Steve Smith - Test Batting Ranking

[Muloghonto]

5 minutes ago, MultiB48 said:

i had pointed this out sometime before as well but ppl keep on going on these silly comparisons .putting imran, wasim etc all together is like putting johnson in with starc, hazelwood we might sneak in lee as well as he played within the last decade ,when wasim was improving imran was going down and becoming more of a support bowler.

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/player/40560.html?class=1;spanmin1=24+Jan+1985;spanval1=span;template=results;type=bowling

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/player/43547.html?class=1;spanmax1=02+Jan+1992;spanval1=span;template=results;type=bowling

 

As we can see, Imran & Wasim played together for just over seven years, of which Imran was bowling regularly for 5 years and part time for the rest. 5 years is almost half the career span for MOST test players (who average about 10-12 years in the test arena). Over this period, both of them played nearly 40 tests and both of them took wickets at less than 24.00 average.

It doesn't matter that Wasim was on the rise (and not at his peak yet) and Imran was off his peak and slowly winding down. THEY WERE STILL AMAZING BOWLERS at that juncture, as their record proves. Ergo, throw in Qadir and their excellent 2nd spinners + Waqar, Aaqib, etc. and we have a bowling attack that is better than ANY at this moment in time. Yet, they were not the best attack of the 85-91 period, as WI still were the best attack of that timeframe. 

 

[Muloghonto]

26 minutes ago, MultiB48 said:

it is easy to group them up like that but wasim didnt perform that well after his debut series (and imran didnt play that series) ,it took him some time to improve, by the late 80s when he started performing imran was going down .now you could put all of them together as 2-3 yrs of the past doesnt seem that long but when you are living it out it is.

 

 

this is wasim till 88

Career averages

	Span	Mat	Inns	Overs	Mdns	Runs	Wkts	BBI	BBM	Ave	Econ	SR	5	10
unfiltered	1985-2002	104	181	3771.1	871	9779	414	7/119	11/110	23.62	2.59	54.6	25	5	Profile
filtered	1985-1988	20	34	637.2	154	1602	55	6/91	6/96	29.12	2.51	69.5	2	0

 

pretty poor s/r doesnt look like match winner's stats

brood and anderson would be ahead of them ,as would be philander, steyn and rabada or starc and hazelwood 
 

 

 

incorrect on two counts:

 

1. True, Imran missed a few, then Wasim missed a few etc. but point remains - they played, as opening bowling pair, for over 30 tests. Bulk majority of which were them both opening the bowling. 
True, Imran declined for most of it, but his 'decline' is not the 'general lowering of performance over time' like most - he lost stamina with the ball, but smartly, kept himself as an opening burst bowler  (heck, he opened the bowling even with super speedy Waqar as #3 in the team a few times), then coming in as a change bowler with the old ball/ new ball after 80 overs or so. Look closely and stats also reflect this. Either way, that is a significant amount of matches over time and Imran + Wasim + Qadir, i still maintain, is easily better than any attack today minus Steyn or perhaps, the current Aussie attack. 

 

[express bowling]

3 hours ago, MultiB48 said:

it is easy to group them up like that but wasim didnt perform that well after his debut series (and imran didnt play that series) ,it took him some time to improve, by the late 80s when he started performing imran was going down .now you could put all of them together as 2-3 yrs of the past doesnt seem that long but when you are living it out it is.

 

 

this is wasim till 88

Career averages

	Span	Mat	Inns	Overs	Mdns	Runs	Wkts	BBI	BBM	Ave	Econ	SR	5	10
unfiltered	1985-2002	104	181	3771.1	871	9779	414	7/119	11/110	23.62	2.59	54.6	25	5	Profile
filtered	1985-1988	20	34	637.2	154	1602	55	6/91	6/96	29.12	2.51	69.5	2	0

 

pretty poor s/r doesnt look like match winner's stats

brood and anderson would be ahead of them ,as would be philander, steyn and rabada or starc and hazelwood 
 

 

 

4 hours ago, MultiB48 said:

i had pointed this out sometime before as well but ppl keep on going on these silly comparisons .putting imran, wasim etc all together is like putting johnson in with starc, hazelwood we might sneak in lee as well as he played within the last decade ,when wasim was improving imran was going down and becoming more of a support bowler.

 

 

Spot on !

 

As I said before , Imran and Wasim did not have their peak bowling years together, although they bowled together for 5 or 6 years.

 

You have already pointed out Akram's stats till 1988, which were much below his overall stats

 

Imran lost pace in the 2nd half of 1988, as far as I remember and his stats till 1990 after that are again average

 

 

Career averages

	Span	Mat	Inns	Overs	Mdns	Runs	Wkts	BBI	BBM	Ave	Econ	SR	5	10
unfiltered	1971-1992	88	142	-	727	8258	362	8/58	14/116	22.81	2.54	53.7	23	6	Profile
filtered	1989-1990	12	17	377.5	103	923	28	4/45	6/109	32.96	2.44	80.9	0	0

 

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/player/40560.html?class=1;spanmax1=31+Dec+1990;spanmin1=01+Jul+1988;spanval1=span;template=results;type=bowling;view=series

 

 

By the time Akram started bowling at his peak, Imran had tapered off, SR of 81 and average of 33

 

It was not like Hazlewood and Starc, both bowling at their peak with the first with a low average and the 2nd with a low SR.

[Muloghonto]

 Imran and Wasim did not have their peak bowling years together, although they bowled together for 5 or 6 years.

 

Talk about beating a strawman. Nobody said Imran and Wasim were at their peaks when bowling together. What was said, is that Imran-Wasim constituted an amazing opening combo, followed by Qadir + their very good 2nd spinner/servicabe 3rd pacer/Waqar made it a better bowling attack than any today. Two ATG bowlers don't have to be at their peaks to constitute a great attack. a 60% Imran and 70% Akram still makes an attack greater than any today. Especially in all conditions, given that the Aussie pace-gun cr@ps the bed in the subcontinent all the time. 

 

Hazlewood and Starc at their peak are barely as good as Wasim-Imran were back then.

 

Any which way you slice and dice it, fact remains, when you play 80-100 matches and open bowling with one another nearly 30 times, with both averaging under 24, it constitutes a GREAT opening attack. Period. 

 

[Muloghonto]

24 minutes ago, MultiB48 said:

it is one of those looking good on paper sort of situations .this is why wasim waqar pair is more famous than wasim imran

obviously Wasim-Waqar is better. So was Walsh-Ambrose. So what ? It doesn't take away from the fact that Imran + Wasim >= any attack going around today. Paper, in this case, reflects reality, reputation and the effectiveness. The closest the WI came to losing, in their 13-14 year unbeaten run, was at the hands of Wasim-Imran, et. al. 

 

[express bowling]

38 minutes ago, MultiB48 said:

it is one of those looking good on paper sort of situations .this is why wasim waqar pair is more famous than wasim imran

To add to your point .....

 

Akram did not look that good even on paper in the 1980s

 

On 31.12.89  he had a SR of 65.9 and average of 28.2 in a bowling era when general batters had lower averages

 

He became a great bowler in the '90s.

 

And anyone who has actually seen Imran post mid-1988 know that he was a 36 + guy who had lost pace and effectiveness. Had a SR of 82.8 and average of 33.5 during this period.

 

 

Edited December 23, 2017 by express bowling

[rtmohanlal]

11 hours ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

Did he ever go in terminal decline? His worst phase was during 1998-2001. Post the Ashes in 2001, he was just ridiculously good, especially away from home.

what I actually meant was that Warne has adequate longevity of 145 tests in that we need not take his total nO: of tests to evaluate him.For instance he has an avg: of 24.99 after 134 tests.That means he is definitely a sub 25 category bowler

[Jimmy Cliff]

Pakistan circa 1985-1989 in games where both Imran and Wasim played. Not including games post '89 as Imran was pretty much a batsman from here on:

 

 

LINK

 

While Akram was obviously not performing like an ATG, these are still pretty damn good numbers. Imran & Akram both bowled 900+ overs each and took 187 wickets at 25.36. If this is a poor attack then I'd kill to have such a poor attack playing for India.

 

[express bowling]

9 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

Pakistan circa 1985-1989 in games where both Imran and Wasim played. Not including games post '89 as Imran was pretty much a batsman from here on:

 

 

LINK

 

While Akram was obviously not performing like an ATG, these are still pretty damn good numbers. Imran & Akram both bowled 900+ overs each and took 187 wickets at 25.36. If this is a poor attack then I'd kill to have such a poor attack playing for India.

 

 

As you can see, it was largely due to the exploits of Imran Khan till April 1988.

 

It was not a poor attack but not as good as the best attacks of the 2010s.

[Jimmy Cliff]

9 minutes ago, express bowling said:

 

As you can see, it was largely due to the exploits of Imran Khan till April 1988.

 

It was not a poor attack but not as good as the best attacks of the 2010s.

I'd definitely take Steyn/Philander/Morkel over them but not the other best attacks of 2010s i.e. Anderson/Broad, Ashwin/Jadeja, Starc/Hazlewood as they are a little too condition dependent for my liking. Johnson/Harris may have a case though although they didn't play together as much as these guys.

[rtmohanlal]

I think we need not dissect the stats of ATG bowlers to know as to whether  it  was his peak or some sort of dip in form or things like these.For instance Ashwin avg:ed 27.58 in the last one year & more importantly 28.33 at home, but that does not take any thing away from Smith's performance in India.

[express bowling]

1 minute ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

I'd definitely take Steyn/Philander/Morkel over them but not the other best attacks of 2010s i.e. Anderson/Broad, Ashwin/Jadeja, Starc/Hazlewood as they are a little too condition dependent for my liking. Johnson/Harris may have a case though although they didn't play together as much as these guys.

 

Some attacks these days are condition dependent but flip side is, they are beasts in those conditions, which pose serious threats to the batters who have to score against them .... like Ashwin, Jadeja, Shami in Asia.

 

While evaluating batters of this era, this factor is important too.

 

Another thing is, 1980s had 6 or 7 really good batters, but the others were really average and found it hard to score runs.  Bowlers benefited from this.

 

1990s saw great improvement in both batting and bowling, and there was a much better fight between bat and ball.

[express bowling]

24 minutes ago, rtmohanlal said:

I think we need not dissect the stats of ATG bowlers to know as to whether  it  was his peak or some sort of dip in form or things like these.For instance Ashwin avg:ed 27.58 in the last one year & more importantly 28.33 at home, but that does not take any thing away from Smith's performance in India.

 

" Development phase "  and  " drag-on phase " , if any, are very pertinent while analyzing the potency of both ATGs and really good players.

 

Going by names .... Kapil-Srinath, Srinath-Zaheer and then Zaheer-Shami may look like the best pace duos India have ever had, but people watching the game know that is not the case.

Edited December 23, 2017 by express bowling

[rtmohanlal]

33 minutes ago, express bowling said:

 

Some attacks these days are condition dependent but flip side is, they are beasts in those conditions, which pose serious threats to the batters who have to score against them .... like Ashwin, Jadeja, Shami in Asia.

 

While evaluating batters of this era, this factor is important too.

 

Another thing is, 1980s had 6 or 7 really good batters, but the others were really average and found it hard to score runs.  Bowlers benefited from this.

 

1990s saw great improvement in both batting and bowling, and there was a much better fight between bat and ball.

Comparing records of  2 condition dependent bowlers Kumble & Ashwin with that of some past ATG bowlers. Yes... in general these condition dependent bowlers are beasts  in their favourable conditions, but the case with past ATG bowlers is that they were beasts in all conditions.

 

waqar         home 20.87 abroad 25.96

mcgrath      home 22.43 abroad 20.81

ambrose     home 21.19 abroad 20.78

warne        home 26.39 abroad 24.61

akram        home 22.02 abroad 24.61

donald       home 21.64 abroad 22.96

kumble      home 24.88 abroad 35.85

ashwin      home 23.04 abroad 31.75

 

All the past ATGs in general were convincingly larger threats even at home when compared to now a days condition dependent bowlers at home.   W.R.T abroad the lesser said the better.In other words the batsmen who faced these past ATGs  didn't have a bit of relief not only  abroad but even in home conditions.

Edited December 23, 2017 by rtmohanlal

[express bowling]

15 minutes ago, rtmohanlal said:

Yes... in general these condition dependent bowlers are beasts  in their favourable conditions, but the case with past ATG bowlers is that they were beasts in all conditions.For example take the case of these bowlers.

 

waqar         home 20.87 abroad 25.96

mcgrath      home 22.43 abroad 20.81

ambrose     home 21.19 abroad 20.78

warne        home 26.39 abroad 24.61

akram        home 22.02 abroad 24.61

donald       home 21.64 abroad 22.96

kumble      home 24.88 abroad 35.85

ashwin      home 23.04 abroad 31.75

 

All the past ATGs in general were convincingly larger threats even at home when compared to now a days condition dependent bowlers at home.   W.R.T abroad the lesser said the better.In other words the batsmen who faced these past ATGs  didn't have a bit of relief not only  abroad but even in home conditions.

 

We were discussing the mid and late '80s  bowlers compared to the 2010s ones.

 

Only the WI attack of that period was generally better than the current ones

 

Most of the bowlers you quoted operated in the 1990 to 2005 era, which I think was a mighty fine period for bowlers ( as both the team- regular batters and protective gear were better than the 80s and '70s )

Edited December 23, 2017 by express bowling

[Jimmy Cliff]

25 minutes ago, express bowling said:

Some attacks these days are condition dependent but flip side is, they are beasts in those conditions, which pose serious threats to the batters who have to score against them .... like Ashwin, Jadeja, Shami in Asia.

 

While evaluating batters of this era, this factor is important too.

Agree but unless there is a huge difference in the overall stats, I'd always tend to prefer the players who are more likely to deliver across different conditions.

 

30 minutes ago, express bowling said:

Another thing is, 1980s had 6 or 7 really good batters, but the others were really average and found it hard to score runs.  Bowlers benefited from this.

 

1990s saw great improvement in both batting and bowling, and there was a much better fight between bat and ball.

It's chicken and egg situation though. Was it bowlers benefiting from bowling to poor batsmen or was it a case of batsmen just not getting enough stat padding chances the way modern batsmen do against Zim/Bang and currently even WI/SL?  I personally think it's more a case of 80s batsmen not getting enough opportunities against crap attacks compared to modern batsmen. Most sides in the 80s (except for India and Sri Lanka) had an ATG or near-ATG bowlers playing for them at some time or the other. And even India had their best ever pacer in Kapil Dev. Disagree on the count of 6-7 batsmen as well. Any top order batsman who averaged 45+ in the 80s is damn good in my book. There were 14 of them in the 80s. The big improvement in the 90s was that we had 2 ATG spinners emerging unlike the 80s that were entirely dominated by pace.

 

 

[express bowling]

49 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

Agree but unless there is a huge difference in the overall stats, I'd always tend to prefer the players who are more likely to deliver across different conditions.

That is true.  However, barring some bowlers of the '90s , the great WI attacks of 75 to 95 and a couple of bowlers here and there .....these bowlers are better than most in the last 50 years.   We also have to consider the fact that, in the batting era, bowlers averages need to be reduced if people feel that batsmen's averages need to be reduced by 2 or 3.

 

Steyn, Harris and Hazlewood have good home and away stats.

 

Quote

It's chicken and egg situation though. Was it bowlers benefiting from bowling to poor batsmen or was it a case of batsmen just not getting enough stat padding chances the way modern batsmen do against Zim/Bang and currently even WI/SL?  I personally think it's more a case of 80s batsmen not getting enough opportunities against crap attacks compared to modern batsmen. Most sides in the 80s (except for India and Sri Lanka) had an ATG or near-ATG bowlers playing for them at some time or the other.

 

Not talking about stats but the batsmanship in the mid and late '80s.  Some of the most boring and flairless batters were there, who just hung on without any intent to score even against mediocre attacks.

 

England, India and SL had very poor bowling attacks .... Australia and NZ were mediocre ... NZ poor if no Hadlee .... Pakistan ok and WI great

 

Most of the good bowlers of the '80s bowled well in the early '80s.

 

 

Quote

Disagree on the count of 6-7 batsmen as well. Any top order batsman who averaged 45+ in the 80s is damn good in my book. There were 14 of them in the 80s.

Among batters who have scored 3000+ runs, only 8 such batters were there in the 80s.

 

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=1;filter=advanced;orderby=batting_average;qualmin1=3000;qualval1=runs;spanmax1=31+Dec+1989;spanmin1=01+Jan+1980;spanval1=span;template=results;type=batting

 

 

1990s saw flair among both batters and bowlers.

 

Edited December 23, 2017 by express bowling

[Jimmy Cliff]

3 hours ago, MultiB48 said:

no one said it was a poor attack but piling them up as if they remained great from start to finish is just silly

Repeatedly building strawmen is sillier.

 

3 hours ago, MultiB48 said:

anderson broad etc are modern greats,i doubt eng will ever produce a pair like that again but still people are questioning eng's attack,all those yrs back in 2010-11 it was  bresnan, tremlett who paired up with anderson to get the job done.

Anderson and Broad are somewhat upmarket pace bowling versions of Ashwin and Jadeja, very good at home but largely innocuous overseas barring some exceptions. Imran, Akram (even the 80s version) along with 2 out of Tauseef/Qasim/Qadir is anyday a better attack.

[Jimmy Cliff]

Just now, MultiB48 said:

lol if you play all you matches in pak then yeah they were the greatest of them all

In the mid to late 80s, they won series in England and India and gave the WI an almighty scare in their backyard before patriotic umpiring bailed them out but you can carry on.

[express bowling]

17 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

In the mid to late 80s, they won series in England and India and gave the WI an almighty scare in their backyard before patriotic umpiring bailed them out but you can carry on.

Even India defeated England in England in 1986 and drew with WI in 1987/88 ..... although we had a poorer bowling attack than Pakistan at that time.

 

England was a poor team at that time and the WI were going through transition.

 

 

 

Edited December 23, 2017 by express bowling