Morgan V Raina

[weldone]

Anku seems to be a big form of combining the two forms to form an "overall" judgement. I just leave ODIs separate. If someone asked me how good a batsman a certain player was, I'd sooner consider his performances in two-day weekend club cricket than ODIs. If you want my opinion on someone's limited overs credentials, ask me how good their limited overs batting is.

I'd personally agree with all except the bolded part. Cricket, in one word, means test cricket to me

...as per my sig

 

[vcs]

Morgan is a lovely batsman to watch, one of my favourites. Raina also looks good through the offside when he gets going, but also plays his ugly midwicket hoicks to great effect. Both seem to possess a sound temperament, but have some technical issues outside offstump that could limit their Test success. In summary, need more information to arrive at any sort of meaningful judgement. But, would favour Raina as of now on the basis that he has done more so far in both formats.

 

[turnstyle]

Going to go with Rania simply because he's Indian and India is the best.

 

[smash84]

Morgan I suppose......a little better against the short pitched stuff I think

 

[GIMH]

I'd have to give to to Raina for the time being but it could swing either way over the course of the series.

 

[smash84]

I do think that morgan is better but have gone with centurymaker.........the guy is just too far ahead of everyone

 

[flibbertyjibber]

Personally not sure either has the technique for a long test career, may be proved wrong on that given time. Both very good one day players though and both are vital members of their respective one day sides.

As for who i'd say is better, Raina just but it wouldn't surprise me at all if he struggled in England and was outscored in the series by Morgan.

 

[Spark]

Been thoroughly impressed by Raina's ticker myself, even if his technique doesn't set the world alight. Definitely him as of now, but with so many things in this series that could change in a month or two.

 

[Kylez]

Morgan, has the better technique at the end of the day and scores pretty quickly. A lot has been said about Raina's mental strength and gridning ability but Morgan seems like the player who will thrive at Test level. Morgan actually reminds me a bit of Mark Waugh in a few ways.

 

[smash84]

Morgan, has the better technique at the end of the day and scores pretty quickly. A lot has been said about Raina's mental strength and gridning ability but Morgan seems like the player who will thrive at Test level. Morgan actually reminds me a bit of Mark Waugh in a few ways.

and catching in the slips can't be one of them

 

[MW1304]

Morgan has an incredibly weird technique - quite a lot of shuffling and movement before delivery - can see Zaheer testing him a lot this series. But then I can see Tremlett/Broad troubling Raina, too. Don't think either will score hugely.

 

[Bonnie Prince C]

I would definitely have Raina ahead of Morgan just now. I am still not 100% if Morgan has what it takes to be a Test batsman yet, whereas I think Raina does.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Raina, and it's not even particularly close at this point IMO. Wouldn't be surprised if Morgan had a better series though because England's bowlers are better and, as Uppercut said, he's playing at home.

I don't really see how it could be anything but close, actually. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea Raina has played at an acceptable level in tests for longer. He actually debuted after Morgan and has played all of two more tests, averaging slightly lower. Scored a ton in his first test on an absolute autobahn and was made to look an utter chump by the touring NZders.

I have serious doubts anyone with such a pronounced problem with short-pitched bowling can make a serious go of tests.

Morgan might shuffle in his crease, but his focus never wavers from the ball and is still when he plays. His 130 at Trent Bridge, whilst not chanceless, was scored against a proper seam attack in conditions tailor made for them. I think he'll nick off to a few slanted across him (Asif caused him more problems than Amir last year), but I'll be very, very surprised if he doesn't outscore Raina.

I'd have to give to to Raina for the time being but it could swing either way over the course of the series.

GTFO. Et tu Corrin?

 

[Jacknife]

I don't really see how it could be anything but close, actually. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea Raina has played at an acceptable level in tests for longer. He actually debuted after Morgan and has played all of two more tests, averaging slightly lower. Scored a ton in his first test on an absolute autobahn and was made to look an utter chump by the touring NZders.

I have serious doubts anyone with such a pronounced problem with short-pitched bowling can make a serious go of tests.

Morgan might shuffle in his crease, but his focus never wavers from the ball and is still when he plays. His 130 at Trent Bridge, whilst not chanceless, was scored against a proper seam attack in conditions tailor made for them. I think he'll nick off to a few slanted across him (Asif caused him more problems than Amir last year), but I'll be very, very surprised if he doesn't outscore Raina.

Agree, can't see how anyone, can come to the conclusion, that Raina is far ahead of Morgan, both are very new to Test cricket, both have their problems, with certain areas of the game but on the whole, I see more in Morgan but obviously, time will tell.

 

[Howe_zat]

Well said Brumby.

 

[Cevno]

Don't think there is much between them at all.

Both will do better than the other in certain conditions though.

 

[Teja.]

Raina as of now. Has played a good number of substantial knocks in pressure situations. Don't really think Morgan has it in him to be a good test bat tbh.

 

[Prince EWS]

I don't really see how it could be anything but close, actually. I'm not sure where you're getting the idea Raina has played at an acceptable level in tests for longer. He actually debuted after Morgan and has played all of two more tests, averaging slightly lower. Scored a ton in his first test on an absolute autobahn and was made to look an utter chump by the touring NZders.

It's probably a state of mind thing with me; Morgan wasn't really 'in' the team for his first few Tests; he was just filling in. Raina's been a full-strength member of India's team for longer (although he did eventually get dropped). I don't really care what Morgan can do against Bangladesh at home though, and even though Raina's only played a couple more Tests, he's batted in 18 innings to Morgan's 12 (10 if you ignore Bangladesh).

I have serious doubts anyone with such a pronounced problem with short-pitched bowling can make a serious go of tests.

Morgan might shuffle in his crease, but his focus never wavers from the ball and is still when he plays. His 130 at Trent Bridge, whilst not chanceless, was scored against a proper seam attack in conditions tailor made for them. I think he'll nick off to a few slanted across him (Asif caused him more problems than Amir last year), but I'll be very, very surprised if he doesn't outscore Raina.

I don't really disgaree with any of that, but it all speaks to the potential of the player in my books rather than his current standing and where he should be rated. What Morgan has achieved is a distinctly average county career (which is the only decent sized sample we have of anything from him), one good innings for England Lions, a couple of big innings for Ireland in the Intercontinental Cup, a good (albeit chancy) innings against Pakistan (and compete failure for the rest of the series) and a decent half century under some pressure against a poor Sri Lankan attack. It takes a lot more than that for me to start rating such an average domestic performer as anything more than a player with potential, no matter how good his temperament and technique are.

I think Morgan has a lot of potential - I'd back him to outperform Raina in this series and I'd even back him to have a better Test career than Raina if you made me make a call now - but he hasn't really realised that potential yet in any even vaguely meaningful way IMO and I'm not going to elevate him up the ranks until he does. Raina himself has been selected over some far better domestic performers but he's performed a lot better at that level than Raina, even if you believe (like I do) that scoring runs in the County Championship is a fair bit more difficult than scoring them in the Ranji Trophy - and as I said, I think his Test performances have been sustained a little longer.

 

[Uppercut]

Morgan has an incredibly weird technique - quite a lot of shuffling and movement before delivery - can see Zaheer testing him a lot this series. But then I can see Tremlett/Broad troubling Raina, too. Don't think either will score hugely.

His technique derives from playing hurling when he was younger. He's really very Irish .

He's not the best at dealing with attacking fast bowling so a lot might depend on how much protection he gets from those above him.

 

[BoyBrumby]

It's probably a state of mind thing with me; Morgan wasn't really 'in' the team for his first few Tests; he was just filling in. Raina's been a full-strength member of India's team for longer (although he did eventually get dropped). I don't really care what Morgan can do against Bangladesh at home though, and even though Raina's only played a couple more Tests, he's batted in 18 innings to Morgan's 12 (10 if you ignore Bangladesh).

I don't really disgaree with any of that, but it all speaks to the potential of the player in my books rather than his current standing and where he should be rated. What Morgan has achieved is a distinctly average county career (which is the only decent sized sample we have of anything from him), one good innings for England Lions, a couple of big innings for Ireland in the Intercontinental Cup, a good (albeit chancy) innings against Pakistan (and compete failure for the rest of the series) and a decent half century under some pressure against a poor Sri Lankan attack. It takes a lot more than that for me to start rating such an average domestic performer as anything more than a player with potential, no matter how good his temperament and technique are.

I think Morgan has a lot of potential - I'd back him to outperform Raina in this series and I'd even back him to have a better Test career than Raina if you made me make a call now - but he hasn't really realised that potential yet in any even vaguely meaningful way IMO and I'm not going to elevate him up the ranks until he does. Raina himself has been selected over some far better domestic performers but he's performed a lot better at that level than Raina, even if you believe (like I do) that scoring runs in the County Championship is a fair bit more difficult than scoring them in the Ranji Trophy - and as I said, I think his Test performances have been sustained a little longer.

I think you're possibly setting too much stall by domestic FC scores when assessing a player's worth. Morgan is far from alone in not exactly shining in the CC before getting a run in tests.* Vaughan and Trescothick both famously had distinctly ordinary FC records when they graduated to the test XI. Tres is the obvious comparison: gun ODI player, promoted to tests on the strength of this and a temperament that's suited to international cricket.

Morgan has a way to go to establish himself, but I don't think anyone watching the two batsmen could conclude that Raina is far better.

*As an aside, only two of Engaland's current top 7 average more in FC cricket than in tests and one of those only went ahead thanks to his last outing against the current tourists.