen, and never expect to see a greater batsman than Viv Richards, yet his Test Match record doesn't show any hint of supreme greatness. It's the record of a great player of course, but nowhere near what his talent should have produced. Tests=121 Innings=182 Runs=8540 HS=291...

www.cricketweb.net

 

[h_hurricane]

I think Greg Chappell summed it up best.

"Richards was the kind of batsman who would have averaged 80 in tests if he wanted to, but chose not to because he did not need to".

Probably in a weaker team, we would have seen the best of Viv.

 

[harsh.ag]

Replace chose not with cbf

 

[h_hurricane]

Dravid was very good but you'll have a very hard time convincing any non Indian who actually watched them play that Dravid was in the same class as Ponting at 3.

Well, at least one non Indian, read OP, thinks Dravid is in at least the same class as Ponting.

 

[h_hurricane]

On Richards, not many , if any, played the format with gay abandon like he did, and yet ended up with a great record. More like driving your vehicle on a pot hole filled road in a rash manner and still getting great mileage and serviceability.

He never really played for the stats. If he would have, he would not have had the impact like the below example.

WI vs IND Cricket Scorecard, 1st Test at Kingston, February 23 - 28, 1983

Get cricket scorecard of 1st Test, WI vs IND, India tour of West Indies 1982/83 at Sabina Park, Kingston, Jamaica dated February 23 - 28, 1983.

www.espncricinfo.com

 

[sumantra]

Dravid was very good but you'll have a very hard time convincing any non Indian who actually watched them play that Dravid was in the same class as Ponting at 3.

Well, there are by and large 3 kinds of wickets in test match cricket that can produce results (leaving aside two teams first innings took four days to finish kind), 1. Where the balls swing, air or seam, 2. Where the balls turn and 3. Where it comes with real pace and bounce...among the three Dravid had been miles ahead of Ponting in no. 1 & 2. Wickets with real pace and bounce Ponting was ahead...having said that, that kind of wicket is diminishing rapidly...you talked about Ponting in India, I would say, if it is in Aus or S.A Ponting, anywhere else Dravid...if I keep it between the two only...

 

[Coronis]

So its all his own fault he isn’t rated higher? Lazy ****.

 

[stephen]

Well, there are by and large 3 kinds of wickets in test match cricket that can produce results (leaving aside two teams first innings took four days to finish kind), 1. Where the balls swing, air or seam, 2. Where the balls turn and 3. Where it comes with real pace and bounce...among the three Dravid had been miles ahead of Ponting in no. 1 & 2. Wickets with real pace and bounce Ponting was ahead...having said that, that kind of wicket is diminishing rapidly...you talked about Ponting in India, I would say, if it is in Aus or S.A Ponting, anywhere else Dravid...if I keep it between the two only...

Your assertion that Dravid was way ahead of Ponting on swinging wickets is a bit absurd. Dravid did better in England but that's mostly down to one tour in 2002 where he feasted on the might of an end of career Andy Caddick, Alex Tudor and a green Matthew Hoggard. Ponting had a pretty torrid time in England in 2001, but that was mainly down to Gough, who got him 5 or 6 times (who was absent from the India tour in 2002). The fact is that South Africa swung quite a bit, even during Ponting's heyday. And Dravid was terrible there while Ponting was a beast.

The best spin that Dravid faced was against Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka, and he failed over a huge number of tours. Ponting didn't do much better there, averaging 40 (31 against Sri Lanka) but only played 5 tests there and only 4 against Sri Lanka in one tour. Of course Ponting's struggles in India are well known and Dravid was amazing there, so I'm happy to say that Dravid was better against spin, but both weren't very good touring spin friendly countries.

Both were exceptional minnow bashers. Ponting was probably the best against minnows though, smacking Pakistan, the West Indies and New Zealand around. Dravid was similarly good against New Zealand and put England to the sword (mostly down to that 2002 tour though where he scored nearly half his total runs against England and three of his five centuries against them).

But the main difference between the batsmen was that Ponting was aggressive and took the game away from his opponents, while Dravid was more passive and batted for survival. Both were ATG batsmen and were exceptional in their own right, but Ponting was a level above Dravid. Until the last three years of Ponting's career, when he was well into terminal decline, he was considered pretty much Lara and Tendulkar's equal with Kallis, Hayden and Dravid being a notch below.

Rating Dravid a better number 3 than Ponting requires either partisan bias or a view based on something that wasn't watching them play. Ponting had a way bigger impact than Dravid and that's no disrespect to Dravid at all.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Your assertion that Dravid was way ahead of Ponting on swinging wickets is a bit absurd. Dravid did better in England but that's mostly down to one tour in 2002 where he feasted on the might of an end of career Andy Caddick, Alex Tudor and a green Matthew Hoggard. Ponting had a pretty torrid time in England in 2001, but that was mainly down to Gough, who got him 5 or 6 times (who was absent from the India tour in 2002). The fact is that South Africa swung quite a bit, even during Ponting's heyday. And Dravid was terrible there while Ponting was a beast.

The best spin that Dravid faced was against Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka, and he failed over a huge number of tours. Ponting didn't do much better there, averaging 40 (31 against Sri Lanka) but only played 5 tests there and only 4 against Sri Lanka in one tour. Of course Ponting's struggles in India are well known and Dravid was amazing there, so I'm happy to say that Dravid was better against spin, but both weren't very good touring spin friendly countries.

Both were exceptional minnow bashers. Ponting was probably the best against minnows though, smacking Pakistan, the West Indies and New Zealand around. Dravid was similarly good against New Zealand and put England to the sword (mostly down to that 2002 tour though where he scored nearly half his total runs against England and three of his five centuries against them).

But the main difference between the batsmen was that Ponting was aggressive and took the game away from his opponents, while Dravid was more passive and batted for survival. Both were ATG batsmen and were exceptional in their own right, but Ponting was a level above Dravid. Until the last three years of Ponting's career, when he was well into terminal decline, he was considered pretty much Lara and Tendulkar's equal with Kallis, Hayden and Dravid being a notch below.

Rating Dravid a better number 3 than Ponting requires either partisan bias or a view based on something that wasn't watching them play. Ponting had a way bigger impact than Dravid and that's no disrespect to Dravid at all.

Writing off the runs in the 2002 tour completely when one of the tons (148 at headingley) was one of the most supreme demonstrations of batting vs swing in really tough day 1 conditions I've seen is idiotic. Particularly since your rebuttal was about them as batsmen vs swing. Also idiotic is conveniently failing to mention the 2011 tour.

Not applying the same logic you applied for Dravid's england runs to Ponting in NZ is also quite questionable. All of Ponting's runs in NZ came against the might of Brent arnel and Tim Southee v1.0 who might as well have been Brent arnel. While Dravid managed to hold his own against Bond on pitches where almost everyone else looked like a tailender and also got a great ton in 99.

Also, no... arguing that Dravid was better than ponting is a perfectly defensible position. Not a position I agree with but you saying its a laughable opinion only further demonstrates what a partisan hack you are.

I give your post a 3/10. I feel your passion for the game but the cricketing knowledge is sadly lacking. You'll get better with time.

 

[vcs]

Dravid was pretty damn good in England, better than Sachin overall though it's close enough (shame Sachin got to bat against an awful attack in '96 where he was at his pristine best). Looking at the composition of England's attack in 2002 and dismissing them as poor does a complete injustice to how well Dravid batted for us in that tour, he was magnificent. Saved one game, set up another, and scored a double at the Oval for good measure.

 

[vcs]

The aggression thing on the other hand I agree with, and is a legitimate reason for putting Ponting ahead as a No. 3. On the greentop you get like 2/10 times Dravid is a superior option and Ponting probably on most of the other occasions (as long as there's no Harbhajan in the opposition lololol) because he puts you in control of the game. I don't see much difference between them in terms of other evaluation parameters such as high-pressure runs when everyone flops etc. None of them are particularly impressive in that regard unlike a Laxman or Lara type batsman.

 

[harsh.ag]

Dravid > Ponting definitely defensible.

Ponting's ODI exploits may colour the view of their overall batsmanship, but I would definitely have Dravid over him in more than one scenario in tests.