Greatest cricketers since 1980

[Dasa]

Fair enough not having Muralitharan in Level 1 - he hasn't even played Tests yet.

 

[Ikki]

read the cricinfo article on MUrali.. You can think what you want, but statistically it was proved he was the most important player for his team of all time... Or something to that effect.

I read that article, it wasn't a very good one IMO for failing to differentiate between a matchwinner and a player who is very important to his side. What it showed was that in wins, the most important player tended to be Murali. Well, of course it would be; he is easily his team's most important player for a team that for most of his career didn't win a lot. Therefore, when his team did win it was in great part due to him. I recall a comparison the writer did with Warne and he compared their averages in matches won. The huge flaw in that is, is that a lot of the time Australia will win matches regardless of Warne's contributions which will dilute his performances in wins and will hinder his averages. It was a pretty crap statistical argument ITBT. Arguing that Murali is better because he took more 10fers for his team is just irrelevant. No other great bowler bowled as much as him, with as little competition as him to accrue all those 4fers/5fers/10fers. It also compared him to Jordan and the like, which is also not apt since he never lead Sri Lanka to anything in Tests akin to what Jordan did in Basketball.

When I am talking about a matchwinner, that is not what I am talking about. For me, a matchwinner is a player who in the most vital moments of a match brings a moment of magic to decide it. Having watched Warne's career, I found it uncanny how he removed the most important batsman at the most vital time so often. That batsman may not have been even the best batsman in his team, but at that moment was doing well and running away with the game. Another thing I talk about in terms of matchwinners, and Warne, is the sheer "WTF, how did he just change the game on it's head?" moments. Warne did that in ODIs in WCs and in Tests (Ashes 05 a great example). For me, that is what I refer to.

----

Edit: here is that article http://www.cricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/470754.html It claims him to be the most valuable MVP. As far as being the most important to his side, sure. In fact, he seems to have Hadlee 2nd, so it just shows you what statistics the writer found valuable.

 

[Ikki]

Murali always had the pressure to deliever as well...

McGrath or Warne did not have to go through that - even MacGill bowled well than Warne on numerous occassions!

His contribution to Sri Lankan cricket was awesome as someone earlier said.

I would always put him in the category of greats!

That's nonsense, mate. If anything McGrath and Warne always had pressure to deliver for the result always mattered for them. To flip your argument around: Murali's team for a long time were weak and the team's results didn't matter hence he could just bowl without that pressure. It's as bad a point as yours and it shouldn't be made.

Murali is certainly a great, but being forced to limit the names I didn't put him before those names. From my list, from Hadlee down I could swap one of those for him and it wouldn't really bother me.

 

[Migara]

Didn't disagree with a whole lot of what you put so I just rearranged the names.

Top 30 Greatest Cricketers since 1980

Level 1:

Shane Warne
Imran Khan
Adam Gilchrist
Viv Richards
Ricky Ponting
Richard Hadlee
Glenn McGrath
Sachin Tendulkar
Brian Lara
Malcolm Marshall

Level 2:

Allan Border
Steve Waugh
Jacques Kallis
Muralitharan
Ian Botham
Kapil Dev
Wasim Akram
Allan Donald
Curtley Ambrose
Dennis Lillee

Level 3:

Waqar Younis
Shaun Pollock
Matthew Hayden
Javed Miandad
Virender Sehwag
Rahul Dravid
Andy Flower
Kumar Sangakara
Greg Chappell
Sunil Gavaskar

Murali in Level 2 shows Ikki's bias

 

[Ikki]

Actually, going through my list, I think the more controversial absence is Kallis. But again, any name I take out from Level 1 into Level 2 is going to be controversial. 10 names probably isn't enough.

 

[GIMH]

Pot-kettle-black

Been a cracking read this, so far. Good work CW.

Flintoff should be top of all lists btw

 

[weldone]

Top 11 cricketers of last 30 years should probably be, according to me (without considering Gavaskar):

Adam Gilchrist
Richard Hadlee
Malcolm Marshall
Sachin Tendulkar
Muttiah Muralitharan
Imran Khan
Glenn McGrath
Jacques Kallis
Wasim Akram
Brian Lara
Viv Richards

 

[Sir Alex]

Tier 1

Malcolm Marshall
Muralitharan
Sachin
Lara
Richards
McGrath
Khan
Adam Gilly
Hadlee
Wasim

Tier 2

Waqar
Warne
Ponting
Dravid
Sehwag
Kallis
Kapil
Botham

etc etc etc

 

[Black_Warrior]

Greatest bowlers since 1980

Level 1

Malcolm Marshall
Glenn Mcgrath
Shane Warne
Mutthiah Muralitharan
Imran Khan
Richard Hadlee

Level 2

Dennis Lillee
Curtley Ambrose
Joel Garner
Michael Holding
Wasim Akram
Allan Donald
Ian Botham
Waqar Younis
Dale Steyn

Level 3

Shaun Pollock
Courtney Walsh
Anil Kumble
Saqlain Mushtaq
Craig Mcdermott
Kapil Dev
Iqbal Qasim
Bob Willis
Ian Bishop
Bruce Reid

Level 4

Jason Gillespie
Abdul Qadir
Merv Hughes
Chaminda Vaas
Shoab Akhthar
Harbhajan Singh
Makhaya Ntini
Darren Gough
Chris Cairns
Stuart Mcgill

Lillee, Ambrose and Akram deserve a place in level 1.

Too early to place Dale Steyn in level 2. Would place Gillespie, Akhtar and Vaas in level 3.

Jeff Thomson??

 

[Faisal1985]

Imran Khan
Sachin
McGrath
Shane Warne
Marshall
Lillee
Akram
Younis
Murali
Botham
Pollock
Lara
Kallis
Ambrose
Chanderpaul
Donald
Gilly
Ponting

 

[Son Of Coco]

The didn't face McGrath/Warne argument re: Ponting is a more interesting one.On one hand,it is an advantage that he didn't have to face the two best of his generation compared to another bat,whoever it may be,who faced and did reasonably well against both.On the other hand,blokes like Vincent,Salman Butt and some Bang batsman I can't remember have scored centuries against McGrath/Warne.So it's surely not a stretch to think Ponting would have fared decently.

I think someone posted some stats on here recently showing how Ponting had fared against McGrath in state cricket. He went alright if I remember correctly.

 

[Son Of Coco]

Murali always had the pressure to deliever as well...

McGrath or Warne did not have to go through that - even MacGill bowled well than Warne on numerous occassions!

His contribution to Sri Lankan cricket was awesome as someone earlier said.

I would always put him in the category of greats!

I think, if you saw the matches, you might've seen MacGill getting better results in some cases whilst not always bowling 'better'. He did bowl better than Warne on some occasions though.

 

[pskov]

I think someone posted some stats on here recently showing how Ponting had fared against McGrath in state cricket. He went alright if I remember correctly.

Alright is a bit of an understatement.

Ponting faced NSW with McGrath in the side on 4 occasions in FC cricket, scoring 729 runs with four hundreds and two fifties in 8 innings at an average of 91.13.

And McGrath got him out once, lbw for 43 in the second innings of a 218 run win for NSW at the SCG in 1995.

As an interesting aside, McGrath's record for his state was relatively poor - 90 wickets at 27.40 and just three 5fers in 26 matches. Though as he only played 9 Shield matches post 1995 you could say once he was good enough he didn't get much opportunity to improve on those stats as he was always with Australia.

 

[BhupinderSingh]

Greatest Cricketers Since 1980

Level 1:

Imran Khan
Muttah Muralitharan
Viv Richards
Wasim Akram
Richard Hadlee
Shane Warne
Glenn McGrath
Sachin Tendulkar
Ricky Ponting
Brian Lara
Malcolm Marshall

Level 2:

Allan Border
Steve Waugh
Jacques Kallis
Ian Botham
Andy Flower
Kumar Sangakkara
Adam Gilchrist
Kapil Dev
Waqar Younis
Allan Donald
Curtley Ambrose


Level 3:


Shaun Pollock
Shivnarine Chanderpaul
Matthew Hayden
Javed Miandad
Rahul Dravid
Younis Khan
Abdul Qadir
Inzamam-ul-Haq
Dennis Lillee
Shoaib Akhtar
Dale Steyn
Greg Chappell
Anil Kumble
Sunil Gavaskar
Verinder Sehwag

 

[Top_Cat]

I think someone posted some stats on here recently showing how Ponting had fared against McGrath in state cricket. He went alright if I remember correctly.

That would be me and Ponting bashed him in both OD and FC matches, even if Tas were busy being hammered by NSW.

 

[honestbharani]

That would be me and Ponting bashed him in both OD and FC matches, even if Tas were busy being hammered by NSW.

If anything, I would like to see stats of Warne Vs Ponting...

 

[bagapath]

... in wins, the most important player tended to be Murali. Well, of course it would be; he is easily his team's most important player for a team that for most of his career didn't win a lot. Therefore, when his team did win it was in great part due to him. I recall a comparison the writer did with Warne and he compared their averages in matches won. The huge flaw in that is, is that a lot of the time Australia will win matches regardless of Warne's contributions

Ikki.... you are writing the very definition of a match winner for murali and then giving the title to warne, who you are actually defining as just one of the important players in his team and not necessarily the match winner.

 

[Furball]

Ikki.... you are writing the very definition of a match winner for murali and then giving the title to warne, who you are actually defining as just one of the important players in his team and not necessarily the match winner.

In fairness, I can see Ikki's point, I'd be amazed if Sri Lanka won many Tests throughout Murali's career without Murali making a huge contribution, simply because there was no-one else to run through the opposition.

To use 2 very recent examples, Graeme Swann bowled 2 overs in the first Test vs Pakistan, and in the 5th Ashes Test last summer England won despite James Anderson bowling 21 wicketless overs in the match. I can't imagine Sri Lanka would have won many Tests with Murali contributing so little.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

This exercise requires way too much thought for a wet Wednesday in the Uk. One or two drop down a tier or two due their careers overlapping the 70's - and one or two deliberately placed in the wrong tier to annoy the neighbours.

Viv Richards
Sachin Tendulkar
Brian Lara
Shane Warne
Muttah Muralitharan
Malcolm Marshall
Richard Hadlee
Glenn McGrath
Adam Gilchrist
Ricky Ponting

Ian Botham
Imran Khan
Dennis Lillee
Greg Chappell
Wasim Akram
Allan Border
Steve Waugh
Jacques Kallis
Allan Donald
Curtley Ambrose

Javed Miandad
Kapil Dev
Waqar Younis
Matthew Hayden
Virender Sehwag
Rahul Dravid
Sunil Gavaskar
Shaun Pollock
Courtney Walsh
Kumar Sangakkara

 

[Spark]

Ikki's hypothesis is a good one - it could be argued that the reason Murali did well in Sri Lankan victories was because his doing well was the reason for the victory.