Sri Lanka's ugly ducklings turn into swans but let's not call them great yet | Dileep Premachandran

[vvvslaxman]

Srilanka will unleash Ranjit Fernando now :haha: . SL fans already have lot of inferiority complex. Now you can see lot of hate mails in crass language. They are not that cool.

[Anakin]

But then again Inzy is the best against pace bowling and a much bigger (not only physically) matchwinner according to a whole lot of people, including some here. And why bother with context when you have pure numbers?

[flamy]

Not every 36-24-36 bimbette can be a Paz Vega.

Wow. I don't need to read the rest of the article. I respect this dood's opinion. :nice:

[Ram]

On the topic of Samaraweera, I am greatly amused every time someone says 'He averages .0003 in Australia, 1.242 in South Africa, .342 in New Zealand, but his average at home 994.56. So you cant respect him as much'. I say why? Sure, the player may have gotten a big proportion of his runs at home, but he still got them. Its not like they played plastic ball cricket with 20 yard boudaries there. It was a normal cricket match, under normal cricket conditions and he got the runs, while others failed. Give him credit for that. Dont belittle his record at home, but pointing out his inadequacies abroad. If we were apply the same logic, the Great Don played test cricket in only TWO countries. Keeping that mind, there's no WAY you could even remotely claim that he was the best batsman ever. Who knows what might have happened had he played anywhere else. But you know what, it would be SO unfair on the the Don if we were to say that. Its not his fault that he didnt play test cricket in other countries.

[zubinpepsi]

On the topic of Samaraweera' date=' I am greatly amused every time someone says [i']'He averages .0003 in Australia, 1.242 in South Africa, .342 in New Zealand, but his average at home 994.56. So you cant respect him as much'. I say why? Sure, the player may have gotten a big proportion of his runs at home, but he still got them. Its not like they played plastic ball cricket with 20 yard boudaries there. It was a normal cricket match, under normal cricket conditions and he got the runs, while others failed. Give him credit for that. Dont belittle his record at home, but pointing out his inadequacies abroad. If we were apply the same logic, the Great Don played test cricket in only TWO countries. Keeping that mind, there's no WAY you could even remotely claim that he was the best batsman ever. Who knows what might have happened had he played anywhere else. But you know what, it would be SO unfair on the the Don if we were to say that. Its not his fault that he didnt play test cricket in other countries.

u confused urself there.. by comparing Don with samaraweera...during Don's time. cricket was mainly played in Eng/Aus.. its not the case now... while its no fault of Don of not playing anywhere other than Aus and Eng.. but samaraweera did play in other countries.. dint he?? wat did u find wrong in tht analysis.. samaraweera, jayawardene averaging 50+ is a disgrace ...

[DomainK]

On the topic of Samaraweera' date=' I am greatly amused every time someone says [i']'He averages .0003 in Australia, 1.242 in South Africa, .342 in New Zealand, but his average at home 994.56. So you cant respect him as much'. I say why? Sure, the player may have gotten a big proportion of his runs at home, but he still got them. Its not like they played plastic ball cricket with 20 yard boudaries there. It was a normal cricket match, under normal cricket conditions and he got the runs, while others failed. Give him credit for that. Dont belittle his record at home, but pointing out his inadequacies abroad. If we were apply the same logic, the Great Don played test cricket in only TWO countries. Keeping that mind, there's no WAY you could even remotely claim that he was the best batsman ever. Who knows what might have happened had he played anywhere else. But you know what, it would be SO unfair on the the Don if we were to say that. Its not his fault that he didnt play test cricket in other countries.

I disagree. It takes something to be able to score on different kinds of surfaces. A batsman who can do that definitely is better than the others. There are many batsmen who can score on home turf, but fail miserably abroad. That comparison is bound to come and that's not unfair at all.

[punjabi_khota]

On the topic of Samaraweera' date=' I am greatly amused every time someone says [i']'He averages .0003 in Australia, 1.242 in South Africa, .342 in New Zealand, but his average at home 994.56. So you cant respect him as much'. I say why? Sure, the player may have gotten a big proportion of his runs at home, but he still got them. Its not like they played plastic ball cricket with 20 yard boudaries there. It was a normal cricket match, under normal cricket conditions and he got the runs, while others failed. Give him credit for that. Dont belittle his record at home, but pointing out his inadequacies abroad. If we were apply the same logic, the Great Don played test cricket in only TWO countries. Keeping that mind, there's no WAY you could even remotely claim that he was the best batsman ever. Who knows what might have happened had he played anywhere else. But you know what, it would be SO unfair on the the Don if we were to say that. Its not his fault that he didnt play test cricket in other countries.

Peer assessment. Ask all the world cricketers now about the top 50 test cricketers of last 2 decades and see if Sameeraweera's name comes up. And then ask them about the greatest cricketers ever and see if Bradman's name comes up.

[vvvslaxman]

To be fair to Samraweera nobody was hyping him anyway. Even among Srilankans he is not the best batsman overall.

[Mr. Wicket]

I find it absurd that the Bradman argument is being used to parallel Samaraweera. **** what the statistics say, you just have to watch the man bat to see that he's a pretty limited and inconsistent batsman in tough conditions and against better opponents. Those who fall on statistics are no different from the Pakis who pull up Yousuf's comparative stats to try and big him up alongside a Dravid, Lara, Tendulkar or Waugh. Stats are only good for so much - in cases like that for anyone who has watched those men through the majority of their careers, it's VERY evident that Yousuf is a far lesser batsman than any of those. And similarly to anyone who has watched Sri Lanka play on a regular basis home and away, the trend is obvious - Samaraweera cashes in when situations suit him (slower paced pitches or lesser bowlers), and struggles when the ball's moving a bit more. I can't be arsed to bother with the stats (which will eventually be manipulated in various ways to suit people as and when it pleases them), but anyone who thinks Samaraweera is a seriously high quality batsman should find tapes of the ENTIRE SL in England tour in 06, or maybe the India tour the previous winter. Ball keeping low = Samaraweera dominating. Sajid Mahmood getting a bit of bounce and swing at Lord's and Samaraweera made him - a fairly mediocre close-to-40-average bowler - look lethal. Or remember him looking completely out of sorts against Harbhajan and Kumble the moment they got pitches where the ball could BOUNCE and turn with some pace rather than just staying low and turning slowly? (Or heck, what about him coming undone on most Australian tours? Why is that that the moment he gets some short stuff, he regularly starts giving catches behind the cordon?) The man has holes in his batting that are damn hard to pick when on a slow pitch, but given a track with some pace and bounce he's a lot less impressive than you'd expect a 50+ average player to be. (PS: In terms of Bradman, it's also worth seeing the bowlers he cashed in against and the bowlers dear Samaraweera cashed in against. One pillaged and filled his sack against a whole lot of mediocre guys like the West Indies, Zimbabwe or the legendary GAY attack or ASS attack or whatever the Paki fanboys call them on a bunch of roads. The other played against only the top teams of the era with no real weaker teams to capitalize against, bar the odd NZ tour. When your main batting conquests are the likes of Verity, Tate, Laker, Constantine and Bedser as opposed to Danish Kaneria, Iain O'Brien, Enamul Haque and Darren Powell, it says enough.)

[Lord]

On the topic of Samaraweera' date=' I am greatly amused every time someone says [i']'He averages .0003 in Australia, 1.242 in South Africa, .342 in New Zealand, but his average at home 994.56. So you cant respect him as much'. I say why? Sure, the player may have gotten a big proportion of his runs at home, but he still got them. Its not like they played plastic ball cricket with 20 yard boudaries there. It was a normal cricket match, under normal cricket conditions and he got the runs, while others failed. Give him credit for that. Dont belittle his record at home, but pointing out his inadequacies abroad. If we were apply the same logic, the Great Don played test cricket in only TWO countries. Keeping that mind, there's no WAY you could even remotely claim that he was the best batsman ever. Who knows what might have happened had he played anywhere else. But you know what, it would be SO unfair on the the Don if we were to say that. Its not his fault that he didnt play test cricket in other countries.

ofcourse he isnt the best batsman ever.SRT is :P