Post Packer World XI - a discussion

[bagapath]

tbh... Lillee only had one tour of Pakistan and Ambit only had one tour of India, IIRC.. That really should not be held against them.


But personally, having watched the 3 in action (although Lillee and Marshall, I only saw clippings, not the live games), I would prefer to have Marshall and Ambit.


But then again, it is probably the Windies fan in me.

i meant ambrose's record against india, not just in india. for a great bowler he has pretty poor numbers against a major cricketing nation and that will have to be held against him. also lillee's 17 tests against pak yielded him wickets at a 30+ avg

 

[Lillian Thomson]

i think we are going to have more arguments for the middle order batting slots. if i club the records of 3,4 and 5 and keep the minimum req of 2000 runs and 40+ avg more than 30 names come up. if i divide accordng to batting positions g.chappell doesnt come up anywhere. still conflicted about the criteria. any suggestion?

3,4,5 - Richards, Tendulkar, Lara. Looks like a very short argument to me.

 

[G.I.Joe]

tbh... Lillee only had one tour of Pakistan and Ambit only had one tour of India, IIRC.. That really should not be held against them.


But personally, having watched the 3 in action (although Lillee and Marshall, I only saw clippings, not the live games), I would prefer to have Marshall and Ambit.


But then again, it is probably the Windies fan in me.

WTH is 'Ambit'? You're lucky Ambrose isn't reading this.

 

[Ikki]

The thing is, you can pick around with Lillee's record, taking out those occasional poor tests and make his record as good as Marshall's. And that's fair enough. But with Marshall, his record is already that good, even with a few poor performances, the occasional bad run of form, a game where he wasn't 100% fit. Even with all of the occupational hazards a fast bowler has to face, he still managed to iron them out impossibly good figures.

But the difference between "already that good' and "almost that good is 3 tests. It's hardly uncompetitive, is it? And doing badly in Pakistan and doing badly in New Zealand will likely yield different results - hint: pitch.

And if we're getting very technical with statistics, an average of 20 is actually quite a bit better than an average of 23. Mathetically, the better the bowling averages get, the greater the difference between adjacent numbers.

Really? I'd like to see that formula. I thought it was rather linear: x runs/ y wickets = average.

And from what I'm told, the West Indies was a ridiculously good place to bowl pace. Marshall's home SR and his SR away seems indicative of that - 42 at home 49 away.

The character/match-winning ability line is a lot easier to argue (whatever fidgeting you do you can never make Lillee as good statistically as Marshall) and I would say much the same thing if i was arguing the merits of Warne (my favourite cricketer of all time). But when comparing to MM I think it does Marshall a bit of an injustice.

If you think Marshall was as much of a match-winner as Lillee, that's fine. Great, we agree to disagree. But I don't think that's proven merely by the difference in average. I wouldn't call McGrath a better match-winner than Lillee.

Should probably also note that Lillee's ODI record is a hell of a lot better. I reckon that impacts on contemporary opinion a lot more than it does on retrospective opinion.

Personally, I pretty much disregard it altogether.

 

[Ikki]

You extoll the merits of Lillee so well, but that's the easy part of the argument when comparing two of the world's best-ever bowlers! You're questioning the ability in tough conditions of a man who once took 7/53 with his left hand in a cast. Marshall played 80-odd test matches. Do you really think noone ever got after him? Were there no times when the rest of the attack was bowling poorly and he had to carry them? When he had to bowl long spells in hot conditions, deal with home-town umpires or battle with world-class batsmen? Yet he just kept on taking wickets. You say his story is less heroic- there's no glorious comeback after injury and no absent three years at his peak- but if there's something boring about someone who takes wicket after wicket after wicket for his entire career then I shall take the boring bowler every time.

I don't mean to demean Marshall's efforts but bowling with a cast on your non-bowling hand is much different to bowling with stress fractures in your back. That's something that'll reshape how you live, let alone bowl, for the rest of your life.

But maybe it is a difference in mentality. I always go for the comeback King. For me, just because you weren't thwarted in a certain time-frame doesn't mean you never would have been thwarted.

 

[Ikki]

Lillee's 15 WSC "Tests" yielded 79 wickets at 23.91 - almost identical to his official Test average. However his strike rate in those matches was just 46 - considerably better than his official Test career strike rate of 52.

If we counted them then it would take his SR to 50.9 (of course, including those horrendous Pakistan tests).

 

[Uppercut]

Really? I'd like to see that formula. I thought it was rather linear: x runs/ y wickets = average.

Yep, and with every wicket you take the difference it makes to your average decreases. The difference in average between 1/100 and 2/100 is 50, whereas the difference between 4/100 and 5/100 is 5- but it's still just one more wicket. Hence the difference between a bowler averaging 20 and a bowler averaging 23 is statistically a fair bit more than the difference between two averaging, say, 29 and 32. It doesn't automatically make Marshall the better bowler- obviously- but in reality the difference between their stats is more than it appears.

And from what I'm told, the West Indies was a ridiculously good place to bowl pace. Marshall's SR and his SR away seems indicative of that - 42 at home 49 away.

Both better than Lillee's SR, incidentally. You're not going to find a solid statistical case for Lillee over Marshall, I'm afraid, your other points are much more valid.

If you think Marshall was as much of a match-winner as Lillee, that's fine. Great, we agree to disagree. But I don't think that's proven merely by the difference in average. I wouldn't call McGrath a better match-winner than Lillee.

Maybe not, but Lillee had to do it all on his own more often than McGrath did. Personally I think McGrath would have been just as capable of carrying his team, but he rarely had to. You can only single-handedly win a match when none of your team-mates help you out. McGrath was, err, "hindered" as far as pure match-winning goes by how rarely that happened when he played.

 

[stephen]

For mine, you could have a bowling attack with any combination of:

Marshall
McGrath
Lillee
Imran
Wasim
Waqar
Hadley
Ambrose
Holding

and even a few other WIndies greats who I can't recall at this moment in time and you would have the "worlds best since the seventies" fast bowling attack.

If I had to pick I'd probably take Marshall and McGrath with the new ball, Imran as my all rounder and Warne and Murali as my spinners, but you could equally trade any of the above and you'd have a bowling attack that batsmen would fear.

 

[honestbharani]

Sorry, how do you know Marshall would have maintained the same fitness if he had to carry the Windies as Lillee happened to do for Australia towards the 2nd half of his career? People get injuries, sometimes because they don't take care of themselves and sometimes because of genetics. For me, the character and the skill it takes to come back, reinvent yourself and still be one of the best bowlers of all time is immeasurable.

There is little said here about those champions that have overcome the odds and done something miraculous, and more about those that never fell from grace. I don't see it that way at all. Let's say Marshall faced an all-time attack and started getting flogged, could you predict how he'd react? In your opinion, did he have the same intensity as Lillee to better himself continuously?

Furthermore, Lillee's prime was lost to WSC. Does anyone have the exact stats for those series? They were regarded the toughest competition ever played by those that participated.

The injuries argument can be done for Ambrose too, though..


He carried the Windies as much as Lillee carried the Aussies at that time.

 

[Uppercut]

Also- a fun fact you're seemingly not aware of- Malcolm Marshall's first series in international cricket was almost as much of a nightmare than the horrendous Pakistan tests you frequently refer to. In a three-test series against India, Marshall averaged 88. Without those his average drops to a chilly 20.40.

While we're still going, Marshall was the handier batsman.

 

[honestbharani]

WTH is 'Ambit'? You're lucky Ambrose isn't reading this.

yeah... but hey, pup11 is lucky the whole Aussie team doesn't read his stuff in CW, right?

 

[Ikki]

Yep, and with every wicket you take the difference it makes to your average decreases. The difference in average between 1/100 and 2/100 is 50, whereas the difference between 4/100 and 5/100 is 5- but it's still just one more wicket. Hence the difference between a bowler averaging 20 and a bowler averaging 23 is statistically a fair bit more than the difference between two averaging, say, 29 and 32. It doesn't automatically make Marshall the better bowler- obviously- but in reality the difference between their stats is more than it appears.

That seems fair enough.

Both better than Lillee's SR, incidentally. You're not going to find a solid statistical case for Lillee over Marshall, I'm afraid, your other points are much more valid.

Yes, but not by much, right? That's the point. I think the difference in SR is a bit skewed. Lillee's SR 49 at home and 55 away (although, without Pakistan it's 52).

Maybe not, but Lillee had to do it all on his own more often than McGrath did. Personally I think McGrath would have been just as capable of carrying his team, but he rarely had to. You can only single-handedly win a match when none of your team-mates help you out. McGrath was, err, "hindered" as far as pure match-winning goes by how rarely that happened when he played.

I personally don't consider "match-winning" a single-handed affair because it's pretty much impossible to do. The term match-winning I give to someone who changes an innings or takes a wicket when it's most needed. Of course, McGrath is an all-time great and certainly a match winner. But in comparison I'd see him inferior to Lillee. My point was it's not something you can see in stats but something you'd only know if you a) watched the games and b) had good reports about it.

Now, I can believe that about Lillee because I saw some of his matches and living in Australia you can't get away from the hero that he's become because of it. In these comparisons where the statistics are close I can give credence to these arguments. In those that seem to almost rest entirely on hearsay is where I have problem.

And did Marshall ever play in WSC? Not to my knowledge, but I assumed the best cricketers of the time were playing in that competition. Was he then facing weaker teams in the Test circuit?

 

[Ikki]

The injuries argument can be done for Ambrose too, though..
He carried the Windies as much as Lillee carried the Aussies at that time.

Which? His injury in 2000?

 

[Uppercut]

Oh hell yeah, of course, that's what great bowlers do. But once again you're doing the easy part well. I await something- anything- to suggest that Malcolm Marshall didn't change games in exactly the same way.

 

[Ikki]

Oh hell yeah, of course, that's what great bowlers do. But once again you're doing the easy part well. I await something- anything- to suggest that Malcolm Marshall didn't change games in exactly the same way.

I wouldn't say he didn't, I would say he didn't do it as much as Lillee which is what I am led to believe. Maybe it's much harder to do when you bowl in that attack the Windies had. Going back to what began this little conversation, it seems likely considering most people outside this board don't put Marshall that far up even despite his pretty complete record. Pretty much everyone that played with or against these bowlers rates Lillee higher.

 

[G.I.Joe]

yeah... but hey, pup11 is lucky the whole Aussie team doesn't read his stuff in CW, right?

Pup's nicknames atleast make some sense. Curtly 'don't talk to no man' Ambrose wouldn't let any winking smileys come in the way of letting one know exactly what he thinks of people calling him weird names.

 

[The Sean]

And from what I'm told, the West Indies was a ridiculously good place to bowl pace. Marshall's home SR and his SR away seems indicative of that - 42 at home 49 away.

I know this isn't the point you were really making mate, but that's an incredible stat in Marshall's favour there. Away from the fast bowling havens of the Caribbean, all over the world on pitches that frequently weren't even close to suiting him, he still took a wicket every 49 balls.

Simply phenomenal.

 

[subshakerz]

Gavaskar
Hayden
Ponting
Richards
Tendulkar
Waugh S (c)
Gilchrist +
Imran
Warne
McGrath
Lillee/Marshall

Hmm...Hayden over Greenidge, Ponting over Lara, Waugh over Imran (as captain), Warne over Murali, and Lillee ahead of Marshall....Aussie fan, I take it?

 

[Ikki]

I know this isn't the point you were really making mate, but that's an incredible stat in Marshall's favour there. Away from the fast bowling havens of the Caribbean, all over the world on pitches that frequently weren't even close to suiting him, he still took a wicket every 49 balls.

Simply phenomenal.

Yeah, I think during that time the only one better away was Paddles. 48.9 or something. It's no secret pitches weren't what they are now in those days.

 

[stephen]

Hmm...Hayden over Greenidge, Ponting over Lara, Waugh over Imran (as captain), Warne over Murali, and Lillee ahead of Marshall....Aussie fan, I take it?

To be fair the only option there that is clearly wrong is Waugh over Imran. Ponting/Lara/Tendulkar/Richards all have extremely good claims on the 3 middle order positions and Warne/Murali is more personal taste than anything. Lillee over Marshall is debatable, but to his credit he couldn't decide.

FTR I would have:

Hayden
Gavaskar
Ponting
Lara
Tendulkar
Imran (c)
Gilchrist
Warne
Marshall
McGrath
Murali

Rhodes (12th man)