South Africa - captaincy blunder?

[Richard]

SA are masters of being less than the sum of their parts...

Thing is, the parts haven't performed anywhere near up to the standard we expect of them recently:
Alan Dawson's last 8 ODIs: 5.55-an-over
Makhaya Ntini's last 13 ODIs: 5.45-an-over
Jacques Kallis hasn't really been bowling well for 3 or 4 years now.
Lance Klusener hasn't ever been quite as good as I reckon he could have been.
Charl Langeveldt, with an ODI average of 19 and ER of 4.1, has barely played recently.
With regards the batting:
Duminy has been brought in and has been totally wasted, batting below Pollock and Boucher at leat, who, while fair players, are not batsmen of rare promise.
Graeme, while he's only been out in single-figures once in the last 9 ODIs, he's not made a half-century in that time.
Herschelle Gibbs, as I've mentioned in another thread, really should have been dropped from ODIs by now, just a question of if there's anyone better. Certainly not Puttick.
Jacques Rudolph in his last 14 ODIs: 26.20
Mark Boucher's ODI record has always been disappointing, even if there has been some mitigation.

About the only players who have been consistently good since WC2003 have been Pollock (ER 3.52-an-over) and Kallis (65.58, though that disguises a largely poor New Zealand series). So South Africa have basically been a two-man team for a while now.

 

[Tim]

And how could you tell all this Richard? did you see any of the NZ/S.A series?
Or are you once again trying to build something from scorecards & bulletins on Cricinfo or Cricketweb?

 

[Richard]

It's surprising no one has mentioned Jonty Rhodes's retirement as a possible reason for South Africa's apparent decline.

Yes, Rhodes wasn't the most prolific batsman, but there are players like him, who have a certain impact on the team, and despite a lesser performance in terms of quantity, manage to induce the spirit of wanting to win.

Jonty Rhodes Tests from 1998 onwards: average 45.51
Jonty Rhodes in ODIs from August 2000 onwards: 48.70
It might have taken him a while to fulfil his potential, but the selectors always knew it was there and kept faith with his batting.
And yes, I don't know how I managed to remember Cullinan, Kirsten, Donald and Elworthy but forget him - unforgivable of me. :slapwrist:

 

[Richard]

And how could you tell all this Richard? did you see any of the NZ/S.A series?
Or are you once again trying to build something from scorecards & bulletins on Cricinfo or Cricketweb?

No, I'm using lots of reports (allied to the scorecard) and building-up a pretty good picture from them. It's so much better than just using one account, when we've seen CricInfo\Wisden mistakes so often.
In any case, which part of my last post made specific reference to that series?

 

[Tim]

This:

-And I continue to laugh at Richard's rubbish...yep, NZ in particular are playing really poor ODI cricket at the moment. -

"No, it was South Africa who played the poor cricket - most of the bowlers and some of the batsmen underperformed.
And England and West Indies played poor ODI cricket - wow, what a surprise that is."

I'd say you were referring to all 3 series. But anyway, I guess with all the reports you've read you could almost do a ball by ball of each ODI or test then?

 

[Richard]

Well that's all very well and clear now you've pointed it out, but if you'd jst quoted from the relevant post it might have been clearer.

 

[marc71178]

For him to get the captaincy, he will need to hold a regular spot, and it seems McKenzie is hardly a certainty in every South African XI.

Was Graeme Smith when selected? (seeing as he didn't go to the World Cup)

 

[marc71178]

No, it's not, it's a very poor system and it's a reflection of the current quality of ODI bowling that Oram is right up there at the moment, plus the poor system.

Or, could it just be that Oram's performed well?

15 wickets @ 17.07 in his last 8 games (conceding 3.76 per over)

And for the record, those 15 wickets:

Smith
Kallis
Boucher
Smith
Klusener
Prince
Pollock
Peterson
Gayle
Trescothick
Jones
McGrath
Vaughan
Collingwood
Gayle

So only 1 non-batsman...

 

[Richard]

Was Graeme Smith when selected? (seeing as he didn't go to the World Cup)

He was a fixture in the Test-side (averaging as he did over 50), and his World Cup omission was widely accepted as a huge error.

 

[Richard]

Or, could it just be that Oram's performed well?

15 wickets @ 17.07 in his last 8 games (conceding 3.76 per over)

And for the record, those 15 wickets:

Smith
Kallis
Boucher
Smith
Klusener
Prince
Pollock
Peterson
Gayle
Trescothick
Jones
McGrath
Vaughan
Collingwood
Gayle

So only 1 non-batsman...

And what matters is not the names of the batsmen but the shots which were played.
Of course, PWC takes no account of that and that's why it's so poor.
Of course, credit is deserved for the economy, but it seems very much to me that it's biased in favour of wickets, rather than economy as it should be.

 

[marc71178]

It actually takes more things than mere numbers into consideration.

For one it doesn't subscribe to a ludicrous arbitrary cut-off for economy rates.

 

[Richard]

Err, no, of course it doesn't - it doesn't say "good" or "bad" - it just, ludicrously, attempts to seperate every single player when there are countless who are for all intents and purposes equal.

 

[marc71178]

If they were all equal, how come they don't average the same?

Oram has in 8 games taken 15 wickets, 14 of which were either genuine batsmen (and some of the best around) or handy men who are not easy to dismiss - and 1 rabbit.

So what more does he have to do to be ranked highly?

 

[Neil Pickup]

If they were all equal, how come they don't average the same?

Oram has in 8 games taken 15 wickets, 14 of which were either genuine batsmen (and some of the best around) or handy men who are not easy to dismiss - and 1 rabbit.

So what more does he have to do to be ranked highly?

Who's the rabbit?

 

[marc71178]

Rich H's favourite.

As rabbits go, it's not the biggest..

 

[Richard]

If they were all equal, how come they don't average the same?

Because there's not much difference between an average of 42 and an average of 43. Or even between 41 and 44.
No-one will ever average exactly the same except by extraordinary coincidence.

Oram has in 8 games taken 15 wickets, 14 of which were either genuine batsmen (and some of the best around) or handy men who are not easy to dismiss - and 1 rabbit.

So what more does he have to do to be ranked highly?

Nothing, very obviously - he is ranked highly, so he doesn't have to do any more.
However, to achieve a high rating from me, he would have to do well in less favourable circumstances.
Up to the end of the South Africa series his bowling had been so poor recently it was almost untrue - except for the odd time he somehow or other escaped against Pakistan and missed a few games.
It has always struck me that fate has conspired in his favour.

 

[Neil Pickup]

My definition of rabbit is single digit average at the most.

Robbie P's career is: FC 25 (4x100), List A 27 (1x100), Test 31, ODI 13

Not a rabbit!

 

[Richard]

Not a rabbit, just a wholly useless fingerspinner!

 

[marc71178]

My definition of rabbit is single digit average at the most.

Robbie P's career is: FC 25 (4x100), List A 27 (1x100), Test 31, ODI 13

Not a rabbit!

Apologies.

So it's 15 decent players and no rabbits.

Only serves to ask why some people cannot accept Oram as a bowler.

Also suggests that was Peterson selected for SA as a batsman who can fill in?

 

[Langeveldt]

Also suggests that was Peterson selected for SA as a batsman who can fill in?

Wishful thinking....