Muttiah Muralidaran's 10 top batsmen

[Migara]

Personally I think that Ponting played some good back to the wall innings against Murali than Tendulkar. SRT had ample support in playing spin where ever he played, but Ponting didn't have that support. I can remember a 96 he made in Kandy, anothe century in SSC when Aussies were in precarious situations. But Ponting was never dominating as SRT over Murali in his early career. But post 2000 SRT did became a Murali bunny-esque. Didn't do comparatively well in tests or ODIs against him. All an all I think it's an even game.

 

[Ikki]

I find it more accurate when it is a bowler like Murali since he bowls so many overs/has a larger proportion of his team's bowling. If a batsman makes a score against Sri Lanka it's likely he played Murali well.

 

[Jono]

Considering sigging this.

I hate you so much right now.

 

[Furball]

And individually they did well against him. Half our line-up average 50+ in matches against him.

Any chance of doing that analysis of only matches played in Sri Lanka?

For starters, the top 3 in that list have only played Murali in Australia. If I was Murali, I'd be a lot more impressed with someone like Lara coming into my own backyard and dominating me.

 

[Ruckus]

Come on now.

Sachin and Lara, by almost everyone's accounts, and this has been said for many years, are two of the best spin bowlers to play the game in the last 20-30 years.

.

I agree, but in the case of Murali perhaps Tendulkar just shouldn't be that high up in the list, if there are others like Ponting who seems to have done equally well (or even better).

But I know what you are going to say - it's Murali's list! And I agree these debates are pretty damn pointless...

 

[G.I.Joe]

Considering sigging this.

You're considering what?

 

[Teja.]

Players often tend to rate other players who had the spark of prodigy in them more than similarly effective players who did not do so. A good example would be Ambrose and Akram in comparison to Donald and Waqar.

Ponting might have averaged over 9000 against Murali, but in the end, sadly, Murali will remember the effortless spanking that Sidhu gave him in the initial part of his career over all those Ponting Innings. Not sayin' it's fair, but it's his opinion.

 

[Jono]

**** you GI Hoe

 

[BoyBrumby]

Come on now.

Sachin and Lara, by almost everyone's accounts, and this has been said for many years, are two of the best spin bowlers to play the game in the last 20-30 years.

I find it quite sensible that they'd top both Warne and Murali's lists.

Absolutely. I think it would take a particularly one-eyed Ponting fan to suggest he was as adept at playing spin as either of them. He doesn't have a pronounce weakness or anything, but I think it's uncontroversial to suggest he's more fluent against pace.

What is more intriguing is why Murali rates Crawley as having played him better than Ponting (or Lehmann or Martyn or whoever).

Unless Murali actually puts flesh on the bare bones of his list, we can only speculate.

 

[Black_Warrior]

Ponting being a poor player of spin is a myth, really. He has only struggled against Harbhajan in that one series.

No player who has 10000 test runs and over 30 centuries is a 'poor' player of anything.
I hate this black and white attitude many cricket fans have.. If a Ponting has only a few centuries against India, he cant play spin, if Lara does not average over 50 against Donald and Wasim he cant play pace. I find this simplistic approach towards analysng players quite annoying to be frank.

Yes Ponting might not be as great a player of spin as Lara, but he is still a fantastic player of spin, pace, swing, any kind of bowling. Poor players average in 30s and score 5000 test runs.

Come on now.

Sachin and Lara, by almost everyone's accounts, and this has been said for many years, are two of the best players of spin bowling in the last 20-30 years.

I find it quite sensible that they'd top both Warne and Murali's lists.

You might go back and edit it so I would like to quote this as evidence for your dumb posts

 

[vcs]

Personally I think that Ponting played some good back to the wall innings against Murali than Tendulkar. SRT had ample support in playing spin where ever he played, but Ponting didn't have that support. I can remember a 96 he made in Kandy, anothe century in SSC when Aussies were in precarious situations. But Ponting was never dominating as SRT over Murali in his early career. But post 2000 SRT did became a Murali bunny-esque. Didn't do comparatively well in tests or ODIs against him. All an all I think it's an even game.

Tendulkar did struggle in the 2005 and 2008 series apart from the one hundred in Delhi TBF. And India-SL played a lot of bore draws on flat decks in the '90s.

 

[Migara]

Crawley scored 155 & 10 the only instances he played Murali. Murali's off spin suited his legside play IMO.

 

[Jono]

You might go back and edit it so I would like to quote this as evidence for your dumb posts

The post you quoted had my edit in it mate.

 

[Black_Warrior]

Regarding John Crawley being in Murali's list..does anyone know if Murali played a lot against him in country cricket?

 

[Black_Warrior]

The post you quoted had my edit in it mate.

Damn..I should have re'edited it

 

[Ruckus]

Players often tend to rate other players who had the spark of prodigy in them more than similarly effective players who did not do so. A good example would be Ambrose and Akram in comparison to Donald and Waqar.

Ponting might have averaged over 9000 against Murali, but in the end, sadly, Murali will remember the effortless spanking that Sidhu gave him in the initial part of his career over all those Ponting Innings. Not sayin' it's fair, but it's his opinion.

Exactly, which really highlights that these lists are completely pointless in the first place - because they are generally just based on the players most memorable moments, which definately does not correlate with their overall performance against these players.

 

[vcs]

Regarding John Crawley being in Murali's list..does anyone know if Murali played a lot against him in country cricket?

Apparently, both played for the same county.

 

[Ikki]

Any chance of doing that analysis of only matches played in Sri Lanka?

For starters, the top 3 in that list have only played Murali in Australia. If I was Murali, I'd be a lot more impressed with someone like Lara coming into my own backyard and dominating me.

Batting records | Test matches | Cricinfo Statsguru | Cricinfo.com

There you go.

 

[G.I.Joe]

Come on now.

Sachin and Lara, by almost everyone's accounts, and this has been said for many years, are two of the best players of spin bowling in the last 20-30 years.

I find it quite sensible that they'd top both Warne and Murali's lists.

You might go back and edit it so I would like to quote this as evidence for your dumb posts

You might go back and edit it so I would like to quote this as evidence for your dumb posts

 

[Ruckus]

Absolutely. I think it would take a particularly one-eyed Ponting fan to suggest he was as adept at playing spin as either of them. He doesn't have a pronounce weakness or anything, but I think it's uncontroversial to suggest he's more fluent against pace.

Yeh but that should have nothing to do with the construction of the list. It is how Ponting has played Murali, not spin in general.