Smith vs Kirsten

[Sudeep]

Read the post on the West Indies vs South Africa thread I wrote about Sampras and Warne, greats facing problems. Smith is just a good player and can face problems as well.

Yeah, but they work on it, and eventually eliminate it. With Smith, the process seems to be too slow.

 

[Pratters]

Yeah, but they work on it, and eventually eliminate it. With Smith, the process seems to be too slow.

The fact that he keeps scoring the centuries versus the likes of West Indies for the moment, albeit against a school boy bowling attack means he does not need to work on it till its still working for him.

He has enough time and I find it no reason to believe the technical flaws, which have been made a pefect case of a mountain made of a mole hill, we diminish/be removed.

You do not believe that and you are entitled to your opinion.

Cheers.

 

[Langeveldt]

The captaincy cannot factor into it when comparing Kirsten and Smith either. Had Kirsten been granted the captaincy at that stage, he may have done as well if not better. Simply put, you can't compare the two players and factor in anything until Smith has played 101 Tests.

Absolute tosh.. So we cannot safely say that Don Bradman was a better bat than Nasser Hussain because Nasser played more tests?

 

[Richard]

So he was in poor touch for the last 3 Tests of a series after scoring 2 massive scores as well then?

Convenient that, got nothing to do with England having him worked out is it...

Nope, mostly it had to do with bad luck - about which he could not complain, having been dropped on 8 in the 259 and missed lbw on 127 in the 277.
You can't work someone out by getting them given lbw incorrectly, getting them to tread on their stumps and getting them run-out.

 

[Richard]

Gary Kirsten's defensive technique allowed him to thrive in conditions that Smith simply cannot.

How do you know Smith cannot thrive in them - how often has he had the chance?

 

[Richard]

Because Smith has a major technical glitch which he hasn't been able to solve so far?

A major technical glitch? I'd have thought a major technical glitch would have stopped someone from averaging 53 in Test-cricket.

 

[tooextracool]

that simply gives you an idea about how poor the standard of pace bowling is today.
and seriously, you of all people should know that major weaknesses arent being exposed as well as they would have in a different era, considering how much hayden averages.

 

[Richard]

Yet there's not as much evidence that Smith has a particular weakness as Hayden does; Smith's only ever been troubled by Bicknell (twice) and Hoggard (three times) and he's proved proficient at whipping inswingers away, unlike Hayden.
Yes, the standard of seam-bowling is poor ATM but until you're found-out consistently rather than just in 2 or 3 games we don't know whether or not it's having a massive effect.

 

[tooextracool]

Yet there's not as much evidence that Smith has a particular weakness as Hayden does; Smith's only ever been troubled by Bicknell (twice) and Hoggard (three times) and he's proved proficient at whipping inswingers away, unlike Hayden.

when exactly did he prove this? every time hes come across anything near a quality pace attack his average has fallen down to the 20s.

Yes, the standard of seam-bowling is poor ATM but until you're found-out consistently rather than just in 2 or 3 games we don't know whether or not it's having a massive effect.

yes and its hard to say that its not affected him either, given the number of times hes faced quality bowlers and the fact that on each occasion hes come up short.

 

[Richard]

when exactly did he prove this? every time hes come across anything near a quality pace attack his average has fallen down to the 20s.

On one of two occasions, yes - and as we've been through before even the poor-quality attacks will still have bowled plenty of inswingers, and he's proven very adept at whipping them away.

yes and its hard to say that its not affected him either, given the number of times hes faced quality bowlers and the fact that on each occasion hes come up short.

The number of times? I'd say they number 2 or 3 at most.
And that doesn't really show very much.

 

[Mr Mxyzptlk]

did you read any of my last post? seriously how in the world can someone who played away from his body for a very large part of his career and had a weakness against the short ball have a great defensive technique?
if you ask me, 9 out of 10 openers with kirsten's technique would have failed miserably in their test careers. the fact that kirsten succeeded was testiment to his character and mental toughness.
even graeme smith, while he has a weakness against the in swinger, even he has a more solid defense than kirsten. whether he can work around his weakness like kirsten did though, is yet to be proven.

I read your post and responded. The point being that Kirsten may have had weaknesses, but Smith's are more harmful to his game in my estimation. Not the last three words...

 

[tooextracool]

I read your post and responded. The point being that Kirsten may have had weaknesses, but Smith's are more harmful to his game in my estimation. Not the last three words...

exactly and to say something like kirsten had an excellent technique is rather ludicrous, given that he so obviously did not.
as far as smith's technique being more harmful to his game is concerned,we'll find that out eventually, but IMO kirsten had far more flaws in his technique that he had to work his way around, than someone like smith does, because kirsten's flaws against the short ball and the playing onto the stumps could have been exposed my any fast bowler on any wicket. at least in smith's case his weakness is limited to bowlers who can swing the ball and only when they get the conditions to do so.

 

[tooextracool]

On one of two occasions, yes - and as we've been through before even the poor-quality attacks will still have bowled plenty of inswingers, and he's proven very adept at whipping them away.

and as has been said before, the odd on target in swinger doesnt expose the weakness of any player. to expose someones weakness you have to be capable of bowling that ball consistently, not just once in a blue moon.

The number of times? I'd say they number 2 or 3 at most.
And that doesn't really show very much.

assuming you mean the number of quality attacks, then failing against 2 or 3 is a significant number, especially considering that most bowling attacks in the world today are extremely poor.

 

[tooextracool]

Yet there's not as much evidence that Smith has a particular weakness as Hayden does; Smith's only ever been troubled by Bicknell (twice) and Hoggard (three times) and he's proved proficient at whipping inswingers away, unlike Hayden.
Yes, the standard of seam-bowling is poor ATM but until you're found-out consistently rather than just in 2 or 3 games we don't know whether or not it's having a massive effect.

err smith was troubled by shabbir in pakistan too.
and i think the above argument is applicable to hayden too, because he hasnt been found out consistently either.

 

[Richard]

Yet Hayden since 2001\02 has simply barely seen a seaming wicket or a bowler who can swing the ball: Hoggard at The SCG in 2002\03; Mumbai 2004\05 and Mills at The 'Gabba the next game are about the only times.
Smith's played 63 Test-innings, 22 of them could be classified as on seaming pitches or against bowlers consistently swinging the ball. Naturally, his average drops quite a bit but he's still played well enough times, and negated less accurate bowlers who can nonetheless swing it in a considerable number of times, to suggest he can negate the flaws in his technique.
I didn't, of course, see South Africa in Pakistan so I was unaware of Shabbir causing him problems.

 

[Richard]

and as has been said before, the odd on target in swinger doesnt expose the weakness of any player. to expose someones weakness you have to be capable of bowling that ball consistently, not just once in a blue moon.

No, against someone who is poor against the inswinger a single delivery can be enough, easily.

assuming you mean the number of quality attacks, then failing against 2 or 3 is a significant number, especially considering that most bowling attacks in the world today are extremely poor.

No, it's not - because there are so many poor attacks around you rarely get the chance to prove yourself against a good one, meaning that the odd sporadic failure could easily be coincidence and nought else.

 

[tooextracool]

Yet Hayden since 2001\02 has simply barely seen a seaming wicket or a bowler who can swing the ball: Hoggard at The SCG in 2002\03; Mumbai 2004\05 and Mills at The 'Gabba the next game are about the only times.
Smith's played 63 Test-innings, 22 of them could be classified as on seaming pitches or against bowlers consistently swinging the ball. Naturally, his average drops quite a bit but he's still played well enough times, and negated less accurate bowlers who can nonetheless swing it in a considerable number of times, to suggest he can negate the flaws in his technique.

how in the world does someone whos average falls to miserable levels against swing bowlers suggest that he could negate the flaws in his technique?

 

[tooextracool]

No, against someone who is poor against the inswinger a single delivery can be enough, easily.

absolute tripe, how many times do i have to say that a single inswinger is hardly ever going to get anyone with a weakness out to it? you have to be capable of putting it in the right place several times. seriously, thats like saying ponting is poor against spin, hence he must get out to the first turning ball he faces.

No, it's not - because there are so many poor attacks around you rarely get the chance to prove yourself against a good one, meaning that the odd sporadic failure could easily be coincidence and nought else.

coincidence? how is it coincidence when you get out lbw to the same bowler 3 times in a series? how is it coincidence that the bowlers who have caused him problems are all swing bowlers? how is it coincidence that every single time hes faced a quality attack hes failed?

 

[honestbharani]

He hasn't faced the Aussies and I think we can only judge after that has happened.

 

[tooextracool]

he did, except that it was on debut.