Shakib Al Hasan vs The Great All Rounders

[Black_Warrior]

That would put both of them ahead of Australia

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

In order for Bangladesh to win a test match in Australia, their batsmen have to bat out of their skins against the bounce and pace of the well-oiled Australian team that plays a far greater # of tests per year than Bangladesh. Shakib will have to do what Tom Brady did in the Souper Bowl. Simply as that. Period.

 

[vitalogy83]

would put them ahead of sri lanka.

die

 

[viriya]

Shakib had no good bowlers to share wickets with.

He also had no good bowlers to build a bowling partnership with.

You sacrifice average for wickets. And he has a decent bowling average.

 

[cnerd123]

He also had no good bowlers to build a bowling partnership with.

You sacrifice average for wickets. And he has a decent bowling average.

Well not quite. A 4/150 is a lot more common than a 4/200, but a 1/50 is more common that either.

Shakib has a lot of those 4/150 spells that give him a decent average, and in recent games he's been returning more 1/50 kinda spells because now he has other more potent bowlers to share wickets with. i'd say being the lone man in the attack actually helped his average more than it hurt it. Not where he isn't the lone man he finds himself being the 2nd spinner/3rd bowler holding kind of role. Which suits him and the team perfectly, but I think will make his average look worse rather than better.

 

[viriya]

Numbers are great. But not enough to make up for the fact that Bangladesh games don't make news and performances don't get the same attention and coverage.
Shakib has a 5 wicket haul in England, a 6 wicket and 5 haul in South Africa
Century and double century in New Zealand
Century and 6 wicket haul against Pakistan in the same game

No one remembers or cares.

Stokes averages 33 with the bat and 34 with the ball.

If you ask anyone today who is the best allrounder in the world, and if we are being honest, the first name we'll think of is Ben Stokes. We just remember more of the games Stokes has played in his much shorter career because they were given more coverage, attention, and highlighted far far more.

Shakib never got an opportunity to even play a test in Australia. That's not his fault. But it will be held against him. In what's left of his career, he is unlikely to play more than 2 tests in Australia, and maybe a handful in England and India.

Stokes already has 5 tests in India, will have 10 tests in Australia by the end of the year.

This is why Shakib will be an afterthought when talking about Great All Rounders, through no fault of his own.

I would never pick Stokes over Shakib. You are showing your big-3 bias here. An informed cricket fan should know Shakib >> Stokes.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Well not quite. A 4/150 is a lot more common than a 4/200, but a 1/50 is more common that either.

Shakib has a lot of those 4/150 spells that give him a decent average, and in recent games he's been returning more 1/50 kinda spells because now he has other more potent bowlers to share wickets with. i'd say being the lone man in the attack actually helped his average more than it hurt it. Not where he isn't the lone man he finds himself being the 2nd spinner/3rd bowler holding kind of role. Which suits him and the team perfectly, but I think will make his average look worse rather than better.

I think completely the opposite of this tbh

Better other bowlers in team = less total wickets but better average. Not sure how you figure 4/150 gives someone a decent average.

 

[Zinzan]

Pretty much any batsman who scores a hundred enjoys luck of some kind. The problem with these arguments is that we almost always apply them selectively.

Thing is I don't usually pick on lucky hundreds because I agree most invariably have some luck somewhere, but this one was something else..

 

[viriya]

Well not quite. A 4/150 is a lot more common than a 4/200, but a 1/50 is more common that either.

Shakib has a lot of those 4/150 spells that give him a decent average, and in recent games he's been returning more 1/50 kinda spells because now he has other more potent bowlers to share wickets with. i'd say being the lone man in the attack actually helped his average more than it hurt it. Not where he isn't the lone man he finds himself being the 2nd spinner/3rd bowler holding kind of role. Which suits him and the team perfectly, but I think will make his average look worse rather than better.

He could also just be relatively out of form in his bowling. That might be something to to do a proper analysis on. Peer bowling attack quality vs bowling average/number of wickets

 

[viriya]

Thing is I don't usually pick on lucky hundreds because I agree most invariably have some luck somewhere, but this one was something else..

Chandimal recently had an ATG innings vs India where he gave 6+ chances.. he won SL the match. No one cares about the chances anymore.

Players like Shakib seem.to be judged on a different plane cos they play for a historically weak team. Almost every great innings has at least 1-2 chances given so imo this is a weak argument.

 

[Zinzan]

I think completely the opposite of this tbh

Better other bowlers in team = less total wickets but better average. Not sure how you figure 4/150 gives someone a decent average.

I checked at those couple of 5-fers in SA way back in '08 someone had mentioned, and both times SA scored 400+ and won by and innings. Those type of 5-fers don't carry quite so much water for me.

 

[TheJediBrah]

I checked at those couple of 5-fers in SA way back in '08 someone had mentioned, and both times SA scored 400+ and won by and innings. Those type of 5-fers don't carry quite so much water for me.

Yeah pretty much exactly what I was saying if I'm understanding correctly?

 

[thierry henry]

I just find the argument that "Shakib is tier 4/6/12/743 because he hasn't played enough against Aus/SA/India" to be so perverse. People say it like it's so obvious or so easy to judge when it is pure guesswork. They also say it with almost a venom towards Shakib as if it's his fault Bangladesh don't get to play more big games.

I think I made this same argument earlier in the thread, but all you can really say about Shakib is that he has turned in the performances of a Tier 1 superstar God-level all-rounder but unfortunately due to Bangladesh's schedule cannot be compared accurately to other all-rounders.

All of this trying to scale down his performances via some invented formula and either concluding "therefore, Shakib actually sucks" or "therefore, Shakib fits neatly in between Pollock and Stokes" or whatever is frankly nonsense.

 

[TheJediBrah]

He actually averages more with the bat against non-Zimbabwe teams than against Zimbabwe if what I see is accurate. Averages over 40 against "Top-8" teams.

Bowling wise he averages 23 against Zim and 35 against "Top-8" teams.

Still it's a pretty solid record by any standards.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Honest question :

What's a bigger challenge? Facing the England attack at home or facing Herath in Sri Lanka? Shakib just won a match for his country doing the latter,yet if he'd scored runs against England at home that would somehow prove more? How? Someone is going to have to explain that to me.

I'm fine with people saying he hasn't played against the best teams enough, but there doesn't seem to be enough appreciation for him having owned Herath in his own conditions, which is about as big a challenge in cricket right now as any other.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Honest question :

What's a bigger challenge? Facing the England attack at home or facing Herath in Sri Lanka? Shakib just won a match for his country doing the latter,yet if he'd scored runs against England at home that would somehow prove more? How? Someone is going to have to explain that to me.

I'm fine with people saying he hasn't played against the best teams enough, but there doesn't seem to be enough appreciation for him having owned Herath in his own conditions, which is about as big a challenge in cricket right now as any other.

Quite simply because he is an Asian batsman, used to Asian conditions and grown up on a steady diet of facing left-arm spinners on Asian pitches. Performing against England quicks in England would be a much bigger achievement IMO.

 

[cnerd123]

Yea I've made my stance on this 'X performing against Y in Z conditions' style of analysis pretty clear in the past, but I'll say it again.

It's all bull****.

You can bowl badly against elite batsmen in unfriendly conditions and get a bunch of wickets because it's your day and you can bowl well against **** batsmen in helpful conditions and not get wickets to show for it. Similarly you could go to Bangladesh and face a bowling attack with a combined average of 75 with the score at 450/2 and still end up facing a high quality spell vs walking in at 20/3 against SA in SA and being presented with easy bowling to pick apart.

All context, meaning and quality is lost when you begin to dissect the overall stats into such tiny little portions and then begin trying to analyse those numbers instead of actually watching the performances themselves. That Younis Khan vs Sreesanth and Agarkar analogy in the other thread is a fine example of a lame argument - both those bowlers have bowled some really high quality spells in their careers and just writing off any runs scored against them based on career records is silly.

Sure career records mean something, but the more filters you add to your stats guru query and the more arbitrary criteria you add to your evaluation checklist, the further you get away from the true quality of the player and the closer you get towards just finding meaningless data to support whatever agenda or viewpoint it is that you want to push. You learn nothing and only find what it is you want to seek.

 

[OverratedSanity]

@JediBrah Not talking about England in England though. I agree him facing England in their conditions would be a bigger challenge. But Shakib didn't get runs against England at home, and that's being used against him too. Can't have it both ways.

Runs against herath in SL > runs against England at home.

 

[cnerd123]

Also really how lame is it to hold Shakib's record against certain nations in certain conditions against him given how no body wants to play BD. He can only play what he is put up against, and he may not have performed 100% of the time, but he does play for a team that usually finds itself in hopeless situations + he has only just turned 30. He should be entering his prime as a batsman and a spinner. There really have been no great finger-spinning allrounders in the history of cricket, the only ones that come to mind are Vinoo Mankad and Wilfred Rhodes. Shakib's performances definitely rank up there with those two, if not surpassed them.

 

[thierry henry]

People also overlook the important piece of context that matches against Zimbabwe have tended to be very high-stakes games for Bangladesh. Perhaps more so in the more distant past but even recently, I'm sure there has been a lot of pressure on the likes of Shakib to stand up and ensure Bangladesh win those games.