Richard said:
As far as I can tell it's never produced one that turned that much in my scope,
why does that not surprise me?
Richard said:
but certainly the games against England (2001\02), Aus and WI (1999\2000) which have come much closer to being fingerspin-friendly wickets than anywhere else.
the game against england wasnt a turner, we've been through this before. giles got his wickets by getting turn out of the rough. and the fact that vettori got his wickets at over 30 a piece only emphasises that.
as far as the WI game is concerned, this one really shows your desperation. 4 wickets in the entire game were taken by spinners! vettori got 3 of them at an average of over 50 and the other wicket was taken by chanderpaul! well done with that one. so really we've had 2 turning basin reserve wickets since god knows how long.
Richard said:
And that wicket wasn't exactly flat, it was a turner. Yet Styris still scored runs - because everyone scores runs when they shouldn't really be occasionally.
and styris is perfectly capable of playing spin.....your point is?
Richard said:
Err, you were right that Pollock and Ntini were accurate; Terbrugge, Kallis and Boje were all clearly wayward (or else very unlucky - something I find highly unlikely) and this is extremely out-of-character for all three.
so now apparently 2 bowlers being accurate isnt enough to get poor players like styris out? especially when they happen to be the 2 best bowlers in the side?
with regards to the rest, terbrugge is rubbish, i dont see how him bowling rubbish is uncharacteristic. kallis has always been wayward and really has never ever been accurate in his entire career. boje is accurate, but simply not good enough to contend with anyone on a non turner, and styris as ive said earlier, is a good player of spin.
Richard said:
Why on Earth would anyone bowl shorter just because it's away from home? No, the fact is simply that he's been played for the most part much better away from home than he has been at home, which can only be explained as coincidence (and given that most of his home Tests have come against subcontinental teams and a weak West Indies some of it isn't surprising).
he doesnt bowl shorter just because hes away from home, its just that ntini doesnt know how to bowl anything else. in SA his bowling short actually makes him a decent bowler because with the kind of wickets that you get there bowling a bit short there makes you a decent bowler. fact is that in other conditions, particularly england and NZ it makes you poor, and when ntini starts of poorly it usually means he needs to bowl even shorter and therefore we have our overrated pace bowler who cant do anything away from home.
Richard said:
So why has he taken wickets when there's seam-movement sometimes (yes, he's wasted it at others) and hardly ever (except against poor batting) when there's not?
because every bowler can take wickets in seamer friendly conditions sometimes.....