The 4 pace idea - proven to be not good ?

[Laurrz]

with the overrate we saw Symo and Pup having to bowl 20 overs together and leaking 70 runs in that crucial period which could be the difference between the sides

i dont think we're gonna see this tactic again.. that said Windies seem to do ok without a spinner?

 

[Richard]

The essential point is - does anyone seriously think Hogg (or McGain, or whoever) would have done any better?

Sure, Tait (and the part-time spinners, and of times Johnson) have bowled poorly this match, but can you really say because of one single match that a spinner must be picked?

Absolutely not IMO.

 

[sideshowtim]

I think it worked fine. It's hard to have all 4 bowlers firing at their best regardless of what make up you have. If you look at the scores India were dismissed for - 330 and 294, you'd hardly consider that a 'failure', sure Tait had an absolutely shocker but it's rare to see all 4 bowlers bowling very well. Clark and Lee bowled excellently, Johnson did alright but Tait was awful...It's not rare to see one of the 4 bowlers have a shocker regardless of what style they bowl. Our woeful batting in this Test has made our very good bowling performance seem less of an achievement.

The only problem with the format is the over rate, which I think could be improved if they tried harder to do it. We were definitely slack with that today.

 

[Laurrz]

The essential point is - does anyone seriously think Hogg (or McGain, or whoever) would have done any better?

Sure, Tait (and the part-time spinners, and of times Johnson) have bowled poorly this match, but can you really say because of one single match that a spinner must be picked?

Absolutely not IMO.

i agree with this, but surely we cant expect to keep filling in Symo and Clarke to get it right and escape fines/bans

so yea my whole point to this is over rates..

 

[Richard]

Right, I see.

Well, the rarity value of an all-seam attack means the only way to test-out whether you'll be able to bowl your overs quickly enough with one is to... yes, pick one and try.

Think the heat has been pretty intense this Test too hasn't it? Which obviously won't have helped.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

with the overrate we saw Symo and Pup having to bowl 20 overs together and leaking 70 runs in that crucial period which could be the difference between the sides

i dont think we're gonna see this tactic again.. that said Windies seem to do ok without a spinner?

The West Indies came to England in 1976 after Lance Gibbs had retired with Padmore and Jumadeen, neither were good enough so Clive Lloyd decided they would just use their best four bowlers whatever they were. They didn't have anything like a "Test class" spinner until Harper came along. It's true it didn't help the overrates as they got away with bowling 75 overs in some days until the minimum requirement (96 at first) came along. They still didn't improve their overrate though, they were quite happy to run over time where necessary. I remember leaving Lords at 7:40PM on one occasion and there had been no delays in play at all.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

I alluded to the Tait situation here. Shaun's a special type of bowler, he needs to be used right. He feeds off other peoples confidence in him as well as his own. Ponting just doesn't use him right in tests and until he's got Punter's confidence with the red ball, he'll never be a success at test level.

I also think he's a bit down on match practice, which is why I have been severely pro-Noffke for inclusion at this point. Tait's bowled very little recently (he destroyed QLD in the Pura before Christmas, and in a few 20/20's) and needs to get a lot of overs under his belt. I suppose with Tait, he's one of those bowlers that relies on so many factors other than form that it might be worth taking the gamble.

I hope they keep him for Adelaide, they need to show some strong faith in him if they want him to come good.

 

[chaminda_00]

McGain greater then Tait any day of week.

 

[wpdavid]

The West Indies came to England in 1976 after Lance Gibbs had retired with Padmore and Jumadeen, neither were good enough so Clive Lloyd decided they would just use their best four bowlers whatever they were. They didn't have anything like a "Test class" spinner until Harper came along. It's true it didn't help the overrates as they got away with bowling 75 overs in some days until the minimum requirement (96 at first) came along. They still didn't improve their overrate though, they were quite happy to run over time where necessary. I remember leaving Lords at 7:40PM on one occasion and there had been no delays in play at all.

Of course, it helped that those guys were rather better than Shaun Tait and, as you said, they were so much better than the WI spinners at the time that it was a no-brainer really.

Going back to the original question, the other side that did pretty well with an all pace attack was SA in the 1990's. Same logic, I suppose, & there have been times when I've argued a similar approach for England before Panesar came along.

 

[chaminda_00]

There were a lot of matches where the 4th seamer averaged like 35-40 in Test Cricket and basically played just cus he was a fast bowler. Can't think of their names of the top of my head. But there were quite a few occasions where they played someone just cus they were a fast bowler.

 

[Richard]

The only truly non-outstanding West Indies seamers who played Test-cricket between 1976 and 1986 were Winston Davis and Milton Small (who only played something like 2 Tests anyway). There was Winston Benjamin for a brief time too, and he certainly wasn't bad.

Obviously, the preliminaries were laid with the likes of Holder, Boyce and Julien; they were then joined by Roberts, a cut above them in most respects; Holding and Daniel got in there next in 1976, followed by Garner and Croft a year later; there was 2 years out with the Packer Schism (in which time Sylvester Clarke played a fair few games, and Malcolm Marshall too, but he wasn't that good yet); then the Roberts-Holding-Garner-Croft (with Marshall and Clarke stepping-in when one of them missed a game) quad was the first-choice for about 2 years. Croft retired, then Roberts, and there was a brief period where they had a couple of all-rounders and a five-man attack including Harper and Baptiste. Then Walsh came on the scene, then Patterson, then Ambrose, then Bishop. Marshall retired, and Kenneth Benjamin (who wasn't really that good) played for a while.

Really, though, the fact that bowlers of the calibre of Clarke, Gray, Daniel and Croft played so few games shows how strong West Indies' pace stocks were around that time. Only very rarely did a genuinely weak seamer play. Later in the 1980s, other Padmore\Jumadeen-esque bowlers like Clyde Butts played.

 

[subshakerz]

The only truly non-outstanding West Indies seamers who played Test-cricket between 1976 and 1986 were Winston Davis and Milton Small (who only played something like 2 Tests anyway). There was Winston Benjamin for a brief time too, and he certainly wasn't bad.

Obviously, the preliminaries were laid with the likes of Holder, Boyce and Julien; they were then joined by Roberts, a cut above them in most respects; Holding and Daniel got in there next in 1976, followed by Garner and Croft a year later; there was 2 years out with the Packer Schism (in which time Sylvester Clarke played a fair few games, and Malcolm Marshall too, but he wasn't that good yet); then the Roberts-Holding-Garner-Croft (with Marshall and Clarke stepping-in when one of them missed a game) quad was the first-choice for about 2 years. Croft retired, then Roberts, and there was a brief period where they had a couple of all-rounders and a five-man attack including Harper and Baptiste. Then Walsh came on the scene, then Patterson, then Ambrose, then Bishop. Marshall retired, and Kenneth Benjamin (who wasn't really that good) played for a while.

Really, though, the fact that bowlers of the calibre of Clarke, Gray, Daniel and Croft played so few games shows how strong West Indies' pace stocks were around that time. Only very rarely did a genuinely weak seamer play. Later in the 1980s, other Padmore\Jumadeen-esque bowlers like Clyde Butts played.

The difference with the West Indies pace quartet was that each one was a match-winner in their own right. Never had that situation before or since. Unless you have four match-winning pacers, it just makes since to include a spinner for variety's sake. Even England had Giles along with their quartet in 2005.

 

[Richard]

If Flintoff had not been able to bat and if Harmison had been replaced by someone a bit better, I'd have wanted Giles dropped for an extra batsman on non-turning surfaces.

Heck, I never wanted Giles to play on non-turning surfaces at the best of times. If that'd meant 5 seamers, so be it.

And TBH, West Indies had 4-man seam attacks containing just 3 true top-ranking bowlers plenty often enough and were still highly successful. In 1976 (Roberts, Holding, Daniel), 1977 (Roberts, Garner, Croft), 1984 (Marshall, Holding, Garner). And in several in-between periods where they had the likes of Davis and Patterson (a cut below the Roberts, Holdings, Garners, Daniels, Crofts, Marshalls, Walshes, Ambroses and Bishops) and even Winston Benjamin.

 

[age_master]

i agree with this, but surely we cant expect to keep filling in Symo and Clarke to get it right and escape fines/bans

so yea my whole point to this is over rates..

The problem of the over rates could be fixed by not mucking around so much...

Another thing in this particular match is that alot of balls are going to the boundary because the outfield is really fast, so there is more chasing to do.

In this particular case though i think it would have worked better having another slightly slower bowler in there like Hilfy, Bracken or even Noffke. I haven't really looked at it but im guessing that Bracken could bowl an over in 30 seconds or a minute less then Johnson/Tait.

I dont really have a problem with the Clarke and Symonds being used to catch the over rate up, though that should be blended in to the normal tactic rather then having both of them bowl 10 overs together at one point which i think probably cost them abit yesterday.

 

[BoyBrumby]

I'm all for variety where practical, but obviously I don't think any team should select a spinner purely for the sake of it if the seam options are clearly superior. I'm not sure that overall that was the case here tho. It's easy to be wise after the event, but I think Hogg would've contributed rather more to the cause than Tait managed; not least with the bat. Symonds only got in the wickets when he switched to off-spin, so there's something in the pitch for the twirlers.

Off-topic slightly (but related): what's Bollinger like as a bowler? Putting some really good figures on the board this year, but his overall career looks fairly ordinary.

 

[Son Of Coco]

The essential point is - does anyone seriously think Hogg (or McGain, or whoever) would have done any better?

Sure, Tait (and the part-time spinners, and of times Johnson) have bowled poorly this match, but can you really say because of one single match that a spinner must be picked?

Absolutely not IMO.

I'm not sure Symonds bowled so poorly...Tait definitely did though and Johnson's got some stuff to work out.

In reference to the original question...I think 4 quality pace bowlers works better than 2 good ones, one that's misfiring a bit, and one that's short on match form and down in confidence. The Perth wicket wasn't as fiery as it was suggested it would be either...but as India have shown, if you get it in the right spots and swing it a bit you're a god chance of picking up wickets.

The thing that bothers me about Tait is that for such a tall powerful bloke he negates the advantage he should have by delivering the ball from such a low position (that and his action which means - like harmison - he'll never be effective without plenty of match practice and a lot of effort in training). Obviously he's fast. If he could be fast and use his height he'd be even more dangerous. Personally, I think Lee's bouncer is far more effective because it's not as short as Tait's due to him using his full height.

 

[age_master]

Off-topic slightly (but related): what's Bollinger like as a bowler? Putting some really good figures on the board this year, but his overall career looks fairly ordinary.

Yeah he really seems to have found a good groove this year. I spose that he will come into calculations if he can keep performing well consistently for the rest of the season. I haven't seen much of him this year but the figures are incredible. I have seen abit of him over the last couple of years and have not been all that impressed.

 

[howardj]

Never seen the point in 4 quicks really.

It sounds nice and macho in the lead up to the game.

But when the Test draws into day 3 and 4, you almost always wish you had a spinner.

Plus, the 4th quick usually only gets about 7 overs per innings.

 

[NZTailender]

I alluded to the Tait situation here. Shaun's a special type of bowler, he needs to be used right. He feeds off other peoples confidence in him as well as his own. Ponting just doesn't use him right in tests and until he's got Punter's confidence with the red ball, he'll never be a success at test level.

I also think he's a bit down on match practice, which is why I have been severely pro-Noffke for inclusion at this point. Tait's bowled very little recently (he destroyed QLD in the Pura before Christmas, and in a few 20/20's) and needs to get a lot of overs under his belt. I suppose with Tait, he's one of those bowlers that relies on so many factors other than form that it might be worth taking the gamble.

I hope they keep him for Adelaide, they need to show some strong faith in him if they want him to come good.

Agreed. Tait has the ability to be a very dangerous bowler if the conditions suit, and if he's given a free run. He could be a match winner for Australia, in the sense he could take a lot of wickets very quickly to turn a match. That is, if he's persisted with.

 

[Jono]

Four quicks will work if they're all 4 world class. Only two of Australia's are atm.

Tait and/or Johnson aren't that much better than Hogg (though I don't rate Hogg) to warrant removing the option of variety.

Now if we're talking Holding, Marshall, Garner and Roberts or something similar, then maybe you'd consider not playing a spinner.