I don’t completely agree here, but fair. He was simultaneously bowling brilliantly against England in the ODIs. Maybe he was neutralised by the WI batters to a great extent. Still I feel it was an amazing attack with Dymock and Pascoe as well(and Thomson only tailed off post 1980, till 1979-80, he was still bowling well and was fast(obviously not peak)).
As I said, it was a pretty great attack but looked much better on paper than reality. Even Lillee averaged 30+ there. You previously said Viv was the difference to which I disagree (not saying Viv wasn't the best player there by a huge margin), it was the pace attack as Marshall, Garner and Holding totally owned Australia. That series wasn't close but proper WI dominance in all the 3 matches.
Lillee averaging 30 plus was more to WI dominance as he was bowling well in that series by all accounts.
Yeah, but I definitely feel it should be counted against Lillee.
Making a bowler perform poorly means the attack sucked. That’s a new one.
Can't it be that because the bowler performed poorly the opposition dominated?? Like Ashwin/Bumrah in the recent NZ series.
It can be either. I’m curious as to why you would automatically assume its one. I’d still say even if the bowler is having an off series, if they were on form prior and after, a large portion of credit should go towards the batsmen they were facing.
When did I exactly said Viv doesn't deserves credit for that series, or any other WI bat. I would rate that series ahead of both of Smith's. Just that the Aussie attack seemed way better than their returns suggests. And the fact I, alongside probably most others, would rate that series even higher had Lillee averaged 20 odd and dominated the WI batters except Viv.
Not according to the Wisden, which describes Lillee with less pace but more clever as a bowler in that series.
Doesn't really have the results to back him up completely there. Not only Viv, but WI batting unit as a whole did quite well vs Australia. And like, saying the series would be rated higher had Lillee averaged 10 runs less shan't be controversial at all.
As soon as you said that, I didn’t feel any need to debate further
As I said, Smith faced a tougher attack in India, but it's hard to look past that consistency.