My top 20 allrounders of all-time

[Days of Grace]

I presented my top 100 batsmen and bowlers about a month ago on this forum.

 

[Athlai]

I can see a thread coming out soon.

"Brett Lee, worst allrounder ever"

 

[roseboy64]

I presented my top 100 batsmen and bowlers about a month ago on this forum.

Oh ok.

 

[Prince EWS]

I can see a thread coming out soon.

"Brett Lee, worst allrounder ever"

Lee > Gav Hamilton.

 

[Burgey]

Imran Khan is the best captain ever

His results would suggest otherwise.

He was a fine captain, of that there can be no doubt. But really, do you say that he dragged Pakistan to the top of the world test pecking order, or did something equally remarkable which stamps him as "the greatest" captain of all time?

Credit to him for being probably the only person in history to actually get the inmates to stop running thew asylum of Pakistan cricket - he was a great man manager, but to say he's the greatest captain of all time seems a bit of a stretch tbh.

 

[Burgey]

Another thing being overlooked when it comes to Imran is the talent that he unearthed. Inzi, Wasim, Waqar - they all owe a great deal to Imran for either:

1. Sparking off their illustrious international careers.
or
2. Nurturing them to become the players that they did become.

Just look at the way that players who played under Imran praise him in terms of what he did for their career - that will give you a true insight into how successful Imran truly was as captain.

So AB's the greatest test captain for nuturing the baby faced Warne, McGrath, the Waughs, Healy, Taylor et al?

That argument doesn't follow tbh.

 

[pup11]

Sink your teeth into this then lads... My top 20 TEST allrounders of all time.

I suspect that Kallis may lose rating points as time goes on because I expect him not to bowl as much and I also don't expect him to maintain his batting average of 55+


1 G.S. Sobers (WI) 975
2 Imran Khan (P) 878
3 I.T. Botham (E) 867
4 J.H. Kallis (SA) 866
5 K.R. Miller (A) 828
6 G.A. Faulkner (SA) 810
7 R.J. Hadlee (NZ) 706
8 S.M. Pollock (SA) 679
9 N. Kapil Dev (I) 675
10 A.W. Greig (E) 672
11 C.L. Cairns (NZ) 657
12 T.L. Goddard (SA) 648
13 W. Rhodes (E) 572
14 M.A. Noble (A) 561
15 A. Flintoff (E) 541
16 A.K. Davidson (A) 534
17 J.M. Gregory (A) 531
18 C. Kelleway (A) 524
19 Wasim Akram (P) 521
20 M.H. Mankad (I) 520

I hope Watto and Binga too make it to this list in the future.

 

[pup11]

Sink your teeth into this then lads... My top 20 TEST allrounders of all time.

I suspect that Kallis may lose rating points as time goes on because I expect him not to bowl as much and I also don't expect him to maintain his batting average of 55+


1 G.S. Sobers (WI) 975
2 Imran Khan (P) 878
3 I.T. Botham (E) 867
4 J.H. Kallis (SA) 866
5 K.R. Miller (A) 828
6 G.A. Faulkner (SA) 810
7 R.J. Hadlee (NZ) 706
8 S.M. Pollock (SA) 679
9 N. Kapil Dev (I) 675
10 A.W. Greig (E) 672
11 C.L. Cairns (NZ) 657
12 T.L. Goddard (SA) 648
13 W. Rhodes (E) 572
14 M.A. Noble (A) 561
15 A. Flintoff (E) 541
16 A.K. Davidson (A) 534
17 J.M. Gregory (A) 531
18 C. Kelleway (A) 524
19 Wasim Akram (P) 521
20 M.H. Mankad (I) 520

Why is Shane Warne not on that list , i mean comeon give me a break the guy holds the record for scoring most runs in test cricket without scoring a test ton and he till date is the highest wicket-taker in test cricket.

 

[Athlai]

Batting average of under 20 would be my bet, or maybe never scoring a ton.

 

[The_Bunny]

Batting average of under 20 would be my bet, or maybe never scoring a ton.

One of the guidelines he used for determining an "allrounder" was having a batting average above 20.
So that would be it I suppose

 

[Athlai]

One of the guidelines he used for determining an "allrounder" was having a batting average above 20.
So that would be it I suppose

Fair enough too. Warne was a bowler who could hold a bat sometimes. Not an allrounder in my books.

 

[pup11]

Fair enough too. Warne was a bowler who could hold a bat sometimes. Not an allrounder in my books.

So wouldn't the same aaply on Wasim Akram, or a 257* against ZIM makes him a tremendous batsman??????????

 

[Dasa]

He still had an average over 20.

 

[Athlai]

257* against anyone is impressive, I probably wouldn't have Akram that high myself because once again he's a bowler who could bat a little.

Little bit more than Warne mind you.

 

[The Sean]

For the Sean (if he hasn't died of the suspense), and anyone else:

Criteria for rating allrounders.

1. First of all, multipy their batting and bowling ratings.

Example: Sobers has a batting rating of 845 and a bowling rating of 352. Added together, that gives him 1197 points.

The leaders after doing this are:

1. Hadlee 1244
2. Imran 1243
3. Sobers 1197
4. Kallis 1152
5. Botham 1140
6. Miller 1065
7. Pollock 1062
8. Faulkner 1052
9. Kapil 1006


2. Runs per wicket. IMO, an ideal allrounder would take 20 runs per wicket (anyone who sees differently is welcome to post a response). Divide the runs per wicket of each player by 20 to ascertain how many percentage points they are away from the 'ideal' 20 mark. Or, if they are a bowling allrounder, divide 20 by the runs per wicket.

For example: Sobers (batting allrounder). 34.18 RPW. Divide this by 20 and you get 1.71 (i.e. 71% away from the ideal mark of 20). I then muliply 71 by 1.5 (why? Because it seems to get the best result). And, therefore, Sobers loses 106.5 off his original rating of 1197.

For Hadlee, a bowling allrounder, I divide 20 by his RPW of 7.25. He is 176% away from the ideal mark of 20. Therefore, he loses 264 points (171*1.5) from his original rating of 1244.

Now, the closest anyone has come to the ideal mark of 20 RPW is Goddard with 20.46, followed by Faulkner with 21.39.


The leaders after this stage are:

Imran Khan (P) 1108
G.S. Sobers (WI) 1091
I.T. Botham (E) 1070
K.R. Miller (A) 1043
G.A. Faulkner (SA) 1042
J.H. Kallis (SA) 1005
R.J. Hadlee (NZ) 980
N. Kapil Dev (I) 909
C.L. Cairns (NZ) 885
S.M. Pollock (SA) 882
T.L. Goddard (SA) 845


3. Difference between batting average and bowling average.

Imran has a batting average of 37.69 and a bowling average of 22.81. Therefore, the difference is +14.88. This is multiplied by 10 and therefore Imran gets 148.8 points added to his existing 1108.

The big winners are the batting allrounders here, such as Sobers and Kallis. I am thinking that maybe this part of the equation needs some adjustment. Comments are welcome. The losers are those who have a lesser batting average then bowling average (none of the top 20), such as Vettori and Vass.

Anyway, we end up with:

G.S. Sobers (WI) 1328
Imran Khan (P) 1257
J.H. Kallis (SA) 1239
G.A. Faulkner (SA) 1184
K.R. Miller (A) 1183
I.T. Botham (E) 1121
R.J. Hadlee (NZ) 1029
S.M. Pollock (SA) 973
T.L. Goddard (SA) 927
C.L. Cairns (NZ) 926


4. 100 runs/5 wickets a match bonus.

What i mean is 100+ runs over two innings and a total of 5 wickets over the course of the match. Each time a player does this, he gets 15 bonus points.

Sobers and Botham have each done this 7 times. Next is, surprisingly, Greig (4). Imran only did it 2 times with a host of others, including Kallis

5. Another bonus. Anyone to complete the 2000 runs/100 wkts double gets an extra 30 points. Anyone (actually only Botham and Kapil at this stage) to complete 5000 runs/250 wkts gets an extra 70 points.

6. Divide the grand total by 1.5. Why? It just looks nice if the top allrounder is close to 1000 points. 1000 points for me in my ratings makes you a near 'immortal'.


So, after all that lads, I need a warm beer or two with W.G, who usually prefers a scotch.

A reminder of the final ratings:

G.S. Sobers (WI) 975
Imran Khan (P) 878
I.T. Botham (E) 867
J.H. Kallis (SA) 866
K.R. Miller (A) 828
G.A. Faulkner (SA) 809
R.J. Hadlee (NZ) 706
S.M. Pollock (SA) 679
N. Kapil Dev (I) 675
A.W. Greig (E) 672
C.L. Cairns (NZ) 657
T.L. Goddard (SA) 648
W. Rhodes (E) 568
M.A. Noble (A) 550
A. Flintoff (E) 541
A.K. Davidson (A) 534
J.M. Gregory (A) 531
C. Kelleway (A) 524
Wasim Akram (P) 521
M.H. Mankad (I) 520


Of course, if anyone disagrees with my methods, please reply, as long as its constructive criticism because it will help to make these ratings better.

Finally, an answer!

Thanks mate, and well done. Whether we agree or not with your ratings you've clearly put a lot of thought and work into them.

I do have a question - your rankings so far have been statistically based. How much would they differ from your personal opinions, if at all?

 

[Days of Grace]

I try to get my ratings as close to other people's opinions, or the general consenus of experts, as possible.

I'm pretty happy with the allrounders ratings. The only way it differs from my opinion is that Kallis is too high. However, like I have said a lot of times here, to have a batting average of 55 and a bowling average of 31 means that you are a very good allrounder

(the defintion of an allrounder being someone who is adequate with bat and ball, it doesn't have to mean they were brilliant, boys own attacking players, or won many games for their countries). Stats don't cover that.

 

[The Sean]

I try to get my ratings as close to other people's opinions, or the general consenus of experts, as possible.

I'm pretty happy with the allrounders ratings. The only way it differs from my opinion is that Kallis is too high. However, like I have said a lot of times here, to have a batting average of 55 and a bowling average of 31 means that you are a very good allrounder

(the defintion of an allrounder being someone who is adequate with bat and ball, it doesn't have to mean they were brilliant, boys own attacking players, or won many games for their countries). Stats don't cover that.

Fair enough mate.

One thing I would say though is not to feel obligated to always agree with other people, even the experts. I'm all for listening to what players and cricket experts have to say about a player, just as I am always keen to have a look at a bloke's stats.

But one of the great pleasures of cricketing opinions is being able to say sod the lot of them and to form your own opinion too!

 

[Days of Grace]

That's true. That's why I have Davo only one point behind Wasim on the bowler's ratings, even though 80% of people here reckon Wasim was streets ahead, all because of having seen him play and the fact that Wasim had a much more livelier personality.

 

[BhupinderSingh]

His 400 plus International wickets would probably suggest otherwise.

He used to be an allrounder in 1990s but currently he is a batsman who can bowl a bit.He likes to bowl only when conditions are supportive or against minnows.For me,such players are not allrounders.Moreover,he has a very poor wkts/match ratio to be considered a regular bowler first.So for me,he's not an allrounder at all.

 

[BhupinderSingh]

So AB's the greatest test captain for nuturing the baby faced Warne, McGrath, the Waughs, Healy, Taylor et al?

That argument doesn't follow tbh.

Sorry,its the Australian selectors who picked all those players to play for Australia not Allan Border where as Imran himself found talent like Waqar Younis,Aamir Sohail,Wasim Akram,Ijaz Ahmed ,Inzamam-ul-Haq etc who at that time were not even prominent figures in domestic cricket,barring Inzi.Imran Khan passed the knowledge of reverse swing to Wasim & Waqar & shaped them into world dominating bowlers with the bowling skills that he taught to those bowlers.So,your argument stands no weight.