• Welcome to the Cricket Web forums, one of the biggest forums in the world dedicated to cricket.

    You are currently viewing our boards as a guest which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community you will have access to post topics, respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join the Cricket Web community today!

    If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us.

Manufactured openers' success

NZTailender

I can't believe I ate the whole thing
Mark Richardson probably one of the ultimate manufactured openers. From spinner to top order anchor, what a guy. Wish he still played.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
Yea Langer would be a better choice.

Didn't realise MP opened when he was younger though always thought he a middle-order bat all the way up. I dont mind taking your word for it, but by chance you have any proof of this?
It's true, read Vaughan's book last week and he mentions how he opened in all his early matches
 

Top_Cat

Request Your Custom Title Now!
If you've got the technique to be successful at FC cricket, generally, you've got the technique to succeed no matter where you bat and for whom.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
If he's equipped to open the batting and he's asked to open, he's an opening batsman. If he's not good at it, he's merely a bad opening batsman. A lot of "natural" openers are bad at what they do.
So? A natural opener in my book is one who's grown into the role. Natural\manufactured and good\bad are not the same thing.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
By Richard's logic/theory, Ashwell Prince is a 'natural' opener. He opened as a schoolboy and for RSA U19's alongside Mark Boucher.
I'm well aware of the antics of Prince and Boucher (and Ant Botha) as under-19 international openers but it's news to me that Prince was ever much of an opener apart from there. Wonder when he was manufactured into a middle-order batsman.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
It's just funny to compare Richard's ideals of only opening batsmen opening the batting to the strict division of labour of colonial times. Trade unions used to be crazy about it over here. Trade unions would object any time a non-engineer did a little bit of work normally done by the engineers, so paranoid were they that their jobs were under threat.

Richard's theories on opening batsmen remind me of that. Despite Sehwag obviously doing a significantly better job opening the batting than any "real" opening batsman in the world, he objects because he isn't a qualified member of the Opening Batsmen's Union as defined by him. It's absurd. All I could say was "Lol."
It's not really absurd - as I said to Camps just above, who's best (whether Sehwag is indeed a better opening batsman than for instance Michael Slater or Saeed Anwar is a MOO but it's certainly far from an absurd idea) and who's a natural in the role are two different things. I don't "object to" Sehwag being considered as among the best openers ever on the basis of him being merely manufactured into the role, I am less certain than some because I have always retained serious doubts about his ability to succeed against quality seam bowling with a new ball behaving as a new ball should. Until he gets the chance to dispell that and does (he's had no more than the odd chance all career and has failed each time he has) I'll retain that doubt and say I'm far from certain he is fit to rank with a Slater or Saeed.

Being natural or manufactured is a completely separate issue to how good someone is. Though sometimes whether one is natural or manufactured can impact on how good someone is.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
What exactly are these reasons?

You're stating your opinion without actually giving a reason for why you believe that to be the case.
I'm not really stating an opinion - I'm stating how things appear for all intents and purposes to be. The reasons have been alluded to by some others. It's in no small part due to mindset, but technical issues do come into it as well.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
I think it's refreshing to see these 'non-specialists' performing at the top of the order because I'd rather watch the best players playing tests and ODIs, than have them not in the team because their spot in the order isn't available.
Sometimes how good someone is depends on where they bat in the order. Someone might be a fine middle-order player and a poor opener; someone else might be moderate in both roles but if the vacancy is at the top of the order the player you perceived as lesser might actually do a better job.

This certainly isn't an invariable case with no or even few exceptions, but there is plenty of merit in saying that only those who've long-term performance in the role behind them deserve consideration.
I think most of the former players complaining about some of these guys opening seem to be openers themselves who like to remind everyone how hard opening is. ;)
Was, more like. At the present time opening is generally no more difficult and not-irregularly easier than batting in the middle.
 

zaremba

Cricketer Of The Year
For me a manufactured opener is someone who's had no serious proposition as an opener until the age of ~20 then gets pushed up to open. Simple as that.
= Gooch.

Not sure I really buy the "natural opener" thing at all TBH.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
But if you're good enough to be an opening batsman, then you shouldn't be denied the opportunity to be one. If a bowler has the ability to bat, no one's going to deny him that opportunity to be an allrounder because it's a "specialist" job.
Is anyone saying they should be?
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
If you've got the technique to be successful at FC cricket, generally, you've got the technique to succeed no matter where you bat and for whom.
Hmm - more often than not possibly but not I'd say regularly enough to say "generally". And in any case it's far from just about technique, mindset is very important as well - possibly more so than technique.
 

Burgey

Request Your Custom Title Now!
It's just funny to compare Richard's ideals of only opening batsmen opening the batting to the strict division of labour of colonial times. Trade unions used to be crazy about it over here. Trade unions would object any time a non-engineer did a little bit of work normally done by the engineers, so paranoid were they that their jobs were under threat.

Richard's theories on opening batsmen remind me of that. Despite Sehwag obviously doing a significantly better job opening the batting than any "real" opening batsman in the world, he objects because he isn't a qualified member of the Opening Batsmen's Union as defined by him. It's absurd. All I could say was "Lol."
There are actually some pretty valid historical reasons why the unions used to be so heavy on demarcation disputes. Makes for some interesting reading tbh.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
I don't really mind if Gooch is or isn't a manufactured opener. He is irrelevant to the point I'm making - and he's my foremost cricketing hero regardless of whether he's opener or middle-order batsman.
 

Mr Mxyzptlk

Request Your Custom Title Now!
So? A natural opener in my book is one who's grown into the role. Natural\manufactured and good\bad are not the same thing.
And my point is why should it matter, once the manufactured opener is a good opener?

EDIT: Rephrased for clarity.
 
Last edited:

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
I don't really believe in players being manufactured into anything at all, because in my mind all players are manufactured to what they turn out to be.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
And my point is why should it matter if the manufactured opener is a good opener?
As I say - where have I (or to my knowledge anyone) ever said it should? Some of the best ever openers were (apparently) manufactured - Gooch and Merchant to name a couple.
 

zaremba

Cricketer Of The Year
I don't really mind if Gooch is or isn't a manufactured opener. He is irrelevant to the point I'm making - and he's my foremost cricketing hero regardless of whether he's opener or middle-order batsman.
I just don't see it being a particularly coherent distinction, let alone one that can be defined by reference to the specific age at which you were "manufactured".
 

Jungle Jumbo

International Vice-Captain
The phrase 'manufactured' just makes it sound like opening is something Sehwag, Dilshan et al weren't naturally good at and thus required a lot of input from coaches to make this significant change. The immediate success of both the players mentioned above, plus, say, Watson this summer gone, would suggest that this is not the case.

Personally I feel the whole distinction between an opener and a middle-order bat is exaggerated, especially on the technical side of the game. Sometimes we rarely see any swing after the first five overs and I reckon most batsmen would prefer to face the harder ball from the start anyway. Like EWS said re. Dravid, the change is more psychological, and that is probably a product of theoretical orthodoxy than anything else.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
I just don't see it being a particularly coherent distinction, let alone one that can be defined by reference to the specific age at which you were "manufactured".
I didn't really pretend it was. Natural\manufactured is always going to be vague and unspecific because you cannot manufacture something without something natural to manufacture it from.
 

silentstriker

The Wheel is Forever
If you've got the technique to be successful at FC cricket, generally, you've got the technique to succeed no matter where you bat and for whom.
Well, not a few players have been found out at the Test level when they are machines at the domestic level. But yea, the general tendency these days of pitches and bowling makes the position of an opener not a specialist one. Right now, as a selector I'd just pick the best batsman in FC cricket and bat him anywhere in the top six where there is an opening. I wouldn't necessarily look for the best opener in FC cricket just because that's what my Test team might need.

This is my personal fantasy, but if we were to return to pitches like the Perth of old, or crazy swinging conditions, I think it would become a specialist position again.
 

Top