South Africa @ Home In Test

[Shawn Badyk]

England and Australia are the only teams who have managed to be able to win a Test match in South Africa when they last toured South Africa. New Zealand lost their Test series 2-0 in 00/01. So I guess this further cements the fact that Australia, England and South Africa are the 3 best teams in Test cricket. Many rate South Africa at number 2 but I disagree, I rate England at number 2 and you all know my reasons from previous posts.

[Deja moo]

Frankly Shawn, your comments are getting so irritating that I had to post this....
Your comments seem to suggest that only performances in green bouncy pitches count when we rank teams.
Do you mean to say that subcontinental pitches are second class when it comes to test cricket?
There are 4 test nations ( 3 if u exclude Bangladesh) which play tests on dusty tracks, and that is more than a third of all cricket being played.
Why do performances on bouncy pitches only count as "real performances " in your book?
Subcontinental players will always find it hard to bat on bouncy pitches because it is an accepted fact that it is harder for players to adjust to higher bounce when they have played low bounce all their lives.It is easier to adjust from a higher bounce to a lower bounce.
So subcontinental batsmen will always find tours of australia, safrica tougher( i do not say the bounce is the only reason for the dominance of aus and saf over subcon teams on home pitches....i accept that aus and saf are good teams,but not necessarily better than the subcon teams).

Also, may I suggest another reason why I do not consider England as good a team as u make them out to be?....It is known as Entertainment Value....Teams like India, Australia , Pakistan( when playing well),the new West Indies, and to a certain extent even Safrica have it.

Barring flashes in the pan, England do not have it.

[masterblaster]

Well said orangepitch.

The fact that English, Australian and South African batsman find it hard on dusty pitches is the same fact that Subcontinent batsman find green tracks hard.

Thats the beauty of our game. Its so diverse and unique. You cant criticise someone like Hayden scoring a century in India, and you cant criticise someone like Tendulkar scoring a century in Australia or South Africa. It requires the same degree of skill, because Hayden will be used to bouncy pitches and Tendulkar more accustomed to dusty ones.

Dont criticise teams, your not a professional cricketer and wern't good enough to make the top bracket, so dont bag people who work hard and try their best.

I second orangepitch, and say your comments are brash, illogical and irritating.

[Kiwi]

When NZ toured we had about a 3rd string team.. We were going through that stage of injury after injury

[Deja moo]

When NZ toured we had about a 3rd string team.. We were going through that stage of injury after injury

Wasn't that " Boje's series" ?:duh:

[Tim]

Yes that was the annoying series where Boje batted at 3 in the ODIs and scored a couple of hundreds.

The South African Series in a way while it could have been viewed as a nightmare was also a blessing because NZ found 2 or 3 players who could play at international level.

[luckyeddie]

Shawn - a little blind patriotism's fine, but let's not go overboard here. England will do well to draw the series against South Africa this summer

Oh, and Orangepitch - didn't England's victory in Pakistan count for anything? Fortress Karachi, dustbowl, batting by streetlight etc etc?

[Bazza]

I think England have a shot at defending their series win at home to South Africa this summer but lets not get carried away. If we lose this series we will be very average in terms of rankings.

We have to win to defend our position and then look to have a good winter where if we beat in particular West Indies but also Sri Lanka will be tough and Bangladesh then we will be well placed in the rankings and deservedly so!

[marc71178]

Originally posted by Bazza
We have to win to defend our position and then look to have a good winter where if we beat in particular West Indies but also Sri Lanka will be tough and Bangladesh then we will be well placed in the rankings and deservedly so!

It's actually changed so we're not defending our place as such any more Bazza - a drawn series or even a 2.5-1.5 loss may actually improve our ranking.

[Langeveldt]

This guy appears to have something major against South Africa... One reason they are second in the world, I think they beat India in India quite a while ago.. Something that England didnt do... They trounced England when they were last in SA, as well as 5-0 West Indies.. As well as hammering NZ, Pak, SL at home...

Doesnt sound too bad to me?

[Bazza]

Originally posted by marc71178
It's actually changed so we're not defending our place as such any more Bazza - a drawn series or even a 2.5-1.5 loss may actually improve our ranking.

Is that because they now take into account the strength of opposition? I knew because they now take into account the result of each individual match that if we were to win by more than 2-1 we would improve our rating anyway.

And how can we lose 2.5-1.5?

[Shawn Badyk]

Someone said that he does not consider England to be 2nd best because of "entertainment value". Since when has entertainment been a factor in deciding whether a team is good or not? Sport is sport, it is played to win and any entertainment value it gives is a bonus. The only reason people consider India to be entertaining is because everyone knows the scores of the match will be low as Indians can't bat ouside of Asia. England lost their Test series in India 1-0, which is a good result if you ask me, and England won their Test series in Sri Lanka 2-1 and won their Test series in Pakistan 1-0. So, England beat 2 of the 3 teams they played in Asia, so I guess that also proves England are better than India are. Now, India lost 3-0 in Australia, 2-0 in New Zealand, they lost in South Africa too so that shows that India's performance on green pitches is horrible, while England's performance on low paced and low bouncing pitches is excellent.

The fact is the majority of fans here know little about the game compared to me and that may sound arrogant but it's the truth. The fact is I give facts in every post, something not many other people here do. Now the reason why I consider Australia, South Africa and England as being superior to India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka is because in Australia there are a variety of pitches, Brisbane and Perth are very green with lots of bounce and pace, but Sydney has slower pitches so that means that when Australians play Pura Cup they have to learn to adapt to all kinds of pitches. Therefore, that is one reason why I consider the non Asians teams as being superior. If you compare Englands, South Africa and Australias record in Test cricket all over the world it is great and respectable, but Indians record around the world is poor, therefore that is why I consider Australia and South Africa and England to be better than the Asian teams. India is the only place in Asia that Australia and England cannot win at, but the fact India cannot win anywhere but in India is a fact that India are a poor team and cannot be taken seriously.

I am 18 and I am playing my debut season this summer. I have studied the game for a very long time and never played it competitively due to my mental illness. But everytime I played cricket with friends and persons who are very good cricketers I always beat them, and I have superb hand-eye coordination which is why I am a fine batsman. I believe I have the ability to play international cricket one day, as I have always achieved every goal I tried. I represented Poland in rugby union when I played the game, and that is a great achievement as Poland are ranked 13th in world rugby. I am now beginning a career in cricket, I practice very hard, when I play against actual cricketers my age I tend to score well over a 100 before the get me out, my bowling is poor but I look to improve on that as I never took bowling seriously. I believe there are many people here who have the ability to play international cricket, but it all depends on your mental fitness. I have severe obsessive-compulsive disorder and I am psychotic and this combination is the most severe and most disabling mental illness known to humankind. I suffer from tormenting thoughts every second, and as a result I have developed a superior knowledge and understanding of psychology which allows me to succeed in regions you people won't. Cricket is all about psychology my friends, that is why Australia are the best they are the masters of psychology, and I am Australian and I am a fighter and I have the right attitude, I succeed in everything I do just like Australians always have, and I will play international cricket one day for England and I will be a fine player. You may laugh at me but I don't care, I will prove my talent when I am playing international cricket, I said I would go on and play international rugby when I was 15, no one believed I could do it, but I did it when I was 17 and if it wasn't for my mental illness I would have continued my rugby career for Sunnybank and would be playing for Queensland within the next 5 years. I had to quit and now I am fighting to regain my life and I know that cricket is right for me, I love the game, I have studied it like a person can study, I know everything about it and I always did well when playing the game with friends. My advice to anyone here playing the game is to master psychology, as cricket is a game that is played over a long period of time and needs superior mental fitness, and to be a great player you will need superb psychology. If you want help in this area, email me and I will be more than happy to help you.

In my opinion India would probably be number 2 at least if their team had superior psychology, they have talented batsman but need the psychology to get them to perform to their potential.

[Shawn Badyk]

England will quite comfortably beat South Africa this summer. Someone said that England would be lucky to draw the series, and I laughed when I read that. England are better suited to Test cricket but have outperformed South Africa so far this summer in the ODI series, so I think South Africa will have a very hard task of forcing a drawn Test series in England. I expected South Africa to win the ODI series quite comfortably, but that hasn't happened. South Africa are better suited to ODI, that is their strength and I rate them the best in the world in ODI or at least in the top 3. South Africa are in a rebuilding phase and have talented players but they are not talented enough to win a Test series in England. South Africa's best team was their 1998/1999 team that toured England and this team lost the Test series in England against an English team that was strong but in my opinion not as strong as the current England team.

[Neil Pickup]

I'm closing this, it's going nowhere.. see the other closed threads for full reasoning from Corey.

I'll just clear this up first:

Originally posted by Bazza
And how can we lose 2.5-1.5?

Marc's getting his wires crossed. He's not remembered that there are five tests against South Africa - there were only two against Zimbabwe, and there are seven in a summer