Am I the only person who thinks Kallis was a better player than Tendulkar?

[Tygra]

Ok before I begin this post, let me say that in NOWAY am I saying Tendulkar is a bad player. He is one of the all time greats.

However with that being said, Im wondering how it is Tendulkar has always been considered the best batsman of the past 20-30 years, some people even say best batsman ever; when Kallis beats him in almost every statistic.

So lets look at a few facts.


1. Kallis has an average of 55.37 to Tendulkar average of 53.78. Now that isn't a huge difference, but Kallis is ahead.

2. Though I am comparing the two as batsman, we must also remember that Kallis (292 wickets) was a genuine allrounder, which Sachin (46) was not- he was a batsman that could bowl a few overs to get the bowlers a rest. So Kallis had to focus on two aspects of his games compared to one for Tendulkar.

3. This one is my opinion so I may be wrong here. Sachin played a lot of tests in India which is a country that usually produces batting friendly pitches. Where as Kallis played a lot in South Africa, which, yes does have batting friendly pitches, but also has a few pitches that are hard to bat on.

4. One very small point here, Kallis has taken 200 catches to Tendulkars 115.

5. South Africa have been within the top 2 of world cricket for the majority of Kallis' career, I cant think of too many times that India were the best or even second best team in the world.

The only positives I can find for Sachin beating Kallis are that Sachin has 51 centuries to 45 for Kallis (6 more) but he has played 34 more tests- I think most people would agree that Kallis would have scored at least 6 centuries from 34 tests to equal Sachin.

And Sachin has a higher best score of 244 to Kallis 228.

So I think everyone can agree that Kallis is the best all-rounder in the past 20 years, I would argue the best all-round player ever. Is he a better batsman than Tendulkar (forgetting the bowling and fielding)?

From the above statistics, I can't see how ANYONE can say Sachin Tendulkar was a better batsman than Jaques Kallis. There may be a few Indian fans who are biased, however I am English, not South African, I am just looking at statistics and I can clearly see Kallis is better.

All statistics are from cricinfo.com

 

[MrPrez]

Generally the opinion here is that Tendulkar is the better batsman, whereas Kallis was the better player. (I hate saying was wrt Kallis so, so much )

As a South African I'm biased, but even I reckon Tendulkar was slightly better overall. They're a lot closer than what most people give them, though.

If you're going to look at it statistically, bare in mind that Tendulkar was statistically superior to Kallis for most of the time they played. SRT just fell off heavily towards the end of his career, which severely hurt his stats. Kallis had a much smaller fall-off.

 

[OverratedSanity]

From the above statistics, I can't see how ANYONE can say Sachin Tendulkar was a better batsman than Jaques Kallis.

Yup he was better

I am just looking at statistics

Alrighty then

 

[OverratedSanity]

Piss poor OP tbh. Just looking at stats to compare and using nothing else does both kallis and Tendulkar a massive injustice

 

[Spark]

Ok before I begin this post, let me say that in NOWAY am I saying Tendulkar is a bad player. He is one of the all time greats.

However with that being said, Im wondering how it is Tendulkar has always been considered the best batsman of the past 20-30 years, some people even say best batsman ever; when Kallis beats him in almost every statistic.

So lets look at a few facts.


1. Kallis has an average of 55.37 to Tendulkar average of 53.78. Now that isn't a huge difference, but Kallis is ahead.

2. Though I am comparing the two as batsman, we must also remember that Kallis (292 wickets) was a genuine allrounder, which Sachin (46) was not- he was a batsman that could bowl a few overs to get the bowlers a rest. So Kallis had to focus on two aspects of his games compared to one for Tendulkar.

3. This one is my opinion so I may be wrong here. Sachin played a lot of tests in India which is a country that usually produces batting friendly pitches. Where as Kallis played a lot in South Africa, which, yes does have batting friendly pitches, but also has a few pitches that are hard to bat on.

4. One very small point here, Kallis has taken 200 catches to Tendulkars 115.

5. South Africa have been within the top 2 of world cricket for the majority of Kallis' career, I cant think of too many times that India were the best or even second best team in the world.

The only positives I can find for Sachin beating Kallis are that Sachin has 51 centuries to 45 for Kallis (6 more) but he has played 34 more tests- I think most people would agree that Kallis would have scored at least 6 centuries from 34 tests to equal Sachin.

And Sachin has a higher best score of 244 to Kallis 228.

So I think everyone can agree that Kallis is the best all-rounder in the past 20 years, I would argue the best all-round player ever. Is he a better batsman than Tendulkar (forgetting the bowling and fielding)?

From the above statistics, I can't see how ANYONE can say Sachin Tendulkar was a better batsman than Jaques Kallis. There may be a few Indian fans who are biased, however I am English, not South African, I am just looking at statistics and I can clearly see Kallis is better.

All statistics are from cricinfo.com

I don't see how any of these are remotely relevant or valid in comparing them as batsmen.

As for your one actual relevant point: now, if you really think that scoring 0.4 runs per dismissal more is enough to definitively put someone ahead as opposed to all the other traditional methods of rating a batsman - frequency of great/matchwinning innings, consistency in all conditions, ability to handle top-class bowling attacks, range of strokeplay and adaptability, longevity etc then all the more power to you. I'll happily pass.

 

[Shri]

Close but no cigar.

 

[indiaholic]

Obviously a better cricketer but not a better batsman.

 

[Prince EWS]

Am I the only person who thinks Kallis was a better player than Tendulkar?

Nah, I think it'd actually be the predominant opinion here, but it's not based purely on batting. I don't think you'd even be the only one here who thought he was a better batsman than Tendulkar but you'd be in a small minority, and I say that as one of CW's greatest Kallis flagwavers.

 

[marc71178]

Tendulkar better batsman but not for me the best batsman of his era.

Kallis better Test player but would overall player is very close I'd say as Tendulkar was a much better ODI player for me.

 

[Cabinet96]

Not so sure the predominant opinion here is that Kallis is better tbh. One only has to look at the two CW top 50's to see that it's probably not the case.

 

[Pothas]

The top 50 is a funny one though, it is hard to reach any other conclusion than Kallis being better but I still had Tendulkar higher.

 

[OverratedSanity]

The top 50 is a funny one though, it is hard to reach any other conclusion than Kallis being better but I still had Tendulkar higher.

Yeah it's so strange. If I had to rank 50 great cricketers, I'd have tendulkar higher. More because of his impact on the game and how he spanned generations like no one else. At the same time, in a direct comparison, undoubtedly kallis is a better cricketer

 

[akilana]

Tendulkar is boring. Kallis is better batsman.

 

[NasserFan207]

Tendulkar the superior batsman, Kallis the superior player.

 

[Zinzan]

Whilst some here would argue Tendulkar was a better test batsman than Kallis, very few would rate him as a better test cricketer. You can't argue with facts I suppose.

For me Kallis was the greatest cricketer of the last 25 years

 

[Migara]

Tendulkar undoubtedly is the best batsmanof the era. But quite a few are ahead of him as players IMHO. Imran, Kallis, Pollock, Gilly, Sanga and perhaps Murali for sure in test matches. ODIs he has very few rivals. Dhoni, Bevan Symonds, Gilly and Jayasuriya are notables.

 

[Zinzan]

Tendulkar undoubtedly is the best batsmanof the era. .

That's just palpably untrue. There's a good number of people who argue for the likes of Lara, Ponting or even Kallis (in some cases) ahead of Tendulkar, so not sure how you can say 'Undoubtedly'. Perhaps so in India, but certainly not the rest of the world.

 

[OverratedSanity]

That's just palpably untrue. There's a good number of people who argue for the likes of Lara, Ponting or even Kallis (in some cases) ahead of Tendulkar, so not sure how you can say 'Undoubtedly'. Perhaps so in India, but certainly not the rest of the world.

Undoubtedly the best for him, maybe?

 

[benchmark00]

Haha Murali placed in there despite being a gumby in both the other two facets of the game.

 

[Shri]

That's just palpably untrue. There's a good number of people who argue for the likes of Lara, Ponting or even Kallis (in some cases) ahead of Tendulkar, so not sure how you can say 'Undoubtedly'. Perhaps so in India, but certainly not the rest of the world.

Well he is Sri Lankan so your point is invalid.