Jacques Kallis vs Ricky Ponting

[Johan]

W/L ratio might not be the best way to judge bowling strength. Overall Bowling average in/against the specific country in a specific timeline should be better.

Home bowling output of sides during the 2000s, India one of the worst

Bowling records | Test matches | Cricinfo Statsguru | ESPNcricinfo.com

stats.espncricinfo.com

for reference, home bowling output of the Fab 4 era

Bowling records | Test matches | Cricinfo Statsguru | ESPNcricinfo.com

stats.espncricinfo.com

 

[Randomfan]

W/L ratio might not be the best way to judge bowling strength.

It's not the best way to judge bowling strength. The best way would to simply look at home and away average separately for bowling sides in any given period. We can look at them by grouping top 5, top 7 and all sides to get a full picture.

But we are not only judging the bowling strengths. We are judging if batsmen did step up against good teams in given period. Given we had only 7-8 non-minnows for most parts in history, top 5 test sides in any long period is a pretty good cut off. Good teams will put lots of pressure on you and it's not just limited to one aspect. For example, good teams can pile up bigger score to have score board pressure even if collective bowling avg of team may not be exactly in top 5.

If you can't step up in tests involving top 5 sides in any given period then something is missing for player. If you want to be rated among the best then step up against the best. Here by best I do not mean the best side of era, best is just top 5 test nation.

 

[centurymaker]

Indian bowling used to be sub par, more so away from home.

In fact, even this year in BGT, there was almost no real threat outside of one man. If Bumrah had missed the entire series, Indian bowling would have been no different to 2011/12 or 2014/15 in Australia. Simply cannon fodder.

 

[Johan]

Both these dudes really capitalized off of runs against hopeless post-Walsh Windies.

 

[Randomfan]

Both these dudes really capitalized off of runs against hopeless post-Walsh Windies.

No harm in capitalizing against weak sides. That shouldn't be negative for anyone. Negative should be if they are failing to step up against better teams taken together.

To see how they did away against others, we can remove WI. Kallis still averages 49, but Ponting averages 41. That's without going up in quality curve with top 5 test sides.

 

[Johan]

No harm in capitalizing against weak sides. That shouldn't be negative for anyone. Negative should be if they are failing to step up against better teams taken together.

To see how they did away against others, we can remove WI. Kallis still averages 49, but Ponting averages 41. That's without going up in quality curve with top 5 test sides.


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Well my view is basically

England — Ponting>Kallis
Sri Lanka — Ponting>Kallis
Pakistan — NA
India — Kallis>>Ponting
New Zealand — Ponting~Kallis

Windies is weird, for the first 1/3 of their careers it's an ATG attack but for the next 2/3 it's almost Bangladesh level. Anyway, personally I think Kallis overtook Ponting career wise because his home conditions were just so much tougher for batsmenship than Ponting's.

 

[ankitj]

Why is Sri Lanka there but not Pakistan?

 

[Johan]

Why is Sri Lanka there but not Pakistan?

Ponting averages higher in Pakistan/UAE but has legit like 3-4 innings iirc

 

[PlayerComparisons]

Indian bowling used to be sub par, more so away from home.

In fact, even this year in BGT, there was almost no real threat outside of one man. If Bumrah had missed the entire series, Indian bowling would have been no different to 2011/12 or 2014/15 in Australia. Simply cannon fodder.

Yea Indias bowling will be garbage in 6 months on those flat pitches in Eng if Bumrah isn’t fit

 

[Johan]

Eh it'd be fine, Bumrah is a gun enough bowler to somehow restrict Australia to sub 500 on those Melbourne and Brisbane wickets, he'd probably do the same to England, it would be fun to see if India scores against the far inferior English attack though.

 

[subshakerz]

Both these dudes really capitalized off of runs against hopeless post-Walsh Windies.

But also against Walsh and Ambrose.

 

[BazBall21]

It's close but Kallis' cross career consistency did it for me. Ponting is quite a lot more peak-reliant and worse in India than Kallis anywhere.

 

[subshakerz]

Ponting was rated ahead of Kallis as a bat by world cricket probably until 2007 (maybe 2008-2009 too since Kallis had a slump then).

While I give Kallis points for a late career peak compared to a long dip for Ponting, Ponting was just ahead of Kallis for like 70 percent of his career as a bat.

 

[BazBall21]

Ponting had a better peak and was more destructive. Kallis had less weaknesses I think.

 

[subshakerz]

Ponting had a better peak and was more destructive. Kallis had less weaknesses I think.

Kallis not being able to dominate and bat a team out of game was big weakness for me. Pointing had no such issues. Even in his dip he was scoring quick double tons.

 

[Johan]

But also against Walsh and Ambrose.

Nah, their records against Windies pre Ambrose/Walsh retirement is 40s and then like 100

 

[subshakerz]

For all the bashing Ponting gets for his Indian record, he doesn't get enough credit for doing well against Murali. He always batted quite comfortably against him whereas Kallis relatively struggled a bit.

 

[BazBall21]

Kallis not being able to dominate and bat a team out of game was big weakness for me. Pointing had no such issues. Even in his dip he was scoring quick double tons.

They weren't particularly quick and India were a shambles on the 2012 tour IIRC.

I've never criticised Ponting much for his decline because he had a very long career but Kallis was consistently a machine from 1999-2012.

 

[subshakerz]

They weren't particularly quick and India were a shambles on the 2012 tour IIRC.

I am talking about against Amir and Asif in Australia in 2010.

I've never criticised Ponting much for his decline because he had a very long career but Kallis was consistently a machine from 1999-2012.

They debuted the same year. Ponting was consistent like that until 2007. He was better than Kallis in 2008 even. So really it boils down to Kallis being better than Ponting 2009 to 2012 which to me isn't good enough to rank him an overall better bat

 

[Bolo.]

I am talking about against Amir and Asif in Australia in 2010.


They debuted the same year. Ponting was consistent like that until 2007. He was better than Kallis in 2008 even. So really it boils down to Kallis being better than Ponting 2009 to 2012 which to me isn't good enough to rank him an overall better bat

2009 is just when Kallis' average exceeded Pontings for the first time. If you want to look at this in this way and say Ponting was better for the first 2/3s of career, you should also be looking at Kallis and saying he was better for the last 100% of career.

Ponting was consistently better at the start. Kallis was consistently better at the end. Neither was consistently better in the middle. Both had great patches and were better and worse at times, but posting extremely similar numbers from 99-08.