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ICC's top 20 all-time list

Ikki

Hall of Fame Member
Its not just the title. The ICC insists on digging itself into a deeper hole.

Sample this comment by Mr Fitzgerald, who holds the ironically named post of Communications manager at the ICC:

"Matthew Hayden's position of 10th and 18th in the all-time Test and ODI Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for batsmen is an impressive achievement by anyone's standards but this does not necessarily mean he is the 10th-best Test batsman or 18th-best ODI batsman in the history of the game."

Way to contradict ones self.
It doesn't contradict itself at all.
 

FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
Is it really that hard to parse that sentence and work out what is meant by it without jumping to an absurd conclusion?

It is a ranking of the best players of all time based on their performance on the ICC rankings system. That's it. It is is not a ranking of the best players of all time based on their haircut, for example. Or, based on their test average. Or based on their consistency across a 10 year period. Or based on their IQ. It's based on their performance on the ICC rankings system.

Based off that, the list provided is the list of the best players ever in terms of the highest rating achieved. Mystery solved, Tendulkar absolved, world saved.
 

Sanz

Hall of Fame Member
Tendulkar absolved, world saved.
Such fanatism among Tendulkar fans has always been a problem for me. Tendulkar has to be there in every list or else there is a conspiracy, Tendulkar has to be praised at all times even if there is not an occasion, no one can be praised without praising Tendulkar first. If some considered Lara/Ponting/Dravid best, Tendulkar is insulted.

It has gotten ridiculous, over the years. Look at some of the headlines :-

"Sachin trips on ranking disorder'

"ICC snub Sachin, Includes Hayden "

"Mathew Hayden greater than Sachin : ICC"

"India irked by Tendulkar low ranking "

"Zaheer Abbas @ no. 2 as Tendulkar misses out" (That's media in our neighbouring country)

"Quirky Nature of ICC Ranking System"

"ICC All time Greatest Crickers : A joke or an Insult"

"Master Blaster not all time great afterall : ICC"
 

G.I.Joe

International Coach
Oh dear. All I'll say is theres some pretty poor conclusions being drawn by you guys here. No, it can't be that theres a flaw in what is claimed to be an all time rankings system. He MUST be a Tendulkar fanatic!
 

biased indian

International Coach
Oh dear. All I'll say is theres some pretty poor conclusions being drawn by you guys here. No, it can't be that theres a flaw in what is claimed to be an all time rankings system. He MUST be a Tendulkar fanatic!
its always like that some people are always wrong what ever they say ....try to live with it
 

weldone

Hall of Fame Member
The problem is not with Tendulkar neither with Warne. The problem is with the ranking system, which is best fit for ranking current players based on their form for last few years; but the same system can't be applied to draw ANY conclusions by comparing players across time (or err, Best Ever or whatever)...And when it is applied to derive such results, it sucks.

I reiterate, I don't care what the media is telling, I don't care where Tendulkar or Warne (or for that matter anyone else) is placed in the list...All I know is that absolutely ANY conclusions can't be drawn from this ranking, neither about their form for a sustained period, nor anything else, based on the fundamentals.

And I, for one, don't see any conspiracy from ICC in this, I just see the plain imbecility of the person(s) who applied this system across time.
 
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The Sean

Cricketer Of The Year
Ok, against all my better judgement I’m going to have one more go at this and then leave it be. I’m going to illustrate an example by changing one word in the title of the list – from ranking batsmen by their “Best Ever Ratings” to ranking them by their “Best Ever Innings” – which gives us a top 10 of:

Brian Lara 400
Matthew Hayden 380
Mahela Jayawardene 374
Garry Sobers 365
Len Hutton 364
Sanath Jayasuria 340
Hanif Mohammed 337
Walter Hammond 336
Don Bradman 334
Mark Taylor 334

Tendulkar (best ever innings 248) doesn’t make the top 50. Does this mean that Don Bradman is only the equal 9th best batsman of all time, and that Sachin isn’t even in the top 50? Of course not, and this list - just like that of the ICC - makes no attempt to claim that it does. But it does show that 8 batsmen have at some point in their career achieved a statistically higher single-innings peak than Bradman did, and that more than fifty of them have done so compared to Tendulkar. The ICC list, which as I've already noted is years old, operates on a similar principle.
 
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Matt79

Global Moderator
Though I'm fully aware that this is the internet, this is still the dumbest debate I've ever witnessed.
Agreed. New standards of imbecility being plumbed in this thread. And I was worried that with Dubya leaving office, the world might run short of stupid... 8-)
 

Matt79

Global Moderator
Ok, against all my better judgement I’m going to have one more go at this and then leave it be. I’m going to illustrate an example by changing one word in the title of the list – from ranking batsmen by their “Best Ever Ratings” to ranking them by their “Best Ever Innings” – which gives us a top 10 of:

Brian Lara 400
Matthew Hayden 380
Mahela Jayawardene 374
Garry Sobers 365
Len Hutton 364
Sanath Jayasuria 340
Hanif Mohammed 337
Walter Hammond 336
Don Bradman 334
Mark Taylor 334

Tendulkar (best ever innings 248) doesn’t make the top 50. Does this mean that Don Bradman is only the equal 9th best batsman of all time, and that Sachin isn’t even in the top 50? Of course not, and this list - just like that of the ICC - makes no attempt to claim that it does. But it does show that 8 batsmen have at some point in their career achieved a statistically higher single-innings peak than Bradman did, and that more than fifty of them have done so compared to Tendulkar. The ICC list, which as I've already noted is years old, operates on a similar principle.
Your post is a JOKE. Sunil Gavaskar doesn't even make the top 10?
 

Isolator

State 12th Man
Have to agree with G(eraint)I(smyhe)Joe about the title, they could have just called it "Highest Career Peaks" or at least said so when being grilled by the Indian media.In itself the title is fairly easy to misinterpret. And everybody on Earth should know by now that roughly 100% of the population of India is waiting to pounce on something like this and blow it up into an anti-India/Sachin/whatever fest.
 

Dasa

International Vice-Captain
Oh dear. All I'll say is theres some pretty poor conclusions being drawn by you guys here. No, it can't be that theres a flaw in what is claimed to be an all time rankings system. He MUST be a Tendulkar fanatic!
It's this overriding sentiment that has stopped me posting here more often to be honest. Some ridiculous labelling going on, and it seems like this sort of posting is acceptable when if it was being done the other way it'd be pounced on in an instant.
 

Matt79

Global Moderator
But there's not a flaw in the system - there's a flaw in people's interpretation of the results/the article. Amazing how pointing out this fairly basic point hasn't appeared to put people's concerns into perspective, based on some of the arguments made here...
 

weldone

Hall of Fame Member
Ok, against all my better judgement I’m going to have one more go at this and then leave it be. I’m going to illustrate an example by changing one word in the title of the list – from ranking batsmen by their “Best Ever Ratings” to ranking them by their “Best Ever Innings” – which gives us a top 10 of:

Brian Lara 400
Matthew Hayden 380
Mahela Jayawardene 374
Garry Sobers 365
Len Hutton 364
Sanath Jayasuria 340
Hanif Mohammed 337
Walter Hammond 336
Don Bradman 334
Mark Taylor 334

Tendulkar (best ever innings 248) doesn’t make the top 50. Does this mean that Don Bradman is only the equal 9th best batsman of all time, and that Sachin isn’t even in the top 50? Of course not, and this list - just like that of the ICC - makes no attempt to claim that it does. But it does show that 8 batsmen have at some point in their career achieved a statistically higher single-innings peak than Bradman did, and that more than fifty of them have done so compared to Tendulkar. The ICC list, which as I've already noted is years old, operates on a similar principle.
Exactly... and incidentally (or, maybe surprisingly to you) that was my point also...You said it...THAT THE ICC LIST MAKES AS MUCH SENSE AS YOUR LIST DOES...Or, for that matter any other list like the following -

AG Ganteaume (WI) 112
DG Bradman (Aus) 99.94
MN Nawaz (SL) 99
VH Stollmeyer (WI) 96
DM Lewis (WI) 86.33
RE Redmond (NZ) 81.5
BA Richards (SA) 72.57
H Wood (Eng) 68
CS Dempster (NZ) 65.72
TG McIntosh (NZ) 65.66

Your point (and my point too) is that any one of these three lists (the one by you, the one by me and the one by ICC) makes as much sense as the other too...Ya absolutely, when did I deny that?...
 

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