Michael Clarke Discussion thread

[Mingster]

Hamish Marshall has been a better ODI player than Clarke.

[Linda]

Whats that got to do with anything? I thought we were discussing Clarke's potential in the Australian team.

[Waughney]

Originally Posted by Mingster

Hamish Marshall has been a better ODI player than Clarke.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Mr. P

C'mon mate. Really, I expect better from you. We can cover this from every angle, but you cannot leave those games out.

Oh, I wouldn't dream of saying "leave them out", but it's not been unknown for players to start well and fall away.
Thus far, Clarke has done that. Maybe there have been excuses ("he had to slog") but nonetheless, the fact that the average isn't as high as some would like means he is a little overrated.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by marc71178

Yes, and incidentally, by batting so low down, he gets a lot of not outs...

Well, he did earlier on in his career, less so recently.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Son Of Coco

So did Bevan, they're often 30-40 not outs though, which make a significant contribution to the team.

And Bevan has also proved more than capable of coming in at three or four and blazing 70 off 60 balls - something most people appear not to recognise about him, preferring to generalise that he's only capable of playing the way they've seen him play.
Bevan is, of course, also capable of coming in at three and scoring 145* off 120, too. He's a genius the like of which the one-day game has never seen before and Australia were insane to drop him in preferance of Clarke.

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by Richard

And Bevan has also proved more than capable of coming in at three or four and blazing 70 off 60 balls - something most people appear not to recognise about him, preferring to generalise that he's only capable of playing the way they've seen him play.
Bevan is, of course, also capable of coming in at three and scoring 145* off 120, too. He's a genius the like of which the one-day game has never seen before and Australia were insane to drop him in preferance of Clarke.

Of course he was, and that's why Australia kept him at 6 for years, because having him come in at 3 and blaze 145 off 120 balls wouldn't have been to anyone's benefit.

Clarke may well be able to do the same, we'll never know until we see him there. He is certainly good at pacing an innings and, along with Symonds, could form a valuable partnership in the middle order.

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by Richard

Clarke is 23 with 4 seasons under his belt - he's not that young.
He's also not been at all convincing in his ODI career to date - he had a fantastic start (average of 208 after 4 innings).
Since then he's averaged 29.13 when you remove Zimbabwe games (perfectly legitimate, given that Zimbabwe have not been ODI standard from WC2003 onwards).
Still to convince as far as I'm concerned.

If you're basing the fact that his average dropped on averaging 208 for the first 4 innings Richard then i guess he was always going to be a failure.

[marc71178]

Originally Posted by Son Of Coco

Of course he was, and that's why Australia kept him at 6 for years, because having him come in at 3 and blaze 145 off 120 balls wouldn't have been to anyone's benefit.

Yes, and that's why SRT opens for India even though he's clearly better utilised averaging ten less in the middle order.

[Son Of Coco]

Originally Posted by marc71178

Yes, and that's why SRT opens for India even though he's clearly better utilised averaging ten less in the middle order.

exactly! haha

[tooextracool]

Originally Posted by Son Of Coco

Of course he was, and that's why Australia kept him at 6 for years, because having him come in at 3 and blaze 145 off 120 balls wouldn't have been to anyone's benefit.

the australian selectors got it wrong its as simple as that....if you ask me bevan should have been moved around according to the situation, usually i would have him batting up the order when they batted first and have him batting down the order when they were chasing....

[Mingster]

Another example of Richard being a crazy git - 23 is not young? Oh my.

[tooextracool]

not by indian standards

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Mingster

Another example of Richard being a crazy git - 23 is not young? Oh my.

And I've said that where?
It's young, it's just not as young as he looks - he looks about as old as me.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Son Of Coco

If you're basing the fact that his average dropped on averaging 208 for the first 4 innings Richard then i guess he was always going to be a failure.

That's exactly the same as "Lee could hardly go on averaging 16 for ever", another one I've heard plenty of times.
If he'd averaged 35 from then onwards, that'd be more than excellent, but he hasn't - he's averaged pretty poor, so after a phenominal start he's dropped off quite badly.