***Official*** England in India

[honestbharani]

i have watched a large proportion of the tests in which tendulkar has played live anyways, the ones i havent watched(i.e all the ones before 92/93 and a few thereafter), ive managed to get extensive highlights for and have been able to guage the conditions from them.
i have watched his performances in SA, and i can assure you that a major reason why his 169 is considered to be such a great innings is because of the ineptness of the rest of the batting card. further even when they were 5/58, out of the 5 wickets, one was a run out, one was venkatesh prasad, and one was dravid as an opener(and we know how well that experiement turned out). so it wasnt really great bowling or the conditions that put India on the backfoot.

so you know more about swinging conditions than Pollock, Gavaskar, Cullinan, Symcox, Procter and Shastri?

 

[honestbharani]

The difference is playing in India/Pak would only constitute around one tenth of his career, at most. The other two would consitute way more of the relevant players' careers.

This is part of the problem with the arguments about double standards earlier comparing players who've done badly in the odd Test in Asia with those that haven't done anything outside of Asia.

so given that Zim is already out and the Windies will go below Bangladesh in a few years, Asia would constitute HALF of the cricketing world. Would it start to matter then?

 

[honestbharani]

firstly if we are going to play the selective stats game, there is no point in including freddies average from his early years. as has already been stated, in his last 30 test matches he averages 38 with the bat and 25 with the ball. so his stats are much better than kapil dev in their respective primes, and as i said earlier, if his batting performances arent that brilliant as bothams was in their respective eras, then flintoffs bowling average in much more difficult bowling conditions in the current era makes him a superior bowler.

why should the fact that Kapil was MILES better than Freddie at the start of their respective careers be taken out?

 

[honestbharani]

why 56 tests for both bowlers? because it suits your argument?
fact is that if we use kapils first 56 tests and flintoffs last 30 tests, flintoff has a better statistical record with both bat and ball.

Why don't we take the BEST 30 tests of Kapil's from that first 56 as well, since that is what you are doing with Freddie? What is wrong with comparing both their performances after 56 tests each? Why is it flawed? Is it because Freddie was crap at the start while Kaps wasn't?

 

[honestbharani]

err i have never ever said that tendulkar or ponting are crap, Ponting is a fine player against pace bowling, and Sachin is arguably one of the best players of any sort of bowling on a flat pitch. i dont concur with the better batsmen. we have plenty of that today, other than those 5 you also have Martyn, Gilchrist, Sehwag, Laxman, Inzamam, Chanderpaul etc who are all quality players. and as i said earlier, botham had the benefit of much more conducive bowling conditions particularly in England where he played half his test matches. English wickets now are much flatter than what they used to be during bothams time.



that maybe so, but most people would say that flintoff is a better batsman than botham was and also a better batsman and bowler than kapil dev was . but as i stated earlier arguing about this is like arguing who was the best all rounder amongst the big 4. the fact is that flintoffs record is at least comparable with the big 4 and therefore makes him a great all rounder.

Most people would also say that Sachin is amongst the best players of QUALITY SWING BOWLING in CONDITIONS AIDING SWING BOWLING. BTW, just why does his 95 in the recent series against Pak in an ODI when the ball swinging bananas doesn't count? How is that inferior to any great test inning played under similar conditions?

 

[honestbharani]

England are 32/1 after 8 overs against the BP XI. Vaughan out due to the recurrence of his knee injury. BTW, Interesting dismissal for the new skipper Tresco.....


Last Wicket: 24/1 (4.5 ov); Partnership RR: 4.97
ME Trescothick run out (Jadhav/Raina/Karthik) 18 (20b 2x4 0x6) SR: 90.00

 

[Sanz]

that argument makes no sense. you pick the period in kapil devs career where he was probably at his most effective, and then pick the whole of flintoffs career even though you know that he was not even half the player he is now. completely irrelevant.

Incorrect, for most of his career Kapil averaged around in low 30s as a batsman and high 20s as a bowler. Flintoff has been incosistent and cant be called an alltime great allrounder based on one good year.

 

[Sanz]

... a major reason why his 169 is considered to be such a great innings is because of the ineptness of the rest of the batting card. further even when they were 5/58, out of the 5 wickets, one was a run out, one was venkatesh prasad, and one was dravid as an opener(and we know how well that experiement turned out). so it wasnt really great bowling or the conditions that put India on the backfoot.

So when Flintoff scores 100 runs and rest of his team mates failed, it is considered an all time great performance, but when Tendulkar scores when his teammates failed, you come up with this ******** logic ?

 

[adharcric]

Do any of you know how Munaf Patel and VR Singh are bowling in the BP XI vs England match? I know their figures, but does anyone know of their speed, line, length, etc. Cricinfo should be updating their bulletin soon enough anyways, but they don't say enough.

 

[Sanz]

tendulkar has only played once at headingly, and that was in 2002. his maiden test century was at Old trafford, where nearly 1000 runs where scored in the first 2 innings itself.



bouncy wickets have no correlation with seam and swing, and in general bouncy wickets are quite easy to negotiate once you get used to them.



it was actually a slowish wicket without any seam or swing prominent, which is why it ended up being a draw.




i dont know how the cape town wicket was seamer friendly. as bad as the indian bowlers are you would think that they would at least be capable of dismissing the SA side once in 2 attempts on a seamer friendly wicket.



that innings was quite a joke. tendulkar should have been given out not once but twice. once sanford had him caught behind and then dillon had him absolutely plumb lbw only for asoka de silva(not surprisingly) to give him not out on both occasions.



oh come on, there was swing for about a session, that was it, by the time tendulkar came in it was as flat as a pancake and most people will tell you that it was one of the flattest headingly tracks in a very long time. in fact it even started to take turn towards the end of the game as you can see from the wickets kumble and harbhajan took.



tendulkar has had plenty of chances to play on seamer friendly wickets over his career, especially since it spanned the 90s when we saw a fair few of them. however he was also capable of cashing in on the flat tracks and bringing his average up

 

[maxpower]

forget sachin, AA is the best player of swing bowling. Ahh that should end the debate.
First test is in Nagpur, ENG has a good bowling attack, but still my prediction IND to win, with Sachin scoring in high 70's, and Kumble taking bulk of the wickets.

 

[Tom Halsey]

No because Freddie Flintoff has played on 56 tests so far in his career, Had he played 130 tests I would have compared him with Kapil on the basis of 130 tests. Not to mention the fact that Freddie Flintoff will never last 130 test, Kapil beats him hands down on longetivity.

What's the point in quoting stats back from when Fred was rubbish? We're talking about them at their primes.

 

[viktor]

What's the point in quoting stats back from when Fred was rubbish? We're talking about them at their primes.

I believe the comparison was made at 56 Tests because:
Suppose, both Kapil and Flintoff start playing for a some club side together.
After playing 56 games, Kapil has better stats than Flintoff. That would indicate that Kapil is the better player.
Such a comparison would be better than comparing only their best periods or worst periods, whatever..

PS: I am assuming the comaprison was made at 56 Tests. There are too many posts and too little time.. If have made an error, please omit and disregard.

 

[marc71178]

Flintoff has been incosistent and cant be called an alltime great allrounder based on one good year.

A year in which he's played 30 Tests?

 

[marc71178]

So 2 of the spinners are "fit" but now Vaughan's missing and Pietersen has retired hurt.

Can I be the first to say

"Crumpets"

 

[adharcric]

So 2 of the spinners are "fit" but now Vaughan's missing and Pietersen has retired hurt.

Can I be the first to say

"Crumpets"

What exactly happened to KP, he was smashing boundaries. If it is indeed a Munaf Patel bouncer striking Pietersen, I'll be so proud ... an Indian pacer harming the opposition batsmen ... a rare sight.

 

[PY]

What the heck happened to Pietersen? He seems to have been going like a train then retired hurt.

 

[IndianByHeart]

Munaf realy going great guns in this match, he's inching closer to be called up for national duty.

 

[adharcric]

Yeah that's what I'd think too looking at the bowling figures, but cricinfo says that VR Singh was the standout bowler today, at least in the first session. Whoever it is, I hope the selectors get it right.

 

[DhonisOnslaught]

Ok, i have a question for you all. England have so far struggled on this "green top pitch" against second line Indian pace attack (though some guys might be better than our front liners in Ajit/Khan). Would India dare enough to play test match on green top pitch now??

Jones/Harmison/Flintoff/Hoggard against Indian batsmen.

Pathan/Munaf/RPS/Kumble/Santh against English batsmen.


Might prove to be a close contest than the one which will be played on tailor made tracks for Kumble and Bhajji.