Does Michael Atherton get a bad rap?

[_00_deathscar]

From the openers thread:
Interestingly, Atherton averaged a fair few points higher at home than he did away from home.

His record from 1990-2000 also isn't all that bad at all, averaging 40.86 opening, and:
32.06 vs Australia (okay not great)
48.66 vs Pakistan
43.83 vs South Africa
33.84 vs Windies (okay not great)

He actually failed to capitalise vs Zimbabwe (37.50 across 4 tests) and Sri Lanka (7.50 but just the solitary test). Never played Bangladesh.

Did very well vs India and NZ.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

I wouldn't want to hear him rap. I expect he would be bad.

Fine player, need to factor his crocked back into his average too. How often did he play when he was only half fit?

 

[ImpatientLime]

nah everyone knows his story. he was decent, no better than that. he was hampered by chronic back issues especially later in his career and played a disproportionate amount of cricket against australia, west indies and south africa.

in my time watching he is a fair bit below gooch, stewart, cook, strauss and trescothick.

I would say tho that 98* and 185* are two of the absolute great knocks of his generation. that showdown with donald at trent bridge was one of the most gladiatorial and epic contests in the history of the sport.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Him, Stewart and Nasser are similar in that their contributions to English cricket at a time when we were **** and Australia reigned supreme isn’t reflected in their batting averages. They could all have sneaked above 40.

 

[Arachnodouche]

Never seen a batsman "appear" more likely to get out. Probably because of his exaggerated reactions to short stuff or being cut in half. Made for some great photo ops though.

 

[kevinw]

A 37 average, with similar home and away records during a weak period in English cricket history, where only Thorpe and Stewart (in the middle order) also scored runs. Then add in the quality of attacks he faced against Australia, Pakistan, West Indies, South Africa and then in Asia. It's not a bad record overall.

 

[Howe_zat]

He seems to get rather more forgivness than his contemporaries, rather than a bad rap, in my experience.

 

[duffer]

Dour to watch but a good record and excellent commentator. Really like the guy and that seems to be close enough to the general public consensus.

 

[duffer]

He seems to get rather more forgivness than his contemporaries, rather than a bad rap, in my experience.

Played the hand he was dealt with as well as you'd expect anyone to. Same with Nass too, fwiw

 

[Prince EWS]

From the openers thread:
Interestingly, Atherton averaged a fair few points higher at home than he did away from home.

His record from 1990-2000 also isn't all that bad at all, averaging 40.86 opening, and:
32.06 vs Australia (okay not great)
48.66 vs Pakistan
43.83 vs South Africa
33.84 vs Windies (okay not great)

He actually failed to capitalise vs Zimbabwe (37.50 across 4 tests) and Sri Lanka (7.50 but just the solitary test). Never played Bangladesh.

Did very well vs India and NZ.

I dare Michael Atherton to like this post.

 

[Chubb]

There are some people who really dislike him, perhaps because they associate him with the so-called nadir of English cricket (I'd argue they played better in the 1997 and 98-99 Ashes than they did in 2006-07, 13-14, 17-18 or 21-22)

Some either don't know or don't care that he had a serious back problem for most of his career. It's possible without that his technical flaw against pace (jabbing outside off, compulsive hooking) could have been corrected and he may have averaged 40+ overall. But it was a very difficult time to be an opener.

So overall I don't think he gets a bad rap from most people but there is a minority of mainly English people who see him as a failure and a shambles, mostly because they don't really understand cricket.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

There’s a post somewhere in the bowels of Cricket Chat by a no longer active member stating that had he not been picked too soon, not played past his prime and not had a serious back problem he would have averaged 60.

 

[Burgey]

I think he was a good player, bordering on very good. From the POV of watching from here, his importance to that England team was probably undervalued because McGrath had his measure so we never really got a look at the best of him.

 

[GIMH]

I think he’s rated appropriately on here and it’s hard to argue against the opinion that he’d have had a better average in the 00s.

But reality is, overall Trescothick, Strauss and Cook were far better and some people seem to dispute this.

That being said he didn’t just have a back problem but rather ankylosing spondylitis and it’s incredible he played as much top level cricket as he did with that. It doesn’t mean we should scale his average up but it is something rather remarkable.

 

[Son Of Coco]

There’s a post somewhere in the bowels of Cricket Chat by a no longer active member stating that had he not been picked too soon, not played past his prime and not had a serious back problem he would have averaged 60.

Richard?

 

[honestbharani]

He was ok

 

[subshakerz]

Deserved a 40 plus average.

Just to put it in perspective, Atherton played 115 matches. Around 80 to 85 matches were against worldclass pace attacks in a bowler friendly era. Perhaps no opener in cricket history has been tested that much apart from Gavaskar maybe.

You could easily replace 20 tests of those against soft attacks and his average would have gone up.

 

[ZK$]

Having to open the batting in English conditions against all the ATG bowlers of the 90s must have been brutal.

 

[Aritro]

Lol, there were many multi page threads devoted to this many times in a previous decade.

He was a truly nuggety right handed opener of decent but unspectacular talent but admirable resolve. Sounds like he played some great innings, and a made a fair few pugnacious half tons with wickets falling around him. Which are worth highlighting.

And while Richard's slicing and dicing of his record got selective to the point of comedy, it's probably worth keeping in mind things such as injuries, peaks, debuting too young and playing too long to provide context when you look at any player's career record.

So in answer to your question, I have a lot of admiration for Dean Elgar; the subject of this thread.

 

[Kenneth Viljoen]

He was a good opener with sound defensive principles , sometimes threads are only dedicated to greats but only a minute group of players are in that category, cricket would be very boring if we talked only about the greatest players ..There doesn't always have to be a justification for a player not averaging above 45 or 50 , that's just the reality.