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Worse no. 6's than Ramdin

Flametree

International 12th Man
Just wondering who the worst player ever selected to bat at number 6 would be?

I'm not thinking of players who were picked and then shown not to be good enough for test cricket, so much as those who had demonstrated over a period of time that they weren't very good batsmen, but got put as number 6. Players who might have made respectable number 8's who thanks to some flavour-of-the-month selectorial brilliance ended up at 6.

I'll nominate a few kiwis - James Franklin, Chris Harris, Dipak Patel maybe.

Another category might be the bits n pieces folk with short careers who were probably never going to be good enough, but form in first class cricket got them a couple of caps or so. England seemed to specialise in these players for a time, the likes of Irani and Hollioake...

(I suspect the winner of the title for worst player will be Khaled Mahmud, but I can't be bothered checking to see if he did in fact bat at 6....)
 

Flem274*

123/5
Hey you, I wanted to say Franklin and no way is he in the same class as the venerable Christopher Zinzan Harris.

But it's Franklin all the way.
 

flibbertyjibber

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I know my choice might not sit easy but he was given ample opportunities in ODI's beforehand to see he was not a top 6 player but was still picked there in tests.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
I know my choice might not sit easy but he was given ample opportunities in ODI's beforehand to see he was not a top 6 player but was still picked there in tests.
Hollioake senior? Fair call, although he can only have played one test there in the 1997 series IIRC.

Craig White was another, especially back in 1994 when Illingworth thought the need for five bowlers outweighed the need for a decent batting lineup to see off Donald, de Villiers and co. He wasn't the worst batsman in the world, but he was completely out of his depth there at that stage of his career, especially against a very good SA attack.

I think Ronnie Irani may also have played a few times at number 6.

There's a theme here, isn't there. I wonder whether Pringle ever batted at 6 for us. I reckon Capel might have done on occasions. And I think that Geoff Miller might even have batted there early in his test career. A man who never managed a FC ton ffs.

Elsewhere, I remember Aus only picking five batsmen in the decisive Melbourne test back in 1986. Maybe their disco-dancing offie was promoted to number 6. Can't recall his name for the life of me though.
 
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wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
Just looked and yes he did.
Thanks mate - and apologies for being too lazy to do it myself. I just remember reading about England cracking open the champagne when they heard that Aus were only playing five batsmen. Mind you, Aus were so abject in that test it probably wouldn't have made any difference if they had played one more.
 

Prince EWS

Global Moderator
Matthews averaged 41 with the bat in 33 Tests though. Even at #6 specifically he averaged just shy of 44 in 15 innings. Got the job done.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
Matthews averaged 41 with the bat in 33 Tests though. Even at #6 specifically he averaged just shy of 44 in 15 innings. Got the job done.
Fair enough. I'm amazed, but it's hard to argue with the stats. Who did he play against when batting at 6? Not that there were many easy pickings in the mid-80s.
 

Hurricane

Hall of Fame Member
Mathews was very average technique wise. But he had an excellent temperament and would run his ones and twos in tests like it was a one dayer. If his average score was 41 then I would say he created at least 8 of those runs per inning with hard running between the wickets. He was hated in NZ for various reasons mainly because a) he was Australian and b) we thought he was ****y.

whats your favourite past time Greg
my Girlfriend etc

I guess you could call him one of the game's characters. But he was annoying from a distance. Probably very popular in Aus I would presume. Very ordinary bowler but quite accurate. Strangely because his bowling was so ordinary he got slogged in ODIs and they restricted him to tests and in my mind's eye the better bowler for all formats was Peter Taylor. Yet he was only retained for the ODIs.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
Mathews was very average technique wise. But he had an excellent temperament and would run his ones and twos in tests like it was a one dayer. If his average score was 41 then I would say he created at least 8 of those runs per inning with hard running between the wickets. He was hated in NZ for various reasons mainly because a) he was Australian and b) we thought he was ****y.

whats your favourite past time Greg
my Girlfriend etc

I guess you could call him one of the game's characters. But he was annoying from a distance. Probably very popular in Aus I would presume. Very ordinary bowler but quite accurate. Strangely because his bowling was so ordinary he got slogged in ODIs and they restricted him to tests and in my mind's eye the better bowler for all formats was Peter Taylor. Yet he was only retained for the ODIs.
It's funny what sticks in the memory and what doesn't. Looking at his list of tests, he scored loads of runs against England in 1990/91, which I'd completely forgotten. Even took a ton off us on one occasion in that series, of which I have no recollection at all.

Whereas I remember more of the mid-1980s series when he seemed an Embureyesque spinner who could bat a bit, hence the observation from an English pov that he'd been promoted beyond his station at Melbourne. That being said, we'd paid no attention whatsoever to his performances elsewhere, such as batting very well against NZ around that time, presumably with Hadlee at the peak of his powers.

Suffice to say that he doesn't belong in this thread.
 

Flametree

International 12th Man
Definitely wasn't thinking of Greg Matthews when I started this thread! He belongs in a different "Collingwood" thread for "folk with crappy-looking techniques who really can't have been that good - can they? - but who somehow churned out really good numbers". Re Matthews, that obviously only applies to his batting - his bowling was seriously ordinary.

On the Geoff Miller call, I suspect in every test he played he was playing alongside Botham, so the selectors probably felt the two of them made a respectable 6-7 combo....
 

Hurricane

Hall of Fame Member
Just wondering who the worst player ever selected to bat at number 6 would be?

I'm not thinking of players who were picked and then shown not to be good enough for test cricket, so much as those who had demonstrated over a period of time that they weren't very good batsmen, but got put as number 6. Players who might have made respectable number 8's who thanks to some flavour-of-the-month selectorial brilliance ended up at 6.

I'll nominate a few kiwis - James Franklin, Chris Harris, Dipak Patel maybe.

Another category might be the bits n pieces folk with short careers who were probably never going to be good enough, but form in first class cricket got them a couple of caps or so. England seemed to specialise in these players for a time, the likes of Irani and Hollioake...

(I suspect the winner of the title for worst player will be Khaled Mahmud, but I can't be bothered checking to see if he did in fact bat at 6....)
Richard Hadlee. Terrific number 7 but really had no business with an average of 27 IIRC being at number 6.
 

Howe_zat

Audio File
Dwayne Bravo, surely. Spent 50 innings there and never managed to average more than mid-twenties in the position.

In terms of actually useful players, Alan Knott was elevated to #6 for 20 innings despite playing with the likes of D'Olivera and Greig to take on fifth bowler duties. Apparently not a success, he only managed two fifties and averaged 22.
 

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