King Kohli vs Sir Viv in ODIs

[rtmohanlal]

Kohli is a brilliant chaser(includes finishing job too) of huge totals(naturally easy batting conditions) in bilaterals.He needs to do that in a few big tournament knock outs  to have a strong case of out doing Sachin let alone Viv.

[rkt.india]

2 minutes ago, vvvslaxman said:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/16906/scorecard/64976/england-vs-west-indies-1st-odi-west-indies-tour-of-england-1984/

 

This is still Viv's best ODI innings  His 153 against Lille/Thommo/Hogg at the MCg was also good. But 4th and 5th bowling option was poor. Ray bright, Border, Chappell. 

apart from Willis, none of the bowler was any good.

[Straight Drive]

19 minutes ago, rkt.india said:

yes, he is correct about it but did that really happen is the question. Ruling along does not make it.  

 I haven't seen all 11 fielders outside the circle. But it did not matter to Viv. He could hit fours, 6ers or place it though gaps. So averaging that much at that rate in that era was never a problem for him. End of the day he was the best of his era, and he did it in his own way.

[Gollum]

2 hours ago, vvvslaxman said:

Viv Richards defensive shots would go all the way to boundary. That guy had this aura. chewing bubble gum and taking the attack to the opposition. There are lot of similarities i observe. He had incredible reflex, hand eye coordination. Where i would put Kohli ahead of Viv is Kohli is in different league against spin.  Kohli has more gears than Viv Richards in the sense the way he constructs the innings is a lesson for young players.  There are many common traits. They both are fearless. They play shots all around the wicket. They both stick to conventional shots rather than fancy shots. We can compare their skills. But you cannot say one is better than other conclusively

I like you as a poster, so hoping this was a brain fade on your part. How is Virat great against spin? If there is enough spin he always goes missing. To defend Viv against this frivolous charge, I will quote a couple of examples in test cricket because there is where your real prowess against spin shines. 

 

1. In his very 1st series (his 2nd test actually) in India he got a 192* against Bedi-Prasanna-Venkatraghavan, in a match where 2nd top score was 75. Bedi IMO is GOAT Indian spinner and Prasanna is at least as good as Ashwin. 

 

2. In his 1987 tour of India he scored a match winning 109* at Kotla where WI chased down a then record score of 276 in the final innings. The 1st 2 innings of that match were 75 and 127. Granted Maninder Singh and Arshad Ayub were no Ash-Jaddu but that was a one man show by the King.  

 

If you say Che is better than King against spin I can agree but not a guy who went missing in Kolkata/Mumbai 2012, Mohali/Nagpur 2015 and last year's home series against Australia. 

Edited February 8, 2018 by Gollum

[Gollum]

Another thing people are forgetting is the change in the cricket bat. Modern day bats are clubs where even a gully ka Ramu kaka can hit 6s in MCG. Modern day ODI batsmen have never had it so easy. Even in the late 90s a six was an achievement in itself, still remember the joy I had when Sachin hit those 2 sixers of Mcgrath in Nairobi. These days even mishits and outside edges land 20 rows behind the stands. In Viv's time very few could hit them unlike today, so SR would take a big hit. Viv was the greatest clearer of the ropes if you account for equipment.

 

Same as tennis, if you watch a Bjorg/Connors rally you will feel they are over rated. But they played with wooden rackets and inferior quality strings where power and top spin was almost impossible to generate, moreover the rackets were very heavy and affected the swing. Someone like Nadal will be neutered on clay today if he is given those rackets because his prowess on the red dirt depends greatly on the enormous top spin he generates.  

 

A comparison between the bats of Viv's time and modern day clubs.

 

 

[Gollum]

5 hours ago, rkt.india said:

you are contradicting here. If that era was so bowling friendly than how does he average 45 and SR 90 plus? 

Because he was that good. 

5 hours ago, rkt.india said:

Regarding this, can you show any evidence? Field restrictions may not be there but teams used to have very attacking fields giving lot of opportunities for an attacking batsman to score. 

 

Check out the full highlights, at various points of time (esp towards the end) I can see 7-8 fielders in the deep. 

Edited February 8, 2018 by Gollum

[Gollum]

Some of the posters here probably rate Sardar Singh above Balbir Singh Sr, Nakamura above Bobby Fischer, Vettel above Senna, Durant above Jordan etc....No understanding of the history of the sport, no application of mind...simply spouting rubbish after rubbish to hype up their favorites. Tomorrow Ashwin will become greater than Warne, Rohit better than Sachin, Pandya better than Kapil Dev and so on and so forth, shallow reading of cricinfo stats and spending too much time on social media does this to your brain I guess. Perhaps even a top Indian scientist of today is greater than Newton and Einstein combined because he probably knows more than them. 

[velu]

1 hour ago, Gollum said:

Because he was that good. 

 

Check out the full innings, at various points of time I can see 7-8 fielders in the deep. 

 

leg side flick sixes  

2 fielders precisely placed for the shot and he still goes for it 

[jf1gp_1]

I want to see how smith does

[Straight Drive]

Virat and ABD would be a good comparison. Apart from initial few years of A B D, both him and Virat have played in similar conditions across countries, mostly similar bowling attacks, same set of rules etc. etc.

[Gollum]

16 hours ago, MechEng said:

Viv's decline was in tests, in ODIs he was still awesome. He got his highest ODI score in 1987 World Cup.

Nope, 189* against Eng in Manchester 1984, remained WR till Anwar's 194. He declined in ODIs as well post 1987. 

[vvvslaxman]

6 hours ago, Gollum said:

I like you as a poster, so hoping this was a brain fade on your part. How is Virat great against spin? If there is enough spin he always goes missing. To defend Viv against this frivolous charge, I will quote a couple of examples in test cricket because there is where your real prowess against spin shines. 

 

1. In his very 1st series (his 2nd test actually) in India he got a 192* against Bedi-Prasanna-Venkatraghavan, in a match where 2nd top score was 75. Bedi IMO is GOAT Indian spinner and Prasanna is at least as good as Ashwin. 

 

2. In his 1987 tour of India he scored a match winning 109* at Kotla where WI chased down a then record score of 276 in the final innings. The 1st 2 innings of that match were 75 and 127. Granted Maninder Singh and Arshad Ayub were no Ash-Jaddu but that was a one man show by the King.  

 

If you say Che is better than King against spin I can agree but not a guy who went missing in Kolkata/Mumbai 2012, Mohali/Nagpur 2015 and last year's home series against Australia. 

The 276 chase at Kotla.  Pitch all of a sudden became a patta wicket. 75/127 all out was one of the most bizzarre collapse i have ever seen for no apparent  reason. WI was like 29 for 6. THere were no real demons especially from spinners. Indian spinners were not really great in the 80s except odd performance here and there. Manidner 10fer on a treacherous Bangalore wicket. L Siva's 12 wicket haul against England.  Richards always had issues against leggies. Chandra, Qadir in the one half test against Hirwani. He tried to slog his way out of it. Imagine him against Warne, Murali. I am going by his performance against Mendis, Ajmal, Murali, Narine He never had issues with picking their line and length, Even Sachin had issues against some random spinners later in his career. 

 

http://www.espncricinfo.com/india/content/story/91043.html

 

Chandra was dropped for the test when he made 192.

 

In DRS era all the 80s batsmen lives would have been slightly  in more trouble. You could get away by padding the ball away. Not anymore. You have to use your bat as much as possible.

Edited February 8, 2018 by vvvslaxman

[kira]

22 minutes ago, vvvslaxman said:

In DRS era all the 80s batsmen lives would have been slightly  in more trouble. You could get away by padding the ball away. Not anymore. You have to use your bat as much as possible.

THIS! 80s batsmen's ( and even bowlers) stats would have been severely impacted by modern day neutral umpiring and DRS

[Straight Drive]

7 hours ago, Gollum said:

Another thing people are forgetting is the change in the cricket bat. Modern day bats are clubs where even a gully ka Ramu kaka can hit 6s in MCG. Modern day ODI batsmen have never had it so easy. Even in the late 90s a six was an achievement in itself, still remember the joy I had when Sachin hit those 2 sixers of Mcgrath in Nairobi. These days even mishits and outside edges land 20 rows behind the stands. In Viv's time very few could hit them unlike today, so SR would take a big hit. Viv was the greatest clearer of the ropes if you account for equipment.

 

Same as tennis, if you watch a Bjorg/Connors rally you will feel they are over rated. But they played with wooden rackets and inferior quality strings where power and top spin was almost impossible to generate, moreover the rackets were very heavy and affected the swing. Someone like Nadal will be neutered on clay today if he is given those rackets because his prowess on the red dirt depends greatly on the enormous top spin he generates.  

 

A comparison between the bats of Viv's time and modern day clubs.

 

 

Bats are like rebound machines now. 

 

There was no helmets for most part of his career. No protective gear as well.

 

The wickets were uncovered.

 

A bad decision then could not be reviewed. Now batsmen can take review.

 

A comparison of Virat and ABD etc is fine but someone from that era is pointless. 

[jalebi_bhai]

Viv. A batsman who was at least 2 generations ahead in ODIs compared to his peers. Effortless six hitting ability. 

[Gollum]

52 minutes ago, vvvslaxman said:

The 276 chase at Kotla.  Pitch all of a sudden became a patta wicket. 75/127 all out was one of the most bizzarre collapse i have ever seen for no apparent  reason. WI was like 29 for 6. THere were no real demons especially from spinners. Indian spinners were not really great in the 80s except odd performance here and there. Manidner 10fer on a treacherous Bangalore wicket. L Siva's 12 wicket haul against England.  Richards always had issues against leggies. Chandra, Qadir in the one half test against Hirwani. He tried to slog his way out of it. Imagine him against Warne, Murali. I am going by his performance against Mendis, Ajmal, Murali, Narine He never had issues with picking their line and length, Even Sachin had issues against some random spinners later in his career. 

 

http://www.espncricinfo.com/india/content/story/91043.html

 

Chandra was dropped for the test when he made 192.

 

In DRS era all the 80s batsmen lives would have been slightly  in more trouble. You could get away by padding the ball away. Not anymore. You have to use your bat as much as possible.

You can't microanalyze every innings else even Sachin's 1998 home series against Aus and Cook's 2012 India series can be made to look ordinary. I can present enough facts that can diminish Sachin's prowess against Warne-Murali-Saqlain. If you apply such harsh standards there will be very few ATG innings left.

 

In 1976 when we toured WI, Viv scored 142, 177, 130 and 64 and Chandra played those matches, in fact all 4 of the quartet featured in that series. I respect Chandra a great deal and even Viv acknowledged once that Chandra was more dangerous than Jeff Thomson because of his unpredictability. Even if Chandra, Qadir and Hirwani got the better of Viv a few times, doesn't make Viv bad against leg spin. Sachin struggled against Lyon, Murali, Price, Saqlain, Ajmal, Panesar, Mendis etc at various points of his career, I can't generalize and say that he was poor against spin because he clearly wasn't. Warne always rates Viv as among the top bats, he even put him at no 1 in some of his lists...I am sure Warne understands spin bowling more than us and as a kid he must have seen enough of Viv to judge how good or bad he was against spin bowling. If he were poor against leg spin I am sure Warne would have made note of it somewhere. I have read many interviews of Bedi and Prasanna where they talk glowingly about Viv, surely he must have been at least half decent else why these plaudits?

 

I can understand if you rate Younis, Sehwag, Lara, Pujara, VVS etc as better than Viv but Kohli???? He is good but not that good. 2017 home series against Aus was enough proof of his game against them. Even in the past he hasn't set himself apart on turning tracks the way Pujara and to a lesser extent Vijay have done. In ODIs he has hardly been tested by spinners because he has played most of his knocks on featherbeds, we don't have even slightly turning tracks in ODIs these days to judge a batsman's prowess against spin. I mean look at the likes of Warner, Guptill, Dhawan etc (all top order batsmen like Kohli) they aren't great against spin but does modern white ball cricket expose their shortcomings? 

 

Regarding padding argument there was no DRS till 2010s...so should we hold this argument against Sunny, Lara, Sachin, Steve Waugh etc? Padding was a big thing in the 50s and 60s, still get your point but it had reduced a lot in the late 70s and 80s. There were many great batsmen against spin before DRS era, can't deduct points from them all because of padding. By that same logic we must deduct points from modern day batsmen because of protection, bouncer limit, large bats and 100 other things......wahaan ek factor (padding) hai toh mein yahaan 10-15 factor nikaal sakta hoon. 

[vvvslaxman]

4 minutes ago, Straight Drive said:

Bats are like rebound machines now. 

 

There was no helmets for most part of his career. No protective gear as well.

 

The wickets were uncovered.

 

A bad decision then could not be reviewed. Now batsmen can take review.

 

A comparison of Virat and ABD etc is fine but someone from that era is pointless. 

i agree. There are lot of intangible parameters. Mindset is one thing. Those days very few had the mindset to attack the bowlers. Kapil Dev was the only one i could think of besides Richards. But as far as bad decision goes , guys like Richards, Miandad benefitted more. Especially in Windies umpires would be scared of going home alive after giving lbw to Richards. As far as helmet goes it was his choice not to wear. He said having helmet did not allow him to play his shots well.  Kohli blind folded still plays superb shots. If Richards had played in modern era i very much doubt he would have walked out without a helmet. He set himself apart from the rest.

[Gollum]

20 minutes ago, Straight Drive said:

Bats are like rebound machines now. 

 

There was no helmets for most part of his career. No protective gear as well.

 

The wickets were uncovered.

 

A bad decision then could not be reviewed. Now batsmen can take review.

 

A comparison of Virat and ABD etc is fine but someone from that era is pointless. 

Agree with all your points except the bolded bit. Uncovered wickets were till the 60s. Viv was a mid 70s-80s player and he played on covered wickets. I think I read somewhere about uncovered pitches in England in the late 70s also but can't seem to find that source now.

 

  @Jimmy Cliff @vvvslaxman do you have any idea about this? When exactly did uncovered wickets go off vogue? @Tattieboy

[Tattieboy]

3 minutes ago, Gollum said:

Agree with all your points except the bolded bit. Uncovered wickets were till the 60s. Viv was a mid 70s-80s player and he played on covered wickets. I think I read somewhere about uncovered pitches in England in the late 70s also but can't seem to find that source now.

 

  @Jimmy Cliff @vvvslaxman do you have any idea about this? When exactly did uncovered wickets go off vogue? @Tattieboy

In the 70's ......I don't remember uncovered in 1975. Covers were not great then and had gaps underneath and water would run underneath giving damp patches on the wicket. 

[Tattieboy]

15 minutes ago, vvvslaxman said:

i agree. There are lot of intangible parameters. Mindset is one thing. Those days very few had the mindset to attack the bowlers. Kapil Dev was the only one i could think of besides Richards. But as far as bad decision goes , guys like Richards, Miandad benefitted more. Especially in Windies umpires would be scared of going home alive after giving lbw to Richards. As far as helmet goes it was his choice not to wear. He said having helmet did not allow him to play his shots well.  Kohli blind folded still plays superb shots. If Richards had played in modern era i very much doubt he would have walked out without a helmet. He set himself apart from the rest.

Viv Richards has stated recently in an interview that he would not wear a helmet as he sees nothing in bowling  today that would make him wear one