What is harder - a 5 wicket haul or a 100 ?

[Avada Kedavra]

Assuming fair pitch, fair umpires etc.

I would go for the 100 because the minimum number of balls needed for a 100 is 17 whereas the minimum number of balls needed for a five wicket haul is 5

 

[subshakerz]

Nowadays, a fifer is much harder. In the 80s or 90s it might be roughly even.

 

[Pratters]

A five wicket haul is much tougher easily.

 

[Faisal1985]

Ofcourse a 5 wicket haul...............................especially these days when everything is being desigined keeping in mind the batsman...!!!!

 

[Avada Kedavra]

I mentioned in my first post that assume fair pitch, fair umpires etc. Obviously on a flat track, a century is easier. A 5 year old could tell us that.

 

[arcane]

Stastically a 5 wicket haul should be tougher but I think its a century. Especially considering the amount of tail-enders you can pick.

 

[ret]

Voted for 5 for

Usually,
- In good batting conditions, a team usually goes 450/7 dec
- In good bowling conditions, other bowlers are picking up wkts too so it becomes difficult to pick a 5 for
- Run outs decrease the possibility of the wkts going in to bowlers' names

getting a 100 usually depends up on the batsmen (except when he gets a bad one from the umpire or the captain declares when he is on 99) .... but for getting wkts a bowler has to depend up on factors like fielder taking a catch

Lastly 5/10 is difficult than 100 out of whatever

 

[G.I.Joe]

Statistically, a 5 wicket haul is the tougher task. It works out to the bowler contributing 50% to the teams performance in the innings. A batsman would need to make much more than 100 runs to contribute to 50% of the runs scored by the team (assuming the average team score per innings is greater than 200, which I imagine it is).

Practically a century could be said to be tougher imo. One ball to get the batsman out vs multiple chances for the bowler and all that jazz.

However that is compensated for by the fact that the bowler competes with his teammates for wickets, while a batsman need not compete with his teammates for runs. So yeah, I'm undecided.

What does the all time 5 for list look like? I guess Murali leads?

 

[Faisal1985]

Voted for 5 for

Usually,
- In good batting conditions, a team usually goes 450/7 dec
- In good bowling conditions, other bowlers are picking up wkts too so it becomes difficult to pick a 5 for
- Run outs decrease the possibility of the wkts going in to bowlers' names

getting a 100 usually depends up on the batsmen (except when he gets a bad one from the umpire or the captain declares when he is on 99) .... but for getting wkts a bowler has to depend up on factors like fielder taking a catch

Lastly 5/10 is difficult than 100 out of whatever

I fully support that...... 5 for much tougher and involves more factors which aren't in bowler's control...... For example.... Salman Butt fumbling a sitter 5 times, before dropping it.....if i was Asif i would respectfully ask Butt to remove his helmet and punch him in the face...!

 

[aussie]

Nowadays, a fifer is much harder. In the 80s or 90s it might be roughly even.

This.

 

[Richard]

With all being equal there's no way anyone can say which is harder. Pitch offering a bit to whatever type of bowler you are but not too much, good-quality Umpiring, good-quality fielding, strong support for batsman or weak support for bowler (the two are equivalent as the weaker your fellow batsmen the harder scoring big runs is and the stronger your fellow bowlers the harder taking a big bag is), etc. etc. by definition = decent chance for either.

All depends on who bowls well or bats well on the day. Kinda a pointless question for me.

 

[Jarquis]

In Test history there have been approximately four centuries to every three 5fers. (3321:2467)
If I'd had to have made a guess before looking it up I would've estimated that it was closer to 2:1 originally.
Just thought I'd drop that in here for no particular reason

Edit : Only supporting what has already been said in this thread but in the last 10 years there have been 947 centuries to 517 five wicket hauls. Much closer to my 2:1 estimate.

In the last 4 years (slightly before I started following Test cricket really) there have been 350 centuries and only 171 5fers. Exceeding by 2:1 estimate and much higher than the all time ratio.

 

[Hurricane]

In Test history there have been approximately four centuries to every three 5fers. (3321:2467)
If I'd had to have made a guess before looking it up I would've estimated that it was closer to 2:1 originally.
Just thought I'd drop that in here for no particular reason

Edit : Only supporting what has already been said in this thread but in the last 10 years there have been 947 centuries to 517 five wicket hauls. Much closer to my 2:1 estimate.

In the last 4 years (slightly before I started following Test cricket really) there have been 350 centuries and only 171 5fers. Exceeding by 2:1 estimate and much higher than the all time ratio.

It is hard to argue with stats like this. My initial instinct was to vote for the century being harder however. It just seems to me that you might get lucky with a couple of wickets - and then all of a sudden you are bowling to the tail where if you do your job properly you might end up with three quick wickets to complete your 5 wicket bag. Just seems like you can be in the right place at the right time and end up with a 5 wicket bag. But with a century your luck will run out on 70 or 80 if you aren't a good player.

But it is hard to argue with the stats above.

 

[Richard]

Oh and BTW:

IRRELEVANT OPTIONS FFS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Julian87]

I know which one is harder for me and it is definitely not the 5-for.

 

[ret]

Another way to answer this would be take the average inning score of a period and divide it by 10 (no of wkts that can be taken in an inning) and see how much a wkt is worth. That will also tell whats more difficult

For example, if you take 300 as the avg inning score, then 30 would the value of 1 wkt (300 divided by 10), so a 5 wkt haul would be worth 150 runs (5 wkts times 30) , which is more than a 100!

 

[Lillian Thomson]

Another way to answer this would be take the average inning score of a period and divide it by 10 (no of wkts that can be taken in an inning) and see how much a wkt is worth. That will also tell whats more difficult

For example, if you take 300 as the avg inning score, then 30 would the value of 1 wkt (300 divided by 10), so a 5 wkt haul would be worth 150 runs (5 wkts times 30) , which is more than a 100!

There's been some fairly stiff competition but that could well be the daftest logic ever on this forum.

 

[aussie]

Ha.

 

[Jakester1288]

Nowadays, a fifer is much harder. In the 80s or 90s it might be roughly even.

This.

Obviously a bowler will get a 5fa and a batsmen a century easier, but it's tons.

 

[NUFAN]

Nowadays, a fifer is much harder. In the 80s or 90s it might be roughly even.

Yeah because bowlers share the wickets around more now.