Jimmy Anderson v Jimmy Anderson v Jimmy Anderson

[GIMH]

Current Jimmy. Had more quality around him to support in 2010-13. I feel like this may be one reason for the big stats improvement but at the same time it has to work in his favour. Older bowler picking up more of the workload and smashing it out of the park. Got a lot of time for that.

 

[Cabinet96]

Yeah this is really tough. 10-13 had great series in Australia, Sri Lanka and India. Tbh the fact that his stats are so much better post 13/14 Ashes and that there's even this argument in the first place is incredible. Never would've thought it possible in late 2013.

 

[Victor Ian]

Bowlers are better now

Bowlers are clearly better than in the early 2000s.

Not detecting any sarcasm, I suspect you guys are serious. Justify or gtfo.

I don't think the numbers bear this out. Certainly, the aggregates don't. early 2000's took more wickets per match for less runs per wicket at less runs per over. You could try and cherry pick names instead of looking at everyone, but the list of names from early 2000's trumps any list of names from now.

I'd suspect the perception that modern bowlers are better is an illusion - because you actually get to see them, lots of them, in full HD, for every great ball they bowled. Modern bowlers take bags of wickets because modern batsmen throw their wickets away more often.

 

[Starfighter]

After fiddling with statsguru for a bit I'd say how you define 'early 2000's and 'now' is more important. If I go to the end of the 2003 english season the difference in averages is 0.8 or so compared to the entire 2010s, but effectively nil if I include 03/04. Either way, it's not large.

 

[Spark]

Not detecting any sarcasm, I suspect you guys are serious. Justify or gtfo.

I don't think the numbers bear this out. Certainly, the aggregates don't. early 2000's took more wickets per match for less runs per wicket at less runs per over. You could try and cherry pick names instead of looking at everyone, but the list of names from early 2000's trumps any list of names from now.

I'd suspect the perception that modern bowlers are better is an illusion - because you actually get to see them, lots of them, in full HD, for every great ball they bowled. Modern bowlers take bags of wickets because modern batsmen throw their wickets away more often.

I would say the perception that early 2000s bowlers are better as a whole is an illusion because of rose-tinted glasses. They weren't all McGrath, Warne, Pollock and Murali.

It's the 2nd and 3rd tier of bowlers which make the difference, not the ATGs at the top.

 

[OverratedSanity]

but the list of names from early 2000's trumps any list of names from now.

It really doesn't. Australia had Warne and McGrath, but the rest were weak. Who else was great ?

Akhtar and Asif could've been but they were injured/druggedup/in prison half the time, West Indies had Mervyn ****ing Dillon as the leader of their attack, SA had Ntini who was alright and Pollock who was nowhere near the bowler he was in the 90s and by 2003 or so he was merely ok, All NZ had was Shane Bond who again barely ever played two tests in a row, India were meh as ever, SL were rubbish bar Murali, and England had a great quartet that bowled well together for a season and a half.

Almost every single one of those countries has a better attack today than they did back then if you consider the entire decade.

 

[OverratedSanity]

I would say the perception that early 2000s bowlers are better as a whole is an illusion because of rose-tinted glasses. They weren't all McGrath, Warne, Pollock and Murali.

It's the 2nd and 3rd tier of bowlers which make the difference, not the ATGs at the top.

It's so weird because in the 2000s, all people could talk about was how the bowling attacks were so much weaker. There's been a clear uptick in their quality this decade but no one seems to want to admit it.

 

[Spark]

I mean even restricting to Australia, because that's the obvious outlier with Warne and McGrath in the early-to-mid 2000s, the bowling attacks over the last five years frankly haven't been that much weaker than the attacks fielded over that period (and in some cases they have been much, much stronger—Brad Williams, anyone?). It's the batting that has fallen off something of a cliff. India's attack is all-around stronger (better backup for the frontline spinners), England's is considerably stronger, and SA have had Steyn and Philander. Even the WI attack is half-decent. I think NZ posters would rate their bowling stocks now as stronger than in that period too, given who they were able to actually get onto the park.

 

[vcs]

India's bowling has drastically improved since Ashwin and Jaddu came of age. We were always good at home but latter era Harbhajan-Zaheer plus Ojha/Ishant/whoever was nowhere near as consistent at bowling sides out as our current attack.

 

[TheJediBrah]

I mean even restricting to Australia, because that's the obvious outlier with Warne and McGrath in the early-to-mid 2000s, the bowling attacks over the last five years frankly haven't been that much weaker than the attacks fielded over that period (and in some cases they have been much, much stronger—Brad Williams, anyone?). It's the batting that has fallen off something of a cliff. India's attack is all-around stronger (better backup for the frontline spinners), England's is considerably stronger, and SA have had Steyn and Philander. Even the WI attack is half-decent. I think NZ posters would rate their bowling stocks now as stronger than in that period too, given who they were able to actually get onto the park.

2003-04 summer against India (& a bit of Zimbabwe) when Warne/McGrath were injured was hilarious. Brad Williams as you mentioned, also notable Test bowlers Nathan Bracken & Brad Hogg were relied upon heavily. IIRC the series v Zimbabwe involved 6 wicket hauls for Simon Katich & Darren Lehmann.

 

[Gob]

2003-04 summer against India (& a bit of Zimbabwe) when Warne/McGrath were injured was hilarious. Brad Williams as you mentioned, also notable Test bowlers Nathan Bracken & Brad Hogg were relied upon heavily. IIRC the series v Zimbabwe involved 6 wicket hauls for Simon Katich & Darren Lehmann.

No wonder Sachin made runs.

 

[OverratedSanity]

2003-04 summer against India (& a bit of Zimbabwe) when Warne/McGrath were injured was hilarious. Brad Williams as you mentioned, also notable Test bowlers Nathan Bracken & Brad Hogg were relied upon heavily. IIRC the series v Zimbabwe involved 6 wicket hauls for Simon Katich & Darren Lehmann.

On paper the 03/04 attack still had Gillespie, macgill, Lee and bichel (who I was a big fan of), but in reality they didn't bowl well... Mainly because Gillespie was half fit iirc and they had no one to actually lead the pace attack.

 

[OverratedSanity]

No wonder Sachin made runs.

And yet it's one of his worst tours of Australia tbh.

 

[vcs]

Sachin's best contribution in that series was his 2 wickets in the 2nd innings at Adelaide.

Also, it still annoys me that we didn't bat Australia out of the game at Melbourne after the start that Sehwag gave.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Those chances PartHIV fluffed... Still hurts.

 

[stephen]

That series showed just how weak Australia's bowling was outside the big two. McGrath and Warne were Australia's bowling attack and I feel Gillespie was very overrated. Any time Dizzy got an opportunity to lead the attack he went missing.

 

[TheJediBrah]

That series showed just how weak Australia's bowling was outside the big two. McGrath and Warne were Australia's bowling attack and I feel Gillespie was very overrated. Any time Dizzy got an opportunity to lead the attack he went missing.

That's harsh. He just wasn't consistently in peak fitness player. At his best he was always one of the best bowlers in the world, but he missed a lot of cricket and played a fair bit as well when out of sorts.

 

[Daemon]

Was Dizzy as good as James Anderson?

 

[TheJediBrah]

Was Dizzy as good as James Anderson?

They're opposites in terms of longevity. Also completely opposite sorts of bowler.

Dizzy at his peak v Anderson at his peak would be similar. You'd prefer Anderson when it swings a lot and Dizzy anywhere else.

 

[Victor Ian]

OS and Spark, thanks for following up. Maybe, I might just have to actually appreciate these modern bowlers a bit more.