Tom Halsey
International Coach
Yeah, a surprise.danish said:
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Is Imran one of the 10 best bowlers ever?
- Thread starter Francis
- Start date
SA
Banned
For me Imran is the:
Best bowler of alltime
Best allrounder of alltime
but
he comes 2nd in my ranking of greatest cricketers of alltime.
Imran bowled with express pace on dead wickets where no one had thought to do so.In his last 50 odd tests ,his batting & bowling averages of 50 & 19 put him above the likes of Gary Sobers,Ian Botham,Richard Hadlle & Kapil Dev,in the list of greatest allrounders of alltime.His bowling record is superb against all test playing nations.Under his captaincy,his team drew 3 test series with WI when everyone else was being whitewashed in 70s & 80s & then he lead Pakistan to their World Cup triumph in 1992.Players like him are born in centuries,if not milleniums.Whoever says Imran isn't among the top 10 of alltime is being biased & needs some more knowledge of cricket.Many geats including Richard Hadlee consider him the 2nd best allrounder of alltime but I disagree with them because Imran was the only allrounder amongst them all,who would make his team on the basis of his performances in one department alone.
Best bowler of alltime
Best allrounder of alltime
but
he comes 2nd in my ranking of greatest cricketers of alltime.
Imran bowled with express pace on dead wickets where no one had thought to do so.In his last 50 odd tests ,his batting & bowling averages of 50 & 19 put him above the likes of Gary Sobers,Ian Botham,Richard Hadlle & Kapil Dev,in the list of greatest allrounders of alltime.His bowling record is superb against all test playing nations.Under his captaincy,his team drew 3 test series with WI when everyone else was being whitewashed in 70s & 80s & then he lead Pakistan to their World Cup triumph in 1992.Players like him are born in centuries,if not milleniums.Whoever says Imran isn't among the top 10 of alltime is being biased & needs some more knowledge of cricket.Many geats including Richard Hadlee consider him the 2nd best allrounder of alltime but I disagree with them because Imran was the only allrounder amongst them all,who would make his team on the basis of his performances in one department alone.
top 10 pacers for me ( no particular order) : Wasim, Ambrose, Marshall, McGrath, Hadlee, Imran, Trueman, Donald, Davidson and Holding.
I'd wager to bet that if you asked all those bowlers who the greatest fast bowler of all time is, they'd say Dennis Lillee. Wasim and Hadlee being two I know of. I believe I heard Davidson saying the same thing about Lillee as well - the best ever. I believe Marshall thought that as well.
top 10 spinners : Murali, Warne, Bedi, Chandra, Grimmett, O'Reiley, Laker, Gibbs, Kumble, Gupte, Saqlain.
Benaud is the first noticable exclusion. Qadir probably deserves to be in... but I didn't blink seeing that you didn't put him in there.
For me Imran is the:
Best bowler of alltime
Best allrounder of alltime
but
he comes 2nd in my ranking of greatest cricketers of alltime.
I found this interesting. I don't agree with it, but I always felt Imran was closer to Sobers than people realise. Sobers was by far the better batter... but I always thought that Sobers was overrated as a bowler. I mean people said he could bowl anything... that's all and well, but was he effective? Was he one of the 50 greatest bowlers ever? Nope.
I'll put it to you this way. Is Sobers one of the ten best batsman ever? Yes. Is Imran one of the ten best bowlers ever? Yes. Is Sobers one of the 100 best bowlers ever? Possibly.. Is Imran one of the 100 best batsmen of all time? Possibly. See where I'm going? It'll always be Sobers for me though as the best all-rounder.
Anyway I think he may just squeeze in. After my top seven there are a lot of contenders... I should have included Ambrose in my original contenders. Bur I think I'd have Imran in because of what he could do with the old ball.
I'd wager to bet that if you asked all those bowlers who the greatest fast bowler of all time is, they'd say Dennis Lillee. Wasim and Hadlee being two I know of. I believe I heard Davidson saying the same thing about Lillee as well - the best ever. I believe Marshall thought that as well.
top 10 spinners : Murali, Warne, Bedi, Chandra, Grimmett, O'Reiley, Laker, Gibbs, Kumble, Gupte, Saqlain.
Benaud is the first noticable exclusion. Qadir probably deserves to be in... but I didn't blink seeing that you didn't put him in there.
For me Imran is the:
Best bowler of alltime
Best allrounder of alltime
but
he comes 2nd in my ranking of greatest cricketers of alltime.
I found this interesting. I don't agree with it, but I always felt Imran was closer to Sobers than people realise. Sobers was by far the better batter... but I always thought that Sobers was overrated as a bowler. I mean people said he could bowl anything... that's all and well, but was he effective? Was he one of the 50 greatest bowlers ever? Nope.
I'll put it to you this way. Is Sobers one of the ten best batsman ever? Yes. Is Imran one of the ten best bowlers ever? Yes. Is Sobers one of the 100 best bowlers ever? Possibly.. Is Imran one of the 100 best batsmen of all time? Possibly. See where I'm going? It'll always be Sobers for me though as the best all-rounder.
Anyway I think he may just squeeze in. After my top seven there are a lot of contenders... I should have included Ambrose in my original contenders. Bur I think I'd have Imran in because of what he could do with the old ball.
BlackCap_Fan
State Vice-Captain
SA said:
Sorry, but Sobers is better than Imran.
C_C
International Captain
Lillee has more reputation than substance in my opinion...doesnt take away from the fact that he was an alltime great bowler but its similar to overhyping Ronaldinho to be in Pele's class. Lillee's record against the best batting lineup of his time (the WI) is modest.
His record in subcontinent is abbysmal, not to mention such a brief sojourn in the subcontinent leaves a huge question mark on his performance on unfriendly pitches.
It is interesting that you take Lillee as one of the greatest ( the greatest in your opinion) and relegate Murali as 'great but not so great' despite the stats being exactly the other way round.
IMO the last 2-3 places in the spinner's lineup arnt fixed..i wouldnt bat an eyelash if someone put Qadir and Benaud in and took out Saqlain and someone else.
Tom Halsey
International Coach
Best bowler of all time is debatable but there is no way that Imran is the best allrounder of all time or the 2nd best cricket of all time.SA said:
Lillee has more reputation than substance in my opinion...doesnt take away from the fact that he was an alltime great bowler but its similar to overhyping Ronaldinho to be in Pele's class. Lillee's record against the best batting lineup of his time (the WI) is modest.
Perhaps, but in 1981 he took 7 wickets in a very short spell and then four in the next, taking a tenfer. To this day people remember him taking that last ball of the day wicket of Viv Richards. The West Indies were the best in 1981 and Lillee was the reason Australia won that and drew that series. Ask any of those Australian players which team w3as better and they'll say the West Indies.
His record in subcontinent is abbysmal, not to mention such a brief sojourn in the subcontinent leaves a huge question mark on his performance on unfriendly pitches.
Pakistan was the only place he suffered greatly in. Arguing weather or not Lillee performed on bad pitches is pointless. I was watching ESPN's legends of cricket and a rash of fast bowlers were talking about how awesome Lillee was on bad pitches. The main discussion was the MCG, which provided unresponsive surfaces in Lillee's career. There were endless stories about how well he did on bad pitches. Bob Willis said he was even better on bad pitches because he didn't want to give you anything. Only his tour of Pakistan is a great blemish and he only played there once.
It is interesting that you take Lillee as one of the greatest ( the greatest in your opinion) and relegate Murali as 'great but not so great' despite the stats being exactly the other way round.
Stats mean so little when there's maybe a few runs inbetween the avergage. Just one extra wickets per match caused by any of the many variables that come into play can effect average such as.
What pitch conditions does so and so play on most of the time.
Does he get wickets because of pressure
Does he have wickets stolen off him because of great bowlers
What were the overhead conditions like? Did they allow the ball to swing.
Did he contribute better with pressure than wickets
Oh there's more and more. Stats are useless when there's such a small difference. There could be absolutely nothing between somebody who has an average of 24 and somebody who has an average of 20.
Most importantly
And as much as we can both go back and forward with these variable and argue them, it's impossible for us to find a balance between them without watching these players. Can a marathon bowler do better by himself? Yes and no. Can a marathon bowler do even better statisticly with a great attack? Yes and no. Both are possible and I never disclude your view on it. What I'm saying is since both are possible, one can only judge how big of an impact these variables had if somebody has seen the bowlers bowl.
Lillee isn't a reputation. Hadlee saw him bowl and thought he was the finest ever. It's almost a universally accepted fact for all who saw him. And that's what weights greatly on my mind because I know stats can be misleading and people who saw Lillee bowl understand what impact he had on games. One thing can cannot be disputed is that Lillee was renound for impacting spells and people saw how he did it.
Perhaps, but in 1981 he took 7 wickets in a very short spell and then four in the next, taking a tenfer. To this day people remember him taking that last ball of the day wicket of Viv Richards. The West Indies were the best in 1981 and Lillee was the reason Australia won that and drew that series. Ask any of those Australian players which team w3as better and they'll say the West Indies.
His record in subcontinent is abbysmal, not to mention such a brief sojourn in the subcontinent leaves a huge question mark on his performance on unfriendly pitches.
Pakistan was the only place he suffered greatly in. Arguing weather or not Lillee performed on bad pitches is pointless. I was watching ESPN's legends of cricket and a rash of fast bowlers were talking about how awesome Lillee was on bad pitches. The main discussion was the MCG, which provided unresponsive surfaces in Lillee's career. There were endless stories about how well he did on bad pitches. Bob Willis said he was even better on bad pitches because he didn't want to give you anything. Only his tour of Pakistan is a great blemish and he only played there once.
It is interesting that you take Lillee as one of the greatest ( the greatest in your opinion) and relegate Murali as 'great but not so great' despite the stats being exactly the other way round.
Stats mean so little when there's maybe a few runs inbetween the avergage. Just one extra wickets per match caused by any of the many variables that come into play can effect average such as.
What pitch conditions does so and so play on most of the time.
Does he get wickets because of pressure
Does he have wickets stolen off him because of great bowlers
What were the overhead conditions like? Did they allow the ball to swing.
Did he contribute better with pressure than wickets
Oh there's more and more. Stats are useless when there's such a small difference. There could be absolutely nothing between somebody who has an average of 24 and somebody who has an average of 20.
Most importantly
And as much as we can both go back and forward with these variable and argue them, it's impossible for us to find a balance between them without watching these players. Can a marathon bowler do better by himself? Yes and no. Can a marathon bowler do even better statisticly with a great attack? Yes and no. Both are possible and I never disclude your view on it. What I'm saying is since both are possible, one can only judge how big of an impact these variables had if somebody has seen the bowlers bowl.
Lillee isn't a reputation. Hadlee saw him bowl and thought he was the finest ever. It's almost a universally accepted fact for all who saw him. And that's what weights greatly on my mind because I know stats can be misleading and people who saw Lillee bowl understand what impact he had on games. One thing can cannot be disputed is that Lillee was renound for impacting spells and people saw how he did it.
sirjeremy11
State Vice-Captain
Anyone else notice that the "Thirty Better Bowlers Than Imran" list has yet to arrive? 
Yeah I'm still waiting as well.
C_C
International Captain
Francis said:
I dont wish to get into the same arguments again and again.
I rate Lillee below the bowlers i've named because my rating criteria for pacers are : overall performance, performance away from home, performance in the subcontinent, performance against the best of the best and support had.
Lillee comes out of the top 10 for me and despite the 'reputation' he has, i believe this is one instance of image considerably inflating the stock.. just the sheer fact that he was the first Aussie/English bowler since Trueman to be truely worldclass pacer and came on before any other pacer of the 70s/80s were around(with the exception of Roberts) truly adds to his hype.
I've seen Lillee bowl quite a bit from clips and stuff....IMO he was a more consistent version of Akhtar and would be in the top 20 for me...still an alltime great...just like Akhtar would be if he could remain bloody fit.
SJS
Hall of Fame Member
Thats true.Tom Halsey said:
but..
those who call Imran a better all rounder than Sobers build the case around statistics too.
I am not arguing here whether or not Imran is amongst the top 10 bowlers or whether or not he is the greatest all rounder just talking of stats.
BTW, I believe that Imran would get into any great bowlers list. I have seen him bowl in every series he played in India and most others on TV. He was a phenomenal bowler. At his peak he looked almost unplayable but I think calling him the greatest all rounder is stretching it a bit too far and this case is built PURELY around stats.
Imran was a great bowler even without his great stats. And he wasnt a better all rounder than Sobers INSPITE of what appear to be better stats.
Second greatest cricketer of all time....well ...what can one say....redefine bias please.
Beleg
International Regular
While I agree that C_C's estimation of Akhtar's worth is exaggerated - I think some of you are seriously underestimating him in turn. In face of his off field and on field shenanigans it is easy to lose sight of his bowling powers which have been on a steady incline since he came to the fore during the 98-99 season.
honestbharani
Whatever it takes!!!
To be honest, the reason Sobers bowled spin (Which he was decent at, but not really good, which he apparently was as a seamer) was because there were so many seamers in the Windies side at that time and team interests dictated that one spinner was needed. And since he was decent at it and because it gave them the option of the additional pacer, he bowled spin in the latter half of his career. Now, all of the above is hearsay, and though I think the people I heard it from are credible, it is still open to be doubted. So, if anyone has facts which proves the contrary, plz let me know in this thread.Francis said:
