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Originally Posted by tooextracool
Except as i said earlier, the whole game of cricket does not revolve around Australia. England won the Ashes, and India beat Australia 2-1 and drew 1-1 in Australia in 03/04. Neither of those accomplishments made either team the best in the world, because it is performance against all teams that matters not just Australia. As ive shown you even if you were to look at the head to head record against Australia, SA came out on top. Whether or not SA lost crunch games to Australia is rather irrelevant and you are really clutching at straws if you think otherwise, because they were still winning tournaments and beating everyone including Australia quite comfortably for the most part. They had the better players than every other team in the world.
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Right, but we're comparing South Africa and Australia directly. The fact is, Australia also beat most other sides in the period leading up to the 99 World Cup. After the 96/97 C&U Series where Mark Taylor was dropped as captain, Australia lost a series against England, lost in the final of the Coca-Cola cup to India and lost early in the Wills Cup. South Africa lost a home series against Australia and the finals of the next C&U Series, and lost in a triangular series with India and England. Aside from that, both teams beat most other opposition and were clearly the best sides in the entire gap between World Cups. So yes, comparing their head to head records is the best way to compare the teams, unlike say comparing India and Australia in that way between 2001 and 2004.
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Originally Posted by tooextracool
Waugh was a decent captain alright, but he was nowhere near the same class as Cronje. Cronje was a great leader as well as a great tactician. It might have affected his batting a bit, but he was still a much better captain than Waugh.
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I'm not necessarily disagreeing with that (aside from the "nowhere near" part), but Waugh was certainly a great leader under pressure, and it's no coincidence that in those key matches against South Africa (who I'm sure we can agree were Australia's biggest threat) he played crucial roles every time, while Cronje certainly didn't.
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Originally Posted by tooextracool
You have to be kidding if you think Gilchrist is or was a very good batsman. His record is extremely good only if you consider that hes a wicket keeper, but averaging in the low 30s which he has been for most of his career(even now if you remove his record against bangladesh and zimbabwe) and hes only about as good as Sehwag. Unless of course you think Sehwag is brilliant as well.
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I'd love to hear how they are comparable. Gilchrist averages a shade under 36 when you remove the minnows from his record, compared to Sehwag's 31.38 after the same process. Gilchrist also scores more centuries per match and wins far more games for his side. And while Gilchrist isn't an all-time great in ODIs or anything as a batsman alone, he's most certainly a "good" batsman. Gilchrist has the 61st highest average in ODI history, which might not sound like much, but it places him in the top 20 or so among openers in the history of the format, which combined with a fair ability to make big scores and a superb strike rate certainly make him a "good" batsman.