Ranking the Auxiliary skills in test cricket

[Sliferxxxx]

Really depends on the team makeup but I'll use the two GoATs teams as templates. In which case for the WI we valued the slips, the lower order batting then 5th bowler.

 

[Sliferxxxx]

For Australia, I'd imagine it would be the 5th bowler, slips then lower batting.

 

[kyear2]

Really depends on the team makeup but I'll use the two GoATs teams as templates. In which case for the WI we valued the slips, the lower order batting then 5th bowler.

Yeah, and not just them. The dominant Australian team of the '70's, the AT one from the late '90's till 2007, even the SA team that followed.

I would mention the SA from the early 70's as well, but that team literally had everything, and in abundance. Eddie Barlow being one of those players in the Simpson, Hammond, Sobers mold.

And yeah, we're all influenced by what we saw practiced and successfully utilized.

 

[kyear2]

For Australia, I'd imagine it would be the 5th bowler, slips then lower batting.

Which Australian team?

The one with Steve Waugh as the 5th bowler?

 

[subshakerz]

Which Australian team?

The one with Steve Waugh as the 5th bowler?

Can you clarify if you mean a single slip or the entire cordon?

 

[kyear2]

Can you clarify if you mean a single slip or the entire cordon?

1st, 2nd and 3rd slip.

 

[subshakerz]

1st, 2nd and 3rd slip.

I mean, three positions will obviously be worth more than one single position batting or bowling.

 

[Sliferxxxx]

Which Australian team?

The one with Steve Waugh as the 5th bowler?

Yeah the one with Steve Waugh and even his brother who used to pitch in with a few overs himself.

 

[Red]

@Red , @peterhrt , @HeathDavisSpeed , @Burgey , @Sliferxxxx , thoughts?

Not sure there needs to be a definitive answer here.

Looking at Aus’s strong era, there was a mix of all:

Good slippers: Taylor, M.Waugh, Warne, Hayden, Ponting, Clarke

Good lower order bats: Warne, Gillespie, Lee, Reiffel (plus Healy/Gilchrist)

5th bowers: Waughs, Symonds, Watson, Clarke, Lehmann

I’d rank 5th bowlers least necessary if you’ve got 4 strong front liners. Slip catching first cos catches do win matches, and lower order batting second because it can either dig you out of a hole, or turn a 350 score into 500+

 

[Blenkinsop]

I'm going to swim against the tide here and say that slip catching is the least important consideration, not because it isn't a crucial skill but because most Test teams naturally have plenty of good slip catchers.

One player is often preferred to another by selectors because of their lower order batting, or because they can bowl a few overs, but how often has someone missed out on selection because they were not so good in the slip cordon?

I can think of plenty of good teams that would have been great if only they'd had a spin option, or greater depth in their batting. With the possible exception of some Pakistan sides, I can't think of many that would have been great if only they had a better slip cordon.

 

[kyear2]

Not sure there needs to be a definitive answer here.

Looking at Aus’s strong era, there was a mix of all:

Good slippers: Taylor, M.Waugh, Warne, Hayden, Ponting, Clarke

Good lower order bats: Warne, Gillespie, Lee, Reiffel (plus Healy/Gilchr

5th bowers: Waughs, Symonds, Watson, Clarke, Lehmann

I’d rank 5th bowlers least necessary if you’ve got 4 strong front liners. Slip catching first cos catches do win matches, and lower order batting second because it can either dig you out of a hole, or turn a 350 score into 500+

Thanks Red.

Spot on as always.

And yeah, to be successful a team need some amount of contribution from all 3 elements. But I'll address that a bit later on.

 

[HeathDavisSpeed]

Given NZ’s shambolic slip fielding in recent times and how bloody frustrating it was for your front line bowlers to be creating opportunities only for the big bucket hands of Daryl Mitchell to spring a leak, I’d put slip fielding first. Perhaps you don’t need that fifth bowler all that much if you take the opportunities your main bowlers create.

Then tail end batting. There’s a reason you don’t often see line ups like the Mullally/Giddens/Tufnell one. Not only does a **** tail not score you runs, but it potentially wastes the runs from a batsman who has no decent partners. That said, there’s a balance to be struck. You don’t want to compromise the quality of the front line bowlers create just because there’s a better batsman available. I just think you at least want every one (bar #11, perhaps) to be able to have the application and nous to stick around with a set batsman.

The fifth bowler is a bit more situation dependent. More useful on batting decks or ones which require time and consistency to extract the batsman, less important on decks conducive to bowling.

 

[kyear2]

I'm going to swim against the tide here and say that slip catching is the least important consideration, not because it isn't a crucial skill but because most Test teams naturally have plenty of good slip catchers.

One player is often preferred to another by selectors because of their lower order batting, or because they can bowl a few overs, but how often has someone missed out on selection because they were not so good in the slip cordon?

I can think of plenty of good teams that would have been great if only they'd had a spin option, or greater depth in their batting. With the possible exception of some Pakistan sides, I can't think of many that would have been great if only they had a better slip cordon.

I hope you don't mind if I engage you.

I would say that while most teams have multiple people who can field in the slips, I don't think that many teams have great slip catchers. I would say that especially today, the depth of quality slippers out there is really lacking.

While all due respect, for your 2nd paragraph, you're literally making two totally and distinctly separate and different points.

Let's address the first. Yes one player is often selected because they can bowl a few overs in relief. That's the all rounder and quite a few, even if nit all that can fill that role, I'll comeback to that in a little while.

You also mention however that sometimes players are specifically selected because they add extra depth to the lower order. Now correct me, but outside of India and only of relatively recent vintage, and often to derision.

But you then jump to, but no one's ever been dropped because they couldn't catch in the cordon. That's not even related to the fist half of the paragraph. By that logic though I can also say that no bowler has ever been dropped because they can't bat, nor batsman dropped because they couldn't bowl. I mean, India's two best fast bowlers cannot bat. Kohli, the lynchpin of their team cannot bowl.

What you could have countered with is, how many persons have been selected for their slip catching, and I would say many more than has been selected for their lower order batting.

The last paragraph is also a bit confusing.

I can think of teams that could have been aided by a spinner, but by a specialist one, not a 5th option. A 5th option spinner isn't making any team a great one, that already isn't. A fifth option spinner is not moving the needle. And this is open for anyone to contradict me and tell me I'm wrong.

Similarly depth to your batting isn't making a god team great, improving your top order is what would be required in that scenario. A decent lower order batsman is averaging what, mid twenties? Again how is that moving the needle to make a team better? They're averaging in the twenties, and that's on the high side historically, because they aren't a specialist and they're not consistently reliable. It's like you're saying as a team, we're not making enough runs, and your solution is to drop a bowler and let's upgrade the no. 8 spot. That's rearranging the chairs in the titanic.

The reason why you can't think of similar sides in history, is because most great sides already prioritized the position and it was capably filled. It didn't magically happen, these team make it as much of a focus as they do batting and bowling and is very much a specialist skill.

All the great fast bowlers had specialists at 2nd slip, from Coney for Hadlee, the Chappell's for Lillee, the death row for the quartet, Richardson for Marshall, Hooper for Ambrose, Kallis for Steyn, the greatest ever cordon for McGrath and Warne etc etc, it goes on. It's the same for the greatest teams as well, I don't think that it's a coincidence that the GOAT teams of the last 50 years also had superb cordons.

 

[kyear2]

Wanted to continue a point, but the last post was already too long.


Most all rounders are more creations of their situations and are born out of necessity. And while they are appropriately hailed for their contributions, the level of the secondary workload required seems almost inversely proportional to the quality of the team you're in.

Sir Garfield Sobers, he and the West Indies were at their best when he had Hall and Griffith along with Gibbs, and he was required to bowl less and he spent more time in the slips.. With less bowling support and a poorer team around him, he (I must admit willingly) severely over bowled himself, to the detriment of him, the team and his batting.

Imran, be it through the necessity of injury, at times fragile middle order, or for the benefit of extending his career, was almost "forced" to focused more on his batting at times.

Hadlee too, in a not always great team that relied on him more for lower order contributions. He was one that applied himself and really fought for every run, because the team often needed it.

In a better team, Sobers isn't bowling 40 overs a match (something that was ill advised regardless) and fits in much more into the Kallis model. And in batting higher and spending more time at 2nd slip, you provide more value to the team.

Similarly, for the better teams you tend to find talented guys who weren't required to grind or produce at the same levels.

Warne and especially (well mostly) Marshall were more talented than their numbers suggest, but wasn't as frequently required to grind out of situations and often had the green light to have a go, worse case scenario, we get another crack at the opposition a bit sooner. They also never also just batted on for the sake of it. But when the situation required, both produced quality innings.
Steve Waugh didn't had to bowl as many overs or produce match winning spells to as great a degree, but he also stepped up when required and reduced his role the better the attack became.

Anyways, not directly applicable to the topic, just an extension of my perspective into the roles. And also one of the reasons why I never agreed with the notion that Kallis wasn't an all rounder or didn't bowl enough. He did his job.

 

[kyear2]

Given NZ’s shambolic slip fielding in recent times and how bloody frustrating it was for your front line bowlers to be creating opportunities only for the big bucket hands of Daryl Mitchell to spring a leak, I’d put slip fielding first. Perhaps you don’t need that fifth bowler all that much if you take the opportunities your main bowlers create.

Then tail end batting. There’s a reason you don’t often see line ups like the Mullally/Giddens/Tufnell one. Not only does a **** tail not score you runs, but it potentially wastes the runs from a batsman who has no decent partners. That said, there’s a balance to be struck. You don’t want to compromise the quality of the front line bowlers create just because there’s a better batsman available. I just think you at least want every one (bar #11, perhaps) to be able to have the application and nous to stick around with a set batsman.

The fifth bowler is a bit more situation dependent. More useful on batting decks or ones which require time and consistency to extract the batsman, less important on decks conducive to bowling.

As usual you've said it better than I could.

Excellent.

 

[reyrey]

The fifth bowler is a bit more situation dependent. More useful on batting decks or ones which require time and consistency to extract the batsman, less important on decks conducive to bowling.

I would argue the 5th bowlers usefulness starts even before a ball in bowled, as he takes some of the guess work out of selection.

A team with 4 bowlers may be undecided on the pitch, and if they should play 4 seamers or 3 seamers plus a spinner. Pick incorrectly and you may find yourself bowler short.

Having a 5th bowler helps avoid this.

 

[HeathDavisSpeed]

I would argue the 5th bowlers usefulness starts even before a ball in bowled, as he takes some of the guess work out of selection.

A team with 4 bowlers may be undecided on the pitch, and if they should play 4 seamers or 3 seamers plus a spinner. Pick incorrectly and you may find yourself bowler short.

Having a 5th bowler helps avoid this.

I don't disagree with that - a 5th bowler definitely helps with workload and risk management and (without citing any examples off the top of my head) I'm sure I remember some teams coming a cropper with only the 4 bowlers and overloading the batting.

However, I'm not sure that this question is about having slip fielders, having tail end batting or having a 5th bowler, but which is most important to prioritise. If there were two options for 5th bowler, one of whom had lower strike rate/bowling average but wasn't a great slipper whilst the other had a poorer SR/average but was a very good slip fielder, I think I'd be banking on my 4 other bowlers doing the job they're paid to do and taking the greater security of the very good slip fielder.

Effectively, this boils down the scale of the compromise you're having to make and which of these will make the balance of your team better. Perhaps you sacrifice the better bowling of the 5th bowler for greater batting if your tail is particularly weak in that aspect. Personally though, I'd value the greater security in the cordon above marginal improvements in tail end batting or the 5th bowler.

 

[subshakerz]

I'm going to swim against the tide here and say that slip catching is the least important consideration, not because it isn't a crucial skill but because most Test teams naturally have plenty of good slip catchers.

One player is often preferred to another by selectors because of their lower order batting, or because they can bowl a few overs, but how often has someone missed out on selection because they were not so good in the slip cordon?

I can think of plenty of good teams that would have been great if only they'd had a spin option, or greater depth in their batting. With the possible exception of some Pakistan sides, I can't think of many that would have been great if only they had a better slip cordon.

Actually I agree. I switched my vote.

A single great slip catcher is not going to be as useful as a good no.8. A good no.8 just is a more regular contributor.

And it's far easier to find competent slip catchers. The marginal value of a the difference between an elite slip catcher and a competent one is not more than the value of a good no.8

 

[subshakerz]

However, I'm not sure that this question is about having slip fielders, having tail end batting or having a 5th bowler, but which is most important to prioritise. If there were two options for 5th bowler, one of whom had lower strike rate/bowling average but wasn't a great slipper whilst the other had a poorer SR/average but was a very good slip fielder, I think I'd be banking on my 4 other bowlers doing the job they're paid to do and taking the greater security of the very good slip fielder..

I think the original question of this thread was poorly phrased since you can't compare an entire cordon to single no.8 or 5th bowler positions anyways.

 

[Cipher]

Actually I agree. I switched my vote.

A single great slip catcher is not going to be as useful as a good no.8. A good no.8 just is a more regular contributor.

And it's far easier to find competent slip catchers. The marginal value of a the difference between an elite slip catcher and a competent one is not more than the value of a good no.8

I don’t think that was the original question though. It was “Which of the auxiliary skills have been more impactful, important or determinative to results in test cricket over the century.
Let's rank them, slip cordons, lower order batting and relief / 5th bowling.”

Not: “Which elite auxiliary skill would you pick for a team compared to the test standard?”