Post WW2 Dream XI

[The Sean]

Also, The Sean could clarify this; did Miller take Bradman's role at #3 once he retired or what? It looks like he did and in hindsight that's quite a compliment to him. Although, he struggled.

I'd have guessed that Hassett and then Harvey took the #3 position once Bradman retired in most cases.

Miller actually spent most of the next series in South Africa in 1949/50 coming in at no.3 (after not being picked for the tour at all initially!) before settling back down to no.4 or more often no.5 from that point on. He also batted at first drop a few times in England in 1953 and at home in 54/55. He was never a massive success there, but did play one of his finest Test innings from no.3 - a second-innings 109 at Lord's in 1953.

 

[Ikki]

Thanks Sean. The thing about Miller's bowling is because he didn't bowl enough per game (which was because of a back-injury whilst wrestling) to get the 4-or-so wickets per match which people think an absolutely top bowler must have, he tends to be underrated. It's easy to show that in quality, average/sr, you may say Miller was Imran's equal and can compare with the absolute best when you take into account the periods they played in.

                [B]Avg.    SR[/B]
[B][COLOR="DarkRed"]Miller[/COLOR][/B]         22.97   61.5
[B]Other Pacers[/B]   28.80   74.6
[B][COLOR="Blue"]Difference[/COLOR][/B]      5.83   13.1

[B][COLOR="DarkGreen"]Imran[/COLOR][/B]          22.81   53.7
[B]Other Pacers[/B]   29.60   63.7
[B][COLOR="Blue"]Difference[/COLOR][/B]      6.79    10

 

[bagapath]

the one stat that bothers me when i look at miller's records is his bowling SR. for a pacer to take 70 balls per wicket doesnt sound great. though i would have been his die hard fan if i were born in his era beacuse i am a sucker for flair players and he is one of the top 20 cricketers of all-time, his bowling alone may not have been the imran/ ambrose variety. may be he was a walsh kind of bowler, very good but just short of greatness.

 

[The Sean]

the one stat that bothers me when i look at miller's records is his bowling SR. for a pacer to take 70 balls per wicket doesnt sound great.

It was actually just a bit over 60 - in an era where very few bowlers had strike rates much better than that. Trueman and Lindwall are the only two fast bowlers of that era (with more than 100 wickets) that I can think of with better career S/Rs than that and only Trueman's was significantly better. Lindwall's was 59.8 IIRC.

 

[bagapath]

It was actually just a bit over 60 - in an era where very few bowlers had strike rates much better than that. Trueman and Lindwall are the only two fast bowlers of that era (who had long careers) that I can think of with better S/Rs than that and only Trueman's was significantly better. Lindwalls's was 59.8 IIRC.

you're right. this is the ranking of top 8 fast bowlers with 50 + wickets from post ww2 till the end of 1956 in the order of SR.


FH Tyson (Eng) 1954-1956 12 21 2412 1044 59 7/27 10/130 17.69 2.59 40.8 3 1
FS Trueman (Eng) 1952-1956 11 21 2337 1192 53 8/31 9/40 22.49 3.06 44.0 3 0
Khan Mohammad (Pak) 1952-1956 11 19 2671 935 52 6/21 8/41 17.98 2.10 51.3 4 0
RR Lindwall (Aus) 1946-1956 55 101 12276 4698 212 7/38 9/70 22.16 2.29 57.9 12 0
Fazal Mahmood (Pak) 1952-1956 16 25 4454 1455 73 7/42 13/114 19.93 1.96 61.0 7 3
KR Miller (Aus) 1946-1956 55 95 10461 3906 170 7/60 10/152 22.97 2.24 61.5 7 1
JB Statham (Eng) 1951-1956 32 57 6394 2409 101 7/39 9/88 23.85 2.26 63.3 2 0
AV Bedser (Eng) 1946-1955 51 92 15918 5876 236 7/44 14/99 24.89 2.21 67.4 15 5

 

[The Sean]

you're right. this is the ranking of top 8 fast bowlers with 50 + wickets from post ww2 till the end of 1956 in the order of SR.


FH Tyson (Eng) 1954-1956 12 21 2412 1044 59 7/27 10/130 17.69 2.59 40.8 3 1
FS Trueman (Eng) 1952-1956 11 21 2337 1192 53 8/31 9/40 22.49 3.06 44.0 3 0
Khan Mohammad (Pak) 1952-1956 11 19 2671 935 52 6/21 8/41 17.98 2.10 51.3 4 0
RR Lindwall (Aus) 1946-1956 55 101 12276 4698 212 7/38 9/70 22.16 2.29 57.9 12 0
Fazal Mahmood (Pak) 1952-1956 16 25 4454 1455 73 7/42 13/114 19.93 1.96 61.0 7 3
KR Miller (Aus) 1946-1956 55 95 10461 3906 170 7/60 10/152 22.97 2.24 61.5 7 1
JB Statham (Eng) 1951-1956 32 57 6394 2409 101 7/39 9/88 23.85 2.26 63.3 2 0
AV Bedser (Eng) 1946-1955 51 92 15918 5876 236 7/44 14/99 24.89 2.21 67.4 15 5

So only one fast bowler who took more than 100 wickets in the decade after WWII did so with a better strike rate than Miller. Of course we know that Trueman maintained his sub-50 S/R for another 250 wickets but he is very much the exception in this era - particularly when you consider that the great fast men who immediately followed this such as Davidson, Hall and Adcock, all had S/Rs of 60+ as well.

 

[Ikki]

the one stat that bothers me when i look at miller's records is his bowling SR. for a pacer to take 70 balls per wicket doesnt sound great. though i would have been his die hard fan if i were born in his era beacuse i am a sucker for flair players and he is one of the top 20 cricketers of all-time, his bowling alone may not have been the imran/ ambrose variety. may be he was a walsh kind of bowler, very good but just short of greatness.

As Sean says and as my stats just above your post show; there were very few bowlers who struck under 60 in Miller's time. Which makes his 61.5 actually quite a fantastic achievement. Akin to the low 50s in our time. This difference is explained probably in the approach to batting. In Miller's era, batsmen were more defensive and struck less balls. This has an adverse effect on the SRs of the time, but helps the ERs.

                [B]ER[/B]
[B][COLOR="DarkRed"]Miller[/COLOR][/B]         2.24
[B]Other Pacers[/B]   2.29

[COLOR="DarkGreen"][B]Imran[/B][/COLOR]          2.54
[B]Other Pacers[/B]   2.66

This approach to batting has also shaped the current era. But I won't get into that here.

 

[bagapath]

trueman must surely walk into the hall of fame for being so far ahead of his contemporaries

 

[Ikki]

trueman must surely walk into the hall of fame for being so far ahead of his contemporaries

Yes, I've raised that question a few times. He was so far ahead that it's baffling that his name doesn't pop up as much as it should. Of course, he was a pretty unpopular character IIRC; in that he rubbed people the wrong way. This, I guess, is a big flaw when it comes to contemporary commentary.

Although, his home and away record are like day and night. Not that his away record is bad; but not near his absolutely superlative home record.

 

[bagapath]

the contrast betweeen his greatness at home and "mere-goodness" overseas could be the reason for that


home 1952-1965 47 90 10295 4590 229 8/31 12/119 20.04 2.67 44.9 14 3
away 1954-1963 20 37 4883 2035 78 7/75 9/91 26.08 2.50 62.6 3 0

EDIT: ikki, you beat me to it

 

[Lillian Thomson]

the contrast betweeen his greatness at home and "mere-goodness" overseas could be the reason for that


home 1952-1965 47 90 10295 4590 229 8/31 12/119 20.04 2.67 44.9 14 3
away 1954-1963 20 37 4883 2035 78 7/75 9/91 26.08 2.50 62.6 3 0

EDIT: ikki, you beat me to it

In Trueman's day many of the top players only went on the main tours so he probably only played against Australia and West Indies overseas so he didn't play against the poorer sides of the era (except maybe the odd Test against New Zealand as the only tours there were tagged onto the end of an Ashes Tour.)

 

[bagapath]

Team so far

1. Sir Len Hutton
2. Sunil Gavaskar
3. Sir Viv Richards (leading)
4. Sachin Tendulkar (leading)
5. Sir Gary Sobers (leading)
6. -------------
7. Adam Gilchrist (leading)
8. Sir Richard Hadlee
9. Malcolm Marshall
10. -------------
11. -------------

 

[Slifer]

Quite satisifed with the post ww2 team so far, with the possible exception of the omittion og Greg Chappell.

 

[archie mac]

Miller actually spent most of the next series in South Africa in 1949/50 coming in at no.3 (after not being picked for the tour at all initially!) before settling back down to no.4 or more often no.5 from that point on. He also batted at first drop a few times in England in 1953 and at home in 54/55. He was never a massive success there, but did play one of his finest Test innings from no.3 - a second-innings 109 at Lord's in 1953.

They actually asked Toshack to go after Johnston was injuried but he turned them down, and then they asked Miller

 

[bagapath]

Team so far

1. Sir Len Hutton
2. Sunil Gavaskar
3. Sir Viv Richards
4. Sachin Tendulkar
5. Sir Gary Sobers--
6. http://www.cricketweb.net/forum/cricket-chat/41984-choose-last-player-post-ww-2-xi.html
7. Adam Gilchrist
8. Sir Richard Hadlee
9. Malcolm Marshall
10. Shane Warne (Leading)
11.Dennis Lillee (Leading)

 

[bagapath]

warne and lillee win the 3rd and 4th bowling slots. brian lara is leading miller and imran for the last remaining slot.

for those who dont remember the last time we did this back in 2006, CW selected the following team representing post ww 2 period.

1. Sunil Gavaskar
2. Len Hutton
3. Viv Richards
4. Sachin Tendulkar
5. Brian Lara
6. Gary Sobers
7. Adam Gilchrist
8. Malcom Marshall
9. Shane Warne
10. Muttiah Muralitharan
11. Glenn McGrath

this time around hadlee and lillee have replaced mcgrath and murali. lara is likely to retain his position unless miller or imran stage a drmatic comeback late in the day. the remaining 8 have retained their postions.

 

[steve132]

warne and lillee win the 3rd and 4th bowling slots. brain lara is leading miller and imran for the last remaining slot.

for those who dont remember the last time we did this back in 2006, CW selected the following team representing post ww 2 period.

1. Sunil Gavaskar
2. Len Hutton
3. Viv Richards
4. Sachin Tendulkar
5. Brian Lara
6. Gary Sobers
7. Adam Gilchrist
8. Malcom Marshall
9. Shane Warne
10. Muttiah Muralitharan
11. Glenn McGrath

this time around hadlee and lillee have replaced mcgrath and murali. lara is likely to retain his position unless miller or imran stage a drmatic comeback late in the day. the remaining 8 have retained their postions.

I marginally prefer the 2006 team, since Murali added variety to the bowling attack. Both are very strong sides, however.

 

[stephen]

I also am a fan of the 06 team - batting marginally weaker, but more variety with Murali and McGrath > Hadlee as a bowler IMO.

 

[bagapath]

it is essentially a toss up between the bowling attacks:

and in essence it is

lillee, hadlee VS mcgrath, murali

it is a tough, tough call.

 

[Fusion]

IMHO, both Lillee and Hadlee > McGrath, plus we only need one world class spinner so the current team is slightly better. Both teams have a glaring ommision in that Imran is missing.