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Rest of the Greats

L Trumper

State Regular
India's side definitely had an immense batting lineup, but on the bowling front they were comparatively really weak. I never felt they were dominating, just a very good side that could hold their own against anyone else in the world away while winning consistently at home.

I guess in terms of records and series results they have a right to be listed, but it just feels out of place when you look at the rest of the sides mentioned here on the bowling front.
Compare their batting with the rest of the sides, you could say they were the best batting side among that bunch. Certainly their top 6 at that time were immense. But may be after 10-20 years we might not rate them as much as we do now considering the way they fallen of cliff with roughly the same player over the past 2 years.
 

Daemon

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Compare their batting with the rest of the sides, you could say they were the best batting side among that bunch. Certainly their top 6 at that time were immense. But may be after 10-20 years we might not rate them as much as we do now considering the way they fallen of cliff with roughly the same player over the past 2 years.
True.

Another point, while not entirely important, is that India had pretty much no depth outside of the XI. We had poor bowlers waiting on the sidelines and the only capped replacement batsmen we had were mediocre-decent openers in the form of Vijay and Jaffer.
 

The Sean

Cricketer Of The Year
I reckon the Australian side immediately after the second World War often gets underrated, due to it invariably being talked purely in terms of the Invincibles and the 1948 tour rather than its excellence over an extended period. It actually went unbeaten for 25 Tests after the war, and that first loss was in a dead Test with Australia 4-0 up!

FWIW here is the team's record for the six years 1946-52:

1946 in New Zealand (1 Test) - won 1-0
1946/47 home to England (5 Tests) - won 3-0
1947/48 home to India (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1948 in England (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1949/50 in South Africa (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1950/51 home to England (5 Tests) - won 4-1
1951/52 home to West Indies (5 Tests) - won 4-1

Overall, those first 31 Tests after the war yielded 24 wins and just two defeats, only one of which was in a live Test. It's a fantastic record, and was a phenomenal side with a number of Australia's greatest ever players in their prime.

The team changed a bit over that time of course, but a composite "representative" Australian side for the period would look something like:

Sid Barnes
Arthur Morris
Don Bradman
Lindsay Hassett
Neil Harvey
Keith Miller
Don Tallon
Ray Lindwall
Ian Johnson
Ernie Toshack
Bill Johnston

Bill Brown, Sam Loxton and Colin McCool all in with a shout too, while if I was cheating I could try to include Bill O'Reilly who did play that one Test against New Zealand before retiring.
 

fredfertang

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
I reckon the Australian side immediately after the second World War often gets underrated, due to it invariably being talked purely in terms of the Invincibles and the 1948 tour rather than its excellence over an extended period. It actually went unbeaten for 25 Tests after the war, and that first loss was in a dead Test with Australia 4-0 up!

FWIW here is the team's record for the six years 1946-52:

1946 in New Zealand (1 Test) - won 1-0
1946/47 home to England (5 Tests) - won 3-0
1947/48 home to India (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1948 in England (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1949/50 in South Africa (5 Tests) - won 4-0
1950/51 home to England (5 Tests) - won 4-1
1951/52 home to West Indies (5 Tests) - won 4-1

Overall, those first 31 Tests after the war yielded 24 wins and just two defeats, only one of which was in a live Test. It's a fantastic record, and was a phenomenal side with a number of Australia's greatest ever players in their prime.

The team changed a bit over that time of course, but a composite "representative" Australian side for the period would look something like:

Sid Barnes
Arthur Morris
Don Bradman
Lindsay Hassett
Neil Harvey
Keith Miller
Don Tallon
Ray Lindwall
Ian Johnson
Ernie Toshack
Bill Johnston

Bill Brown, Sam Loxton and Colin McCool all in with a shout too, while if I was cheating I could try to include Bill O'Reilly who did play that one Test against New Zealand before retiring.
I'd cheat a bit more and replace Ian Johnson with Cec Pepper
 

L Trumper

State Regular
How is Lindsay Hassett rated these days? Benaud used to say he will get every last ounce of the ability. One of the forgotten greats and brilliant captain too.
 

fredfertang

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Ha ha, well at least they were on the same team, Braddles wouldn't "have to put up with that sort of thing" from Pepper.
I'd forgotten they fell out, but as you say Bradman didn't seem to mind as long as he was running the show
 

The Sean

Cricketer Of The Year
To be fair I'd probably rank Hassett below Hayden and McCabe as well, though that's hardly an insult in my books as I rate both of them extremely highly.

He's probably a touch underrated insofar as he's rarely talked about at all in these parts when Australia's greatest batsmen are discussed. That being said, Australia has produced a lot of great ones and as good as Hassett was he was never really at any point in his career Australia's best batsman, being in the shadow of Bradman - inevitably - for the first half of his career and then to a lesser extent Harvey for the second half. Losing what were potentially some of his best years to the war probably didn't help either.

For all that, he was an outstanding player though who actually got more productive with age, a fine captain, and by all accounts an absolutely fantastic team man with a wonderful, dry sense of humour.
 

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