Warne or Mcgrath the bigger loss?

[Precambrian]

More than anything I think India have worked-out that Clark can be played on a non-seaming pitch - but that really is about it.

Clark will still run through any batting-line-up you wish to give on a surface where there's just a bit in it for the seamers. It doesn't matter how much working-out you try to do.

And both SA and Aus will be best-served by going in with seaming decks, so if they do that I expect Clark to take a bagful, and similarly if he faces India on a seamer there's no way he's likely to do anything less, however good the batting.

No, he didnt make much of an impression when India toured Aus last year, and SA has no reason to expect tracks different from those.

 

[Top_Cat]

No, he didnt make much of an impression when India toured Aus last year, and SA has no reason to expect tracks different from those.

Probably just a bit of a rough patch of form because on decks just as flat, he regularly picked up poles against England the year before. Regularly took early wickets and the in-form blokes too so it appears to be just a blip on the radar. If his form continues through the home season, however.......

 

[krkode]

Yeah all this talk about Clark being the next McGrath. His game is purely one-dimensional, and it was high time the opposition worked him out.

Isn't being one-dimensional good, though? I'm no cricket expert, but everyone always says bowl good-length balls right at the top of (or just outside) off-stump and the wickets will come? Isn't it possible Indian batsmen are just plain good in these conditions and the pitches in India aren't helpful to Clark's style of bowling?

I didn't realize until now that Clark actually averages 22 in tests (probably less before this series) which puts him (statistically, at least) above many fast bowlers today.

 

[Richard]

Isn't being one-dimensional good, though? I'm no cricket expert, but everyone always says bowl good-length balls right at the top of (or just outside) off-stump and the wickets will come?

Not true, really (at least, not very often). And having this one dimension (ie, the skill to bowl mostly at the spot you're aiming at, the top of off-stump or just above and outside) is different to being one-dimensional. Being one-dimensional means that's all you can do. And if that's all you can do you won't get very far, beyond an exceptional economy-rate. But Clark can do so much more than that. Yes, though, there are things Zaheer Khan can do that he can't, or at least that Zaheer Khan can do better than he can. This means that under some circumstances, Zaheer Khan will outperform Clark and that's what's happened so far this series.

I didn't realize until now that Clark actually averages 22 in tests (probably less before this series) which puts him (statistically, at least) above many fast bowlers today.

There's no doubt Clark is one of the best seamers if not the best around. But he's not as good as Glenn McGrath - precious few are. McGrath has a considerable case for being Australia's best ever bowler.

 

[krkode]

There's no doubt Clark is one of the best seamers if not the best around. But he's not as good as Glenn McGrath - precious few are. McGrath has a considerable case for being Australia's best ever bowler.

No argument with that. A true giant of the game.

 

[Precambrian]

Isn't being one-dimensional good, though? I'm no cricket expert, but everyone always says bowl good-length balls right at the top of (or just outside) off-stump and the wickets will come? Isn't it possible Indian batsmen are just plain good in these conditions and the pitches in India aren't helpful to Clark's style of bowling?

I didn't realize until now that Clark actually averages 22 in tests (probably less before this series) which puts him (statistically, at least) above many fast bowlers today.

Yeah no doubt he has been one of the most effective bowlers around for last 2 years. He owned SA in 2006.

But if you take the year-by-year breakup, you can see the Clark Code being decoded. He averaged a whopping 17 in 2006 (42 wickets), 23 in 2007 (17 wickets) and 32 in 2008 (24 wickets). His SR has too fallen drastically from 44 to 57 to 76 in this period. If you ignore his success against Windies in May and June (against mediocre batsmen), he;s been strictly mediocre since the start of 2007-08 season.

 

[HMas]

Warne