Dravid goes to number 1 in test ratings

[FaaipDeOiad]

AND ON FLAT PITCHES, MCGRATH (BETWEEN 2001 AND 2004 AT LEAST) DOES NOT MOVE THE BALL.

Absolute complete and utter rubbish. McGrath is the only bowler in the world who can be consistently relied on to move the ball off the seam on any wicket, and that is the basis for why he is the best bowler in the world and possibly the best ever on a flat wicket.

 

[C_C]

Based on this thread, i am sorry to say that my pet guinea pig understands cricket better than Richard does. He hasnt got a CLUE on bowling...and apparently not much clue on batting either.
Works for me though..i am a bowler.... with guys like Rich on the opposition, i would make even Sid Barne's figures look ordinary.

 

[C_C]

Faiip- McGrath is the best in the world currently and perhaps the best ever on pitches that dont bounce/seam much from countries like WI,ENG,RSA,AUS,NZ etc...
but best ever ? hardly.
Would pick Wasim or Imran or even Waqar over flat wickets any day of the week over McGrath.

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

Faiip- McGrath is the best in the world currently and perhaps the best ever on pitches that dont bounce/seam much from countries like WI,ENG,RSA,AUS,NZ etc...
but best ever ? hardly.
Would pick Wasim or Imran or even Waqar over flat wickets any day of the week over McGrath.

What do you mean exactly? Did you mean to say you would take Wasim, Imran or Waqar on a flat subcontinent wicket? You seem to be saying that McGrath is "perhaps the best ever" on flat wickets in WI, England, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, but at the same time you would take any of those three over him on a flat deck...

Anyway, if the conditions are conducive to swing I'd take Imran over McGrath (keeping in mind that this is just about bowling), taking into account that he is not only a better swing bowler than McGrath but also a few yards quicker, which also helps a bit on flat wickets. If you're picking a bowler to go up against a solid batting lineup on a flat wicket on say a hot, dry Adelaide summer day however, McGrath is the best ever in my opinion.

 

[Smudge]

Oh, guess what, another one.
Can't you just stop posting "I agree" posts?

Why should he? He's merely agreeing with another person who has, shock horror, disagreed with you, making some very valid points in the process.

 

[C_C]

Put it this way.
Hot summer day on a pancake wicket- be it in the subcontinent, adelaide or Antigua, Imran Khan and Wasim Akram are the first two bowlers i would pen, with Waqar a contestable third.
McGrath one of the best IMO from nations that have typically bouncy wickets-ie, WI,AUS,ENG,NZ,RSA ...along with Marshall and Hadlee...... but neither of these three hold a candle to the above three in the art of bowling on bounceless and seamless wickets.
On a typical aussie/english wicket, i would vault Hadlee,McGrath and Marshall ahead of those three...narrowly ahead of Imran who is narrowly ahead of Wasim in my books.

 

[Son Of Coco]

Maybe the only reason you haven't spotted this evidence is that you haven't looked for it, because you're so certain that it can't possibly exist.

No, I think it's more along the lines of having a fair idea of what bowling is about and therefore being astounded when you bring rubbish like that up. It could be a case of you not having the practical knowledge re: the game to accurately back up your radical ideas.

 

[Son Of Coco]

Exactly, which is why McGrath is such a fantastic bowler when the ball is moving off the seam.
When it isn't, though, is when things change.

So you can explain then why he takes wickets on all sorts of decks? Even on a wicket that isn't doing much, you only have to move one occasionally to cause trouble. The key is still line and length no matter what sort of wicket you are playing on...

 

[Son Of Coco]

No-one can force an error of any sort, it's not possible. The only person who can make the error is the batsman, not because he's been fooled by a change of pace or length, but because he's got something wrong.
That he's got something wrong, and that 4 batsmen have got something wrong in the same innings, reflects nothing on the skill of the bowler.

Not on the batsmen's part, no, but on the bowlers it's nothing else.
For one thing, it wasn't the bowlers that forced the batsmen into their shell.

Because there are anomalies in all trends. McGrath isn't the only one, Pollock is exactly the same; Flintoff has had similar experiences since the Sri Lanka tour (though he didn't before); and there are plenty of others who get similar situations over short periods. For most, though, it's short-lived, and things even themselves up so that the figures accurately reflect matters.
But how many times have we seen batsmen not get frustrated because of slow scoring-rates? Infinately more than we have seen them get frustrated.

What a load of rubbish, you can set a batsman up, any good bowler knows that. If you go into a game with no plan re: how to get a batsman out you'll be chasing 500-600. I don't think you have an understanding of the difference between a bad shot and someone who has fallen for the sucker punch. You analyse shots strictly on a single ball basis without taking into account what's happened beforehand...an approach like that is totally clueless.

 

[Son Of Coco]

How many seaming or uneven wickets has McGrath played on since 2001? The first 4 (Edgbaston, Lord's, Trent Bridge, Headingley) and maybe 1 or 2 since then.
How, then, do you account for the fact that between The Oval 2001 and The 'Gabba 2004\05 he rarely if ever bowled wicket-taking deliveries on flat pitches?

I'd account for that by suggesting that your definition of a 'wicket-taking delivery' is extremely flawed.

 

[social]

The whole point of a flat wicket is that you can't use the seam to move it off the pitch. And it's a poor batsman indeed that's fooled by change of angle on the crease, or by a bit of bounce.
The speed-gun, meanwhile, tells the truth, while the human eye deceives - McGrath may have appeared the fastest, but he wasn't.

The speed gun tells the truth but statistics lie?

Richard, you have missed your calling. Give up posting and become a politician (I hear that the Raving Loony Party has an opening) as you selective reasoning will be better received there.

 

[Richard]

Well apparently if you put things in bold and/or capitals it makes them more correct, now matter how wrong it has been proven to be...

No, it just makes it a little more likely that people will get it into their skulls.

 

[Richard]

What?, of course it is when McGrath keeps bowling it thier and their abouts ball after ball a batsman wants to score and that were he will make the mistake of playing a poor stroke off a good delivery which results in his downfall.

Which is not forced, as attested to by the fact it doesn't happen anything close to all the time.

 

[Richard]

Absolute complete and utter rubbish. McGrath is the only bowler in the world who can be consistently relied on to move the ball off the seam on any wicket, and that is the basis for why he is the best bowler in the world and possibly the best ever on a flat wicket.

Nonsense, you can say he'll probably take wickets but all you need to do is watch closely and you'll see that neither he nor anyone else can move the ball off the seam if the pitch doesn't let.
There is no reason why McGrath should be able to do something no-one else can.

 

[Richard]

Based on this thread, i am sorry to say that my pet guinea pig understands cricket better than Richard does. He hasnt got a CLUE on bowling...and apparently not much clue on batting either.

And you haven't got a CLUE on the history of the game, so you can't talk.

 

[Richard]

Why should he? He's merely agreeing with another person who has, shock horror, disagreed with you, making some very valid points in the process.

And, shock-horror, there's no need to agree with someone who's disagreed with me, it's just bandwagon-jumping.
If you agree silence is assent.

 

[Richard]

No, I think it's more along the lines of having a fair idea of what bowling is about and therefore being astounded when you bring rubbish like that up. It could be a case of you not having the practical knowledge re: the game to accurately back up your radical ideas.

I've got a perfect amount of practical knowledge, gained by watching cricket like anyone else.
And having an idea of what bowling is about is about analysing, not making assumptions and sticking to them.

 

[Richard]

So you can explain then why he takes wickets on all sorts of decks?

Because not absolutely everyone has to bowl wicket-taking deliveries to take wickets.

Even on a wicket that isn't doing much, you only have to move one occasionally to cause trouble.

Not true at all, you're unspeakably lucky if you only move a handful of deliveries a day and they are in the right spot to take a wicket.

 

[Richard]

What a load of rubbish, you can set a batsman up, any good bowler knows that. If you go into a game with no plan re: how to get a batsman out you'll be chasing 500-600. I don't think you have an understanding of the difference between a bad shot and someone who has fallen for the sucker punch. You analyse shots strictly on a single ball basis without taking into account what's happened beforehand...an approach like that is totally clueless.

No, it's not - there are some deliveries that'll get any batsman out and the sensible plan is to try and bowl them... of course there are variations that make things more effective, but no variation is any use without movement.
It's easy to form a plan, what you need to do is be good enough to carry one out.

 

[Richard]

I'd account for that by suggesting that your definition of a 'wicket-taking delivery' is extremely flawed.

A wicket-taking delivery is one that took a wicket without complete error on the batsman's part.
Anyone knows what a wicket-taking delivery is, and you can't bowl one unless the ball's moving.