Mike Hussey vs. Ricky Ponting

[ohtani's jacket]

Has Hussey taken the mantle of best Australian batsman from Ponting? Please discuss.

 

[Fiery]

No Ponting is still the best. There are other candidates there that you should probably mention too, e.g Hayden, Gilchrist

 

[Richard]

I reckon it alternates between the two every 3 innings at the absolute most.

Ponting will soon reclaim the title when he slams his next 176 and Hussey manages a mere 69.

Ergo, I demand you apologise for failing to make this a multiple-choice poll.

 

[Richard]

No Ponting is still the best. There are other candidates there that you should probably mention too, e.g Hayden, Gilchrist

Gilchrist hasn't been Australia's best batsman for 4 years.

Hayden never has been.

 

[Fiery]

Gilchrist hasn't been Australia's best batsman for 4 years.

Hayden never has been.

We all know your thoughts on those 2

 

[pasag]

Ponting is the best batsman in the world, enough said.

 

[Fiery]

Ponting is the best batsman in the world, enough said.

fair comment

 

[The Sean]

Ponting is the best batsman in the world, enough said.

Agreed. That's the bottom line.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Another pointless poll to add to other 20 on the first page.

 

[Fiery]

Another pointless poll to add to other 20 on the first page.

This ones probably not as bad as some others tbh

 

[silentstriker]

Ponting, easily.

 

[PhoenixFire]

It's quite an open ended question as it doesn't really say what criteria are involved, but in most if not all cases, Ponting is better.

 

[Mister Wright]

Cricket needs an allstar weekend like the NBA so these disputes could be settled. There could be bat-offs, bowl-offs, keep-offs, run-out-offs and catch-offs. Then we wouldn't need these threads. Would love to see Ponting and Hussey in a bat-off, not sure how it would work though.

 

[sideshowtim]

Ponting has done what Hussey has done for the last 5 years. Averages something like 72 since 2002.

 

[burr]

How many of these polls are there? They're pointless. Especially this one.

 

[Richard]

There's been something of a surfeit of them in the last 2 or 3 days, certainly.

Some (Ambrose v McGrath) are interesting. Some (this) less so. Some (the completely irrelevant and humour-only ones) are silly and pointless if you're going to post them in CC.

 

[ohtani's jacket]

If Hussey keeps this up all summer, this will become a bigger talking point than you're giving it credit for.

 

[ohtani's jacket]

OK, let me put it this way...

If Test centuries start to become fewer and further between for Ponting, people will start questioning whether he's still Australia's best batsman. Now I don't know how much cricket Hussey has in him, but let's suppose that the strength of Australia's middle order becomes the main characteristic of Australian cricket in a Post-Warne/McGrath World (tongue-in-check), and over the next few seasons Hussey is Australia's leading run-scorer. (That's a lot of ifs, but Ponting could score a century tomorrow, so bear with me.)

In this case, would Hussey become the best Australian batsman or does Ponting have some special aura of greatness about him that his knocks would be like Tendulkar and Lara's in the latter stage of their careers?

My impression of Australian cricket (and it's just an impression) is that batting is about runs, runs, runs, with centuries being symbolic of that thirst for scoring. I'm not saying that it's as simple as scoring the most runs, but if Hussey becomes prolific and a matchwinner can he pass Ponting?

If this happens, I wanna know if anyone picked it early.

 

[howardj]

OK this Hussey joke has been funny for two years, but seriously when is it going to end? The bubble has to burst...doesn't it?

 

[bond21]

wow thats ignorant.

around 2002-2003 Hayden was compared to Bradman by Steve Waugh.

If Ponting is the best, Hayden is a close 2nd