The Greatest Innings Ever Played

[zaremba]

Dean Jones 210. Not sure how Jonkers' algorithm would be able to take account of what Jones went through in the course of that particular knock!

Some great knocks by Englishmen:

Gooch 154* was an amazing knock, and it certainly ticked all the right boxes in terms of pitch, bowling attack, outscoring his team-mates, and winning the match against a strong opponent.

Botham (yawn) Headingley and Old Trafford, 1981

Eddie Paynter's tonsillitic heroics v the Old Enemy, 1932/3

 

[Hoggy31]

Punter's 156 for the draw when no one else looked like scoring a run. Any Marto or Mark Waugh ton.

 

[0RI0N]

Bradman's 270 at the MCG
Lara's 153* at the Kensington Oval ,which saw on TV.
Gooch's 154* at Headingley

Special mention to a few Stan McCabe gems(Joburg,SCG & Trent Bridge).

 

[Uppercut]

Gilchrist's first test century against Pakistan has to be up there.

 

[Richard]

Maybe the fact Haydos was the only one to make any real runs in scorching heat of over 40 degrees (I believe) on a track that was also most likely very helpful for bowlers from what it seems.It was an excellent innings.

He was dropped at least twice though. Clearly the best innings of all-time absolutely has to be 150 or so absolute minimum before a chance is given.

Anyway for me the best innings ever is Bradman's 254 at Lord's in 1930. Every single shot went exactly where he aimed it. If anyone else has ever batted for that many deliveries (can't remember the exact number - IIRR it has been worked-out) without having a single shot go even slightly awry, I'll eat my computer.

Best I've ever seen live ball-by-ball is Nathan Astle's 222 in 2001/02, and if there's been a better innings in the last 20 or so years I'll be very surprised indeed.

Gooch's Headingley 1991 epic, though, might well be the second-best there's ever been.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Anyway for me the best innings ever is Bradman's 254 at Lord's in 1930. Every single shot went exactly where he aimed it. If anyone else has ever batted for that many deliveries (can't remember the exact number - IIRR it has been worked-out) without having a single shot go even slightly awry, I'll eat my computer.

I know Bradman said that, but it seems fairly unlikely even for him to have achieved.

Lawrence Rowe's 302 in the mid-70's takes some beating for perfect stroke play, but it's hard to compare that for skill and quality with a batsman making a half century on a sticky in another era.

 

[Richard]

Is there actually any footage of said Rowe innings? Coming in West Indies in 1974, I'd always presumed not.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Is there actually any footage of said Rowe innings? Coming in West Indies in 1974, I'd always presumed not.

There was plenty of it shown on the news and Grandstand at the time but I've not seen it since.

 

[wpdavid]

Is there actually any footage of said Rowe innings? Coming in West Indies in 1974, I'd always presumed not.

I'd be astonished if you were wrong about that. Shame, because there's several parts of that series which I'd love to see.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

I'd be astonished if you were wrong about that. Shame, because there's several parts of that series which I'd love to see.

Lots of highlights were shown at the time but it was mainly news footage which someone in their wisdom probably didn't keep. The Rowe innings, the Greig/Kallicharran Run Out and all the key incidents from that series were shown at the time.

 

[wpdavid]

Lots of highlights were shown at the time but it was mainly news footage which someone in their wisdom probably didn't keep. The Rowe innings, the Greig/Kallicharran Run Out and all the key incidents from that series were shown at the time.

Yes, I vaguely remember seeing some of the action. I also remember an interview with Amiss a few years ago when the matter was mentioned wrt his innings of 260. He said much the same as you.

 

[Migara]

The heat (50 degrees) and the conditions were so bad for batting that the 2nd highest score of the match was 44 from Ponting. Hayden scored more in his 1 innings of 119 than Pakistan did for both innings (112). It was truly something amazing to see, he was out there for more than 7 hours.

In that whole series Pakistani batting was dire. Aussies were kept in check by Steaming Akthar and Saqlain. Pitch was not much of a factor IIRC.

 

[Migara]

No one comments about Laxman's 281?

 

[steve132]

Those who saw Stan McCabe's 232 at Trent Bridge in 1938 insist that it was the greatest innings ever played.

 

[Richard]

No one comments about Laxman's 281?

Certainly deserves at worst a mention. I doubt it was the best, but you'd be hard-pressed to exclude it from a top ten, methinks.

Consider - team almost certainly doomed to lose (222 behind with 9 out of 20 wickets left when he came to the crease and still 42 behind as the last specialist batsman walked out to join him - he was on 95 at this time) and go 2-0 down with 1 to play, and he not merely saved his team from near-certain defeat but scored sufficiently quickly to allow them a shot at victory.

Mind, I'd bet a fair bit that he was never thinking of victory as he batted, just to bat for as long as he could. I imagine most people from both sides went into the last day thinking a draw was near-certain. Perfectly possible that had he managed to go on to get the 300 he'd have so richly deserved (which he was obviously going to be allowed to try to do) India would've batted on too long to be able to force victory. And had that game been drawn, Laxman's innings would be quite a bit less famous, though obviously like Atherton's 185* it'd still be recognised as an epic.

 

[chasingthedon]

I presume there must have been a thread on this subject before but hopefully this will provide a new slant on it.

I have just acquired a little book in a series of “Statistical Meanderings” by CPW Jonkers the point of which is to assess innings statistically with a view to thereby deciding which is the greatest innings ever.

He uses 5 factors:-

F1.Runs scored

Jonker’s takes the cube root of this in his calculation

F2. Quality of Pitch

To get a figure for this he divides 150 by (2 x the average runs per wicket for the match in question plus 3 x the average runs per wicket for the innings in which the runs are scored)

F3. Quality of Bowlers

The average bowling average when Jonkers wrote this was 28 so you calculate the average of the averages of the bowlers involved as at the date of the match weighted with reference to the number of overs they bowl and divide 28 by that figure.

F4. Speed of Innings

Jonkers would have liked to have used runs per 100 balls as the measure but as that is often not available for older innings he uses the individual innings runs per over. He then divides the innings figure by the overall test average (1.5 in his day) and you have F4

F5. Innings relative to that of other batsmen

The way he works this out is complicated but it is intended to be a measure of the dominance of the innings under consideration – if this thread attracts interest I will set it out in detail.

Jonkers considers F2 and F3 to be twice as important as F4 and F5

His rating is completed then by the following calculation

5F1 (2F2 + 2F3 + F4 + F5) divided by 3

Jonkers did this in 1992 – he admits only working it through on “about 30 well known innings” and his “Greatest Innings” on the basis of his formula was Graham Gooch’s 154* against W Indies at Headingley in 1991

OK - three pages, is that enough interest to post up the F5 calculation??

 

[Goocheslamb]

He was dropped at least twice though. Clearly the best innings of all-time absolutely has to be 150 or so absolute minimum before a chance is given.

Anyway for me the best innings ever is Bradman's 254 at Lord's in 1930. Every single shot went exactly where he aimed it. If anyone else has ever batted for that many deliveries (can't remember the exact number - IIRR it has been worked-out) without having a single shot go even slightly awry, I'll eat my computer.

Best I've ever seen live ball-by-ball is Nathan Astle's 222 in 2001/02, and if there's been a better innings in the last 20 or so years I'll be very surprised indeed.

Gooch's Headingley 1991 epic, though, might well be the second-best there's ever been.

were there tv cameras back in 1930? how do know bradmans shots went exactly where he wanted? were you there?

 

[Lillian Thomson]

were there tv cameras back in 1930? how do know bradmans shots went exactly where he wanted? were you there?

The only evidence is Bradman saying it himself, and he is the only one who could possibly know - It does sound about as likely to be true as when President Nixon said "I am not a crook".

 

[Richard]

were there tv cameras back in 1930? how do know bradmans shots went exactly where he wanted? were you there?

There were cameras - not TV cameras, but newsreel ones - but obviously even if they were positioned as they are now, behind the bowler's arm at each end (which they emphatically weren't), it'd still not be possible to tell whether every shot went where it was aimed, as you can't always tell such things.

It's always seemed to me unlikely that Bradman would make-up such near-unthinkable notions really, though. He wasn't one to boast. If he said he was good, it was because he was, not because he wanted people to believe he was better than he was. In any case, even if he managed to hit mid-off 4 times and mid-on once when he was aiming just wide of them I think the innings is probably still the best ever played.

 

[fredfertang]

OK - three pages, is that enough interest to post up the F5 calculation??

My only excuse is it is 6 months since I started the thread - the bloody booklet isn't where it should be (ie under "J") - I will dig it out though Dave