I'm currently reading CMJ's 'Top 100 cricketers of all time', and I must say, I find it very disappointing....
He makes errors thru poor research, i.e. saying that Holding was an outstanding hurdler in his youth. No, CMJ, he was a long-jumper, and only to a school standard - he was never national standard.
And ranking players from 1-100 is always going to be a contentious issue, but even there, CMJ makes some baffling selections. For example, is Andrew Flintoff really a more outstanding cricketer than either Michael Holding or Courtney Walsh? And was Ian Botham really a greater cricketer than Brian Lara?
CMJ alleges that Lloyd maintained a successful record in Test cricket captaincy because his bowlers had a slow over rate that ensured that the Windies didn't lose a Test match. That is a cheap shot by CMJ with no facts or statistics to back up that off-the-cuff assertion. I have a big problem with journalists who make these unsubstantiated comments, and fail to come up with the evidence. So, I went back and looked at all of the Tests captained by Lloyd, and I found that in the vast majority of draws, the other teams were the ones hanging on for a draw. There was only one match I could find where the Windies were hanging on for a draw, and they were batting in that game, so a slow over-rate would've been useless in that match!
It's WI vs Pakistan in 1977 at Kensington Oval....
I find it disappointing that journalists like CMJ can follow the Wisden line of the time, espoused by forgettable editors such as David Frith, trying to denigrate the achievements of Lloyd's West Indies by harping on about slow over-rates, the use of bouncers, and how 'boring' Lloyd's West Indies were....
Roosevelt said if you are right more than 50% of time then you are doing well (not an exact quote)