ohnoitsyou
International Regular
Coudnt help it, was fresh of reading one of Blockys ishant is an atg postsSomebody voted ishant so it left me no choice but to pick Sami
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Who is the best bowler ever to average over 30 in Test cricket?
- Thread starter a massive zebra
- Start date
Red
The normal awards that everyone else has
GIMH
Norwood's on Fire
Yes
Red
The normal awards that everyone else has
Both ****s
smash84
The Tiger King
In economics it is called kinky preferences
GGG
State Captain
No way, I am really surprised that Lee has such a high average.
the big bambino
International Captain
I'm not. If he was off his pace he little left to keep batsmen quiet let alone take their wicket.
watson
Banned
Brett Lee didn't 'keep batsman quiet' as much other top class quicks. However, in the process of carting Lee's bowling around the park they also tended to get out.
His Strike Rate of 53.4 puts him on a par with Imran Khan, and marginally ahead of Wes Hall, Andy Roberts, Curtly Ambrose, and Wasim Akram.
adub
International Captain
His average is actually pretty flattering. Apart from beating up on the Windies, SL and NZ in 22 of his 76 tests his record was very sparse. He didn't average under his career average against any side other than those three. Against everyone else his record blows out to 36.95 average and sr of 62.3. Super ODI bowler, but was rarely much of a threat at test level and almost never against really good test sides.
harsh.ag
Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Since when have WI, SL, and NZ become teams you "beat up on"?
NZTailender
I can't believe I ate the whole thing
approx 2002
watson
Banned
Admittedly, an Average of 37 against the top teams is not fabulous. However, a Strike Rate of 62 is relatively good, and I can't imagine that many bowlers doing a lot better against quality opposition. For example, a quick check of Curtly Ambrose's career showed that he bowled 478 overs against Pakistan during the 90s and came away with a Strike Rate of 68. Wasim Akram had a Strike Rate of 70 against England after 4 series.....etc...etc.
In short, I think that we're being overly picky here.
adub
International Captain
The last time WI were not a team Australia beat up on was in the 99 squared series in the Carribean. (prior to Lee's debut)
The last time NZ were not a team Australia beat up on when Richard Hadlee opened the bowling (a long long time prior to Lee's)
The last time SL were not a team Australia beat up on in Australia (Lee never played a test in SL) = this has never happened
For all of Lee's test career Australia were the clear No.1 in the world. For the vast majority of that time WI, SL and NZ would have been battling out for 6th, 7th, & 8th in the rankings. Against those three teams from the time Lee debuted until he played his last test Australia played 35 tests for 28 wins, 6 draws and 1 loss which is about as dominant as test cricket gets. Even the solitary win for the Windies, superb as the world record chase was, came in a dead rubber at the end of a series where Australia had only lost 29 wickets in getting to 3-0 up and about the only time WI looked like being competitive in the series was when Shiv and Sarwan came together at 4/165 in the 4th dig. We beat up on those teams in that time probably more than any top 8 test sides have ever been beaten up on.
A big part of the reason we beat up on them was that apart from a few notable exceptions like Lara and Shiv those sides didn't have batsmen that could cope with genuine quick bowling. Lee dined out on that with them taking 16 of his 27 4w hauls against them (no surprises that 5 of his others were against India in Australia). But against teams that had batsmen that took a bit more than just pace to dislodge Lee was usually scored against pretty heavily and rarely made a great impact. I can't see how Lee would be close to being the best bowler with a +30 ave.
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adub
International Captain
I'm certainly not saying Lee was complete rubbish, just that there are probably lots of better picks than him in this particular question. His pace and possibly also his undoubted quality in ODI's perhaps raising his status as a test bowler a fair bit above what his actual test bowling deserved.
harsh.ag
Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
I agree there are better options for this poll than Lee, but the point was that Flintoff is NOT one of them but has the same number of votes.
I would put Prasanna, Jack Gregory, Qadir, Umar Gul, and Amar Singh ahead of him, and Broad, Anderson, Patterson, Foster and Harbhajan as his equals or thereabout.
watson
Banned
Yeah, fair enough with regards to the question in the OP.
However, as far as 'status' is concerned, I don't think that the general concensus has raised Lee above his station. That is, most would rate him as a 'good fast bowler' who played a 'good supporting role' to the brilliance of McGrath and Warne. I don't know of anyone who places him close to the ATG category.
But of course, the word 'good' is loaded with subjective meaning and therefore can be interpreted in a number of different ways.