Waqar Younis

[SJS]

In his first six years of test cricket , between 1989-1994, Waqar had the following stunning stats.

Matches : 33
Wickets : 190
Average 19.18
Strike Rate : 36.1
Wkts per test : 5.8
5 wkts in inns : 19
10 in match : 4

I can only think of Syd Barnes with better figures.

Matches : 27
Wickets : 189
Average : 16.43
Strike Rate : 41.7
Wkts per match : 7
5 in inns : 24
10 in match : 7

 

[SJS]

Over the next 9 years he played another 54 tests but his figures were ordinary by comparison.

It just shows what can happen ina longer career particularly to fast bowlers. If Waqar had retired at the end of 1994 on in 1995, he would have been acclaimed as one of the greatest fast bowlers the game has ever seen (which he was) but his latter figures were achieved by a bowler not in his prime and now we judge him by his entire career records

Waqar - 1995-2003

Matches : 54
Wickets : 183
Average : 28.2
Strike rate : 51.2
Wkts per test : 3.4
5 in inns : 3
10 in match : 1

Still pretty good figures but not the same.

Great bowler...Waqar.

 

[Pratters]

The last 9 yearsare the years I saw him bowl and he never looked exceptional to me. I missed him till around 1994. He was dropped in the 92 world cup which I watched, and India didnt play Pakistan much if at all in the early 90s. They didnt show much international cricket in India back then too.

So it is sad that I missed Waqar in his initial years when he was devastating. For those exceptional years, he is entitled to his title as a cricketing great. But I never saw him bowl extraordinarily. It is sad he was out of the Pakistan team for some time and was never bowling the great toe crushers I had heard of his.

But I would quote cricinfo from an article I remember reading when he retired 'at one time in his career he may have bowled as good as any to have held a cricket bowl'. Its some thing like that and sums up his career perfectly.

 

[C_C]

The two Ws were unique bowlers, the type I've never really seen ( and i've seen cricket coverage dating back to the 70s and some from the 60s).....
Neither of them were worldclass in terms of consistency and pitching the ball where they want( almost every bowler of great class have this under lock and key) and were quiete erratic....but they had the ability to conjure up a ball that would leave you gaping- far more often than any other bowler i've ever seen.

its like half volley, half volley, wayward ball outside offstump, yorker from hell that would've even clean bowled God himself, half volley, bouncer.

 

[Choora]

The last 9 yearsare the years I saw him bowl and he never looked exceptional to me. I missed him till around 1994. He was dropped in the 92 world cup which I watched, .

Correction here. Waqar wasn't dropped from the 1992 WC, at that time the guy was on his peak but he missed the WC coz of injury.That was a big blow for Pakistan then coz he was the best bowler at that time.

I think the guy has the best strike rates as a bowler in the world.When he was on his peak the guy was superb, maybe even better than Akram.The only guy i can remember being as destructive as Waqar on his peak was Marshall.

 

[Pratters]

its like half volley, half volley, wayward ball outside offstump, yorker from hell that would've even clean bowled God himself, half volley, bouncer.

I dont think Akram was as wayward as you point him to be. Pretty on the spot that guy.

 

[C_C]

I dont think Akram was as wayward as you point him to be. Pretty on the spot that guy.

Ok that was a bit of an exgaggeration but it was close to Waqar...Akram was good at accuracy but not exceptional like Hadlee, McGrath,Ambrose or Marshall....
i believe that he was less accurate than most great bowlers but made it up with his ability to produce jaw dropping deliveries with greater frequency.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Why bash a legend like Waqar Younis alone? Its a norm in pak for every cricketer to come up with a dodgy birth certificate(they probably gets one when they are five years old).

I wasn't bashing him! He's probably my all-time fav bowler! I'm old enough to have seen him at his very peak, man he was amazing.

I just meant if he was only 33 it's a terrible shame he's not still charging in. At 33 a quick's best years are probably behind him, but Mr McGrath has shown how effective quicks at the "veteran" stage can be!

 

[SJS]

Wasim and Waqar were not erratic by any stretch of imagination. Yes, it is true that at 50 plus runs per 100 balls, Waqar's economy rate is not amongst the best.

As far as Wasim is concerned, I am amazed that such a comment can be made. He is one of the most accurate pace bowlers in the history of the game and one of the most economical.

Of the 131 pace and medium pace bowlers in the 20th century who got 100 or more test wickets, Wasim ranks 11th !! 11th amongst 133 over a hundred years !! If that doesnt make him one of the most economical bowlers of all time, I dont know what does. And if he got such phenominal economy by bowling erratically then I have nothing more to say

 

[Pratters]

19th century

20th century dude . And point well made as usual.

 

[C_C]

Wasim and Waqar were not erratic by any stretch of imagination

Waqar DEFINATELY was erratic but had the ability to conjure up awesome deliveries frequently.

I've seen numerous bowling instances of Akram and i feel that his control over line and length was good....but not great. He had extreme swing and was just behind waqar in frequency of awesome delivery bowled IMO......

 

[SJS]

20th century dude .

And point well made as usual.[/QUOTE]


Sorry for the first - a slip.

Thanks for the second. Not that it means anything to those who made up their minds years ago

 

[C_C]

I seriously dont know how anyone can say Waqar was not erratic when it came to line and length.
One can make a good case for Akram- IMO, he was consistent over that aspect but a great at that aspect- McGrath, Ambrose, Hadlee, marshall etc. definately had more consistency over line and length than Akram.
but Waqar ?
C'mon........if it wasnt for his ability to conjure up magic balls ever so often, he wouldnt be where he ended up......he was pretty poor when it came to line and length bowling consistently.

 

[Pratters]

I argued about Akram and not Waqar.

From what I saw of Waqar, in his period 1996-2002/3, he was a pretty mediocre bowler with nothing special.

 

[Beleg]

SJS, where do McGrath, Ambrose, Hadlee and Marshall stand on that ECO rate list?

 

[C_C]

I argued about Akram and not Waqar.

From what I saw of Waqar, in his period 1996-2002/3, he was a pretty mediocre bowler with nothing special.

I said that in reference to what SJS said.

 

[SJS]

SJS, where do McGrath, Ambrose, Hadlee and Marshall stand on that ECO rate list?

S No Bowler Wkts Eco Rate St Rate
1... Lohmann, George A... 112... 25.1... 42.9
2... Turner, Charles T B... 101... 26.3 ... 62.8
3... Tate, Maurice W... 155... 34.1... 76.8
4... Fazal Mahmood... 139... 34.9... 70.7
5... Davidson, Alan K... 186... 38.3... 53.6
6... Ambrose, Curtly E L... 405... 38.5... 54.6
7 Pollock, Shaun M... 349... 39.0... 54.9
8... Chatfield, Ewen J... 123... 39.2... 82.1
9... Barnes, Sydney F... 189... 39.5... 41.7
10... Adcock, Neil A T... 104... 39.9... 52.9
11... Bedser, Alexander V... 236... 40.4... 61.6
12... Garner, Joel... 259... 41.2... 50.9...
13... Holder, Vanburn A 109... 41.4... 80.4
14 McGrath, Glenn D... 440... 41.6... 52.0
15... Statham, John B... 252... 41.8... 59.4
16... Walsh, Courtney... 519... 42.3... 57.8
17... Cairns, Bernard... 130... 42.5... 77.4
18... Connolly, Alan... 102... 42.7... 68.4
19... Bailey, Trevor... 132... 42.9... 68.0
20... Wasim Akram... 414... 43.2... 54.7
21... Miller, Keith... 170.. 43.5... 52.8
22... Walker, Maxwell... 138... 43.6... 63.0
23... Streak, Heath... 202... 43.7... 63.1
24... Reiffel, Paul R 104... 43.8... 61.6
25... Vaas, W P U J Chaminda... 262... . 44.2... 67.0
26... Imran Khan... 362... 44.3... 51.5
27... Lindwall, Raymond... 228... 44.4... 51.8
28... Fraser, Angus ... 177... 44.5... 61.4
29... Reid, Bruce A... 113... 44.6... 55.2
30... Arnold, Geoffrey... 115... 44.8... 63.2
31... Marshall, Malcolm D... 376... 44.8... 46.8
32... Trueman, Frederick S... 307... 45.1... 47.8
33... Pollock, Peter M 116... 45.2... 53.5
34... Alderman, Terence M... 170... 45.3... 59.9
35... Sarfraz Nawaz... 177... 45.8... 71.5
36... Kallis, Jacques H... 166... 45.8... . 67.0
37... Bishop, Ian R... 161... 46.2... 52.6
38... Hadlee, Richard J... 431... 46.3... 48.2
39... Kapil Dev... 434... 46.4... 63.9
40... McKenzie, Graham D... 246... 46.4... 64.1
41... Snow, John A... 202... 46.6... 57.3
42... Croft, Colin E H... 125... 47.3... 49.3
43... Donald, Allan A... 330... 47.3... 47.0
44... Gillespie, Jason... 206... 47.5... 54.1
45... Holding, Michael... 249... 47.6... 49.8
46... Srinath, Javagal... 236... 47.6... 64.0
47... Old, Christopher... 143... 47.7... 59.0
48... De Freitas, Phillip.. 140... 47.8... 70.3
49... Roberts, Anderson... 202... 48.5... 52.8
50... Greig, Anthony ... 141... 48.6... 66.2
51... Hughes, Mervyn... 212... 49.0... 57.9
52... Harmison, Stephen... 102... . 49.1... 50.4
53... Taylor, Bruce R... 111... 49.3... 54.0
54... Lawson, Geoffrey.. 180 49.5... 61.8
55... Hogg, Rodney M... 123... 49.7... 57.3
56... Lillee, Dennis K... 355... 49.9... 47.9
57... Dilley, Graham R... 138... 50.1... 59.4
58... McDermott, Craig.. 291... 50.2... 57.0
59... Dillon, Merwyn... 131... 50.5... 66.4
60... Willis, Robert... 325... 50.6... 49.8
61... Collinge, Richard... 116... 50.7... 57.7
62... Cork, Dominic G... 131... 50.9... 58.6
63... Hall, Wesley W... 192... 50.9... 51.8
64... Botham, Ian T... 383... 51.1... 55.6
65... Caddick, Andrew... 234... 51.6... 57.9
66... Ntini, Makhaya... 166... 52.8 57.5
67... Ghavri, Karsan D... 109... 52.9... 63.4
68... Shoaib Akhtar 125... 54.1 45.2
69... Waqar Younis... 373... 54.2... 43.5
70... Hoggard, Matthew J... 117... 54.5 59.7...
71... Cairns, Christopher... 218... 54.8... 53.7
72... Gough, Darren 229... 55.0 51.6
73... Morrison, Daniel... 160... 55.1... 62.9
74... Malcolm, Devon... 128... 56.0... 66.2
75... Thomson, Jeffrey.. 200... 58.7... 47.7
76... Lee, Brett... 139... 59.6 53.1

Figures in red - last century

Figures in green - careers ongoing.

 

[C_C]

how exactly is the economy rate column deciphered ?
normally economy rate is runs given/overs bowled....its usually 2.3/3.3/3.8 etc kinda deal....we got 25.1, 38, 59 etc ?

 

[Pratters]

how exactly is the economy rate column deciphered ?
normally economy rate is runs given/overs bowled....its usually 2.3/3.3/3.8 etc kinda deal....we got 25.1, 38, 59 etc ?

Its on 100 balls. So if you give 3.0 runs an over, it would read 50.00. 50 runs given per 100 balls.

 

[C_C]

Its on 100 balls. So if you give 3.0 runs an over, it would read 50.00. 50 runs given per 100 balls.

Right. Gotcha.
Mucho Thanks