Best Team

[kyear2]

Will use the Cricinfo all time Teams selected for each country for this exercise.
Australia
Trumper, Morris, Bradman, Chappell, Border, Miller, Gilchrist, Warne, Lillee, O'Reilly, Mcgrath. 12th Ponting

England
Hutton, Hobbs, Hammond, Pieterson, Barrington, Botham, Knott, Underwood, Trueman, Larwood, Barnes. 12th Compton

India
Gavaskar, Sehwag, Dravid, Tendulkar, Hazare, Mankad, Dhoni, Dev, Kumble, Srinath, Prasanna. 12th Laxman

New Zealand
Turner, Dempster, Sutcliffe, Crowe, Donnelly, Reid, Hadlee, Vettori, Smith, Bond, Cowie

Pakistan
Mohammad, Anwar, Abbas, Miandad, Ul Haq, Khan, Latif, Akram, Mahmood, Qadir, Younis. 12th Yousuf

South Africa
Richards, Smith, Kallis, Pollock, Nourse, Faulkner, Pollock, Proctor, Waite, Tayfield, Donald. 12th Steyn

Sri Lanka
Atapattu, Jayasuriya, Sangakkara, De Silva, Jayawardene, Ranatunga, Vaas, Ratnayake, De Mel, Se Silva, Muralitharan.

W.I
Greenidge, Hunte, Headley, Richards, Lara, Sobers, Marshall, Hendriks, Holding, Ambrose, Gibbs. 12th Garner

So from these Teams in a round robin tournament, which top four teams would advance to the final four, final and the eventual winner in a 5 test series. Who really had the best players in history.

 

[smash84]

Pakistan never had this squad

 

[kyear2]

Ok, for me the top four teams would be Australia, South Africa, West Indies and .... deep breath, not sure, but its between England and Pakistan, its between Pakistans fast bowling and Englands top three. Pakistan, but only by a hair. Top two West Indies and Australia, just over S.A.
Overall Winner, more than enough time to argue that one out.

 

[smash84]

A better Pak team would be

Hanif Mohammad/Mudassar Nazar
Saeed Anwar
Inzamam ul Haq
Zaheer Abbas
Javed Miandad
Mohd Yousuf
Imran Khan (c)
Rashid Latif (wk)
Wasim Akram
Waqar Younis
Abdul Qadir/Saqlain Mushtaq

 

[smash84]

This way Pak bat quite deep and they have 4 top quality bowlers

 

[kyear2]

If I do that then every one will want to change their teams as well. But if no one else objects I will change it, because I actually agree with you and was thinking about that swith as I was typing. But lets hope that doesnt lead to whole sale changes to each team. Because lets face it, I would also prefer Garner or Hall over Gibbs and Dujon/Walcott over Hendriks and the arguments would never end.

 

[smash84]

yes but your Pakistan team had a terribly big tail. The bowling was extra strong but batting which is Pak's weaker suit was not that great. The bowling attack with Imran, Wasim, and Waqar at their peak is bloody awesome

 

[kyear2]

I didnt make the teams, for fairness I used the Teams selected by Cricinfo last year.

 

[kyear2]

A compromise, I included a 12th man for each contending team, so arguments can be made to slight;y change up the line ups for individual matchups. Hope this helps.

 

[Slifer]

If I do that then every one will want to change their teams as well. But if no one else objects I will change it, because I actually agree with you and was thinking about that swith as I was typing. But lets hope that doesnt lead to whole sale changes to each team. Because lets face it, I would also prefer Garner or Hall over Gibbs and Dujon/Walcott over Hendriks and the arguments would never end.

For the sake of my sanity please do me a favor and replace Hendricks with one of Dujon or Walcott and Gibbs with Garner. Spin has never been a real strength of WI cricket and with all due respect to Hendricks his name should have never come close to a WI all time eleven.

 

[Himannv]

For the sake of my sanity please do me a favor and replace Hendricks with one of Dujon or Walcott and Gibbs with Garner. Spin has never been a real strength of WI cricket and with all due respect to Hendricks his name should have never come close to a WI all time eleven.

Read up on the guy sometime back and sounds like he was fantastic with the gloves. Why pick Walcott anyway? His batting takes a hit when he keeps and he wasn't a particularly brilliant keeper either. Dujon however is a fair call.

Definitely agree with Garner over Gibbs.

 

[JBMAC]

Will use the Cricinfo all time Teams selected for each country for this exercise.
Australia
Trumper, Morris, Bradman, Chappell, Border, Miller, Gilchrist, Warne, Lillee, O'Reilly, Mcgrath. 12th Ponting
Drop Border,Gilchrist put in Harvey and Tallon
England
Hutton, Hobbs, Hammond, Pieterson, Barrington, Botham, Knott, Underwood, Trueman, Larwood, Barnes. 12th Compton
Drop Pietersen and Knott put in Dexter and Evans
India
Gavaskar, Sehwag, Dravid, Tendulkar, Hazare, Mankad, Dhoni, Dev, Kumble, Srinath, Prasanna. 12th Laxman
Drop Dhoni and Dravid put in Engineer and Bedi
New Zealand
Turner, Dempster, Sutcliffe, Crowe, Donnelly, Reid, Hadlee, Vettori, Smith, Bond, Cowie
Pretty Good side there
Pakistan
Mohammad, Anwar, Abbas, Miandad, Ul Haq, Khan, Latif, Akram, Mahmood, Qadir, Younis. 12th Yousuf
Same as above
South Africa
Richards, Smith, Kallis, Pollock, Nourse, Faulkner, Pollock, Proctor, Waite, Tayfield, Donald. 12th Steyn
Same as above
Sri Lanka
Atapattu, Jayasuriya, Sangakkara, De Silva, Jayawardene, Ranatunga, Vaas, Ratnayake, De Mel, Se Silva, Muralitharan.
Same as above
W.I
Greenidge, Hunte, Headley, Richards, Lara, Sobers, Marshall, Hendriks, Holding, Ambrose, Gibbs. 12th Garner
Same as above with some reservations I think
So from these Teams in a round robin tournament, which top four teams would advance to the final four, final and the eventual winner in a 5 test series. Who really had the best players in history.

So have made my changes in bold

 

[kyear2]

So does anyone realise that I didnt make these teams, and if everyone made changes then that would take away from the exercise and lead to never ending debate and back and forth.
If no one is interested in taking part in the stated exercise then fine, but stop bashing the teams. Smalishah84 made some good suggestions, but the whosale changes are not up for debate. If i had my choice I too would have included at least Dujon over Hendriks, but its not my team.

 

[Himannv]

I think everyone was focused more on what the best team is. There was a fairly big topic back when these selections were first made which included discussions ranging from which team was the best for which country and which country had the best team. At the end of the day a few people have personal tastes which vary from the rest of the masses.

 

[weeman27bob]

So have made my changes in bold

Out of interest, how close do you consider the gap between Tallon and Gilchrist to be?

 

[Himannv]

Dropping Border for Harvey is a surprising one as well.

 

[JBMAC]

Out of interest, how close do you consider the gap between Tallon and Gilchrist to be?

Tallon was a far superior keeper than Gilchrist could ever be and with a batting lineup i have selected the team is better off with a specialist keeper

 

[subshakerz]

Will use the Cricinfo all time Teams selected for each country for this exercise.
Australia
Trumper, Morris, Bradman, Chappell, Border, Miller, Gilchrist, Warne, Lillee, O'Reilly, Mcgrath. 12th Ponting

England
Hutton, Hobbs, Hammond, Pieterson, Barrington, Botham, Knott, Underwood, Trueman, Larwood, Barnes. 12th Compton

India
Gavaskar, Sehwag, Dravid, Tendulkar, Hazare, Mankad, Dhoni, Dev, Kumble, Srinath, Prasanna. 12th Laxman

New Zealand
Turner, Dempster, Sutcliffe, Crowe, Donnelly, Reid, Hadlee, Vettori, Smith, Bond, Cowie

Pakistan
Mohammad, Anwar, Abbas, Miandad, Ul Haq, Khan, Latif, Akram, Mahmood, Qadir, Younis. 12th Yousuf

South Africa
Richards, Smith, Kallis, Pollock, Nourse, Faulkner, Pollock, Proctor, Waite, Tayfield, Donald. 12th Steyn

Sri Lanka
Atapattu, Jayasuriya, Sangakkara, De Silva, Jayawardene, Ranatunga, Vaas, Ratnayake, De Mel, Se Silva, Muralitharan.

W.I
Greenidge, Hunte, Headley, Richards, Lara, Sobers, Marshall, Hendriks, Holding, Ambrose, Gibbs. 12th Garner

So from these Teams in a round robin tournament, which top four teams would advance to the final four, final and the eventual winner in a 5 test series. Who really had the best players in history.

SA is a pretty underrated team here. They have the deepest batting and plenty of bowling options. Overall, I would think it goes down to them and Australia. Australia simply have everything covered (batting deep with Gilchrist, Bradman is like two batsmen in one, 3 quality pacers and 2 quality spinners).

If WI had replaced Gibbs with Garner or Roberts, I might have given them the edge. But Gibbs and Sobers and three great pacers is simply not penetrative enough an attack compared to Australia, SA, and Pakistan.

England are a wildcard team but have a longish tail and including Peitersen is a joke. Pakistan have the strongest pace attack but the middle order is weak against pace. The rest are not contenders.

 

[kyear2]

Thanks for your response. I agree with most of what you have said. Where I do disagree is that while S.A has great batting and bowling depth, apart from Donald and to a lesser extent Proctor they are not that penetrative. Tayfield and Gibbs are historically similar, Ambrose was better than Donald and no one IMO matches Marshall. For me its a matter of quality oven quantity. The W.I have 5 players in Cricinfo's and our own forums top 2 teams which is matched only by Australia who definately have better variety and depth. S.A though for sure is the 3rd best team to me ahead of Pakista. India doesnt have the bowling to bowl out any of the top 5 and not sure about Englands bowling and batting after the top 3.

 

[subshakerz]

Thanks for your response. I agree with most of what you have said. Where I do disagree is that while S.A has great batting and bowling depth, apart from Donald and to a lesser extent Proctor they are not that penetrative. Tayfield and Gibbs are historically similar, Ambrose was better than Donald and no one IMO matches Marshall. For me its a matter of quality oven quantity. The W.I have 5 players in Cricinfo's and our own forums top 2 teams which is matched only by Australia who definately have better variety and depth. S.A though for sure is the 3rd best team to me ahead of Pakista. India doesnt have the bowling to bowl out any of the top 5 and not sure about Englands bowling and batting after the top 3.

Yes, a very tight contest between WI and SA. Tayfield>Gibbs though. Gibbs had a strikerate of a wicket every 15 overs or so. I dont think batsmen are going to lose sleep facing him and Sobers. On the other hand, Donald, Pollock, Proctor doesn't seem the menacing pace attack for the WI top six. On second thought, you are right, quality usually trumps quantity in cricket.