Was Dennis Lillee really that great?

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Mr. Wicket]

Apparently, not inquisitive enough. This so;

Please do not post such images. Certain Pakistani fans who grew up watching the "glory days" of the 80s, with their near-invincibility in home series and Imran and Sarfraz moving the old ball around corners may end up fapping at such a picture hard enough to go down with carpal tunnel syndrome.

[vvvslaxman]

As an inquisitive fan who missed that era' date=' I'd really like to know why you believe so?[/quote'] Read this http://www.indianexpress.com/oldStory/41525/

[Lurker]

not after I just gave you a big reason to be even more proud of your hero .... post that stat on a aussie forum and watch how they start squirming :winky:

Now thats typical BB-speak. Bhai saaheb I knew that number already, yet you are still claiming the education :orderorder: As for posting on Aussie forum, too old for that man. Aajkal 401K mein jyaada dhyaan deta hoon :giggle:

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Mr. Wicket]

Here is a little sumtin sumtin I had sent to Boss some time ago. This is from Steve Waugh's autobiography, on his first tour to Pakistan in the late 80s. Doesn't discuss Imran. But the culture of hideously biased umpiring and blatant cheating spread throughout the team, fostered by role models Imran, Sarfraz and Miandad.

[vvvslaxman]

I agree. It was outrageously biased umpiring. Just look at their behavior of PCB officials these days. Imagine the situation 20 years back.

[The Outsider]

Which is why I am not sure if StatsGuru is actually helping or hurting cricket? It does help unravel a lot of mysteries but is also making us all monkeys who can churn numbers. There is a distinct differentiation between fans of 80s, and today in the sense 80s folks would know how many wickets Ian Botham needs to overtake Bob Willis or who scored more than 8000 runs in Test(and exact runs). These days you simply look up Statsguru.

That to me sums it up. I have nothing against stats being used in a proper, logical manner - heck I do it for a living! But following sports is so much more than numbers - the important numbers you become aware of anyway, without making the conscious effort. After that you can keep on getting into one drudgery after another of numbers, cutting, slicing, and dicing them with no more reward or understanding. In sports, stats should naturally support your intuition and guess rather than you forming an opinion based on them.

[Mr. Wicket]

I agree. It was outrageously biased umpiring. Just look at their behavior of PCB officials these days. Imagine the situation 20 years back.

Yup. With media scrutiny and the eyes of a lot of the world on them now, they are still a blatantly unscrupulous lot who will encourage and protect blatant cheaters and druggies, ball and pitch tamperers and help glorify some of them. In an era where there was even less accountability and they could get away with a lot, lot more (as they did) - the sky was the limit. Hence why I always have a lot of reservations when looking at players like Imran, Qadir and Miandad, who were helped so much in their achievements by the 12th and 13th men in the white coats - regardless of all the statistics Statsguru and its fans churn out, none of those account for the sort of blatant cheating that went on then.

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Ram]

Even today when there are 26 cameras around, a Pakistani player does not think twice before burying the cricket ball in his mouth, TWICE, in the space of two overs. God knows what these guys were upto, that too amidst Pakistani umpires when playing at home, when there were no cameras around. Pakistan has an undeniable record of one act of cheating after another, in today's modern world. Its entirely plausible to assume similar acts of cheating were par for course and Business-as-Usual for them, 20-25 years back.

[Guest BossBhai]

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[fineleg]

Bheem bhai, Your equating Dennis Lillee to Mahela Jayawoddinna (:wall:) is very funny. Lillee is indeed an all-time great. Of course, I'm not saying he is the best. I would agree someone like Malcolm Marshall who tears apart the batting line up in benign Indian patta pitches deserves higher praise.

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Lurker]

dont gimme that krap ....somehow doubt that given your self expressed allergy to numbers

Now see thats your problem, has always been. When two people are discussing, and one of them says something shouldnt the other take it at that? Why should you always have pre-conceived notion ke saamne waala jhoot bol reha hai? Hamesha ek hi fata raag baja dete ho miyaan :orderorder:

[Mr. Wicket]

that was quite a read Vicky ... and brought back a lot of memories that had been confined to the unwanted sections of my old brain ... :-D ... but when I indulge in stats based disussions with you ' date=' lurks , shwetabh , doc , bumps etc ... its a given that all these things are factored into our discussions more or less[/quote'] indeed - but we're among a few posters who are more familiar with the old players from previous eras, aspects of cricket history that elude most people on here, and the statistics that go with. Unfortunately in discussions with a lot of other posters, the same variables are rarely factored into the discussion... (As Sriram/Lurks pointed out, there are a lot of people who are totally unfamiliar with a lot of other aspects of the game and try and just cover the hole in their knowledge when arguing with only statistics.)

[Guest BossBhai]

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[fineleg]

^ Oh yeah, he is certainly a yob, and similar to :punter: I dislike him for that (though I grudgingly concede that punter is a top bat of this era). However, in terms of bowling fury and skill, he belongs to the cream. Would you not think so?

[Guest BossBhai]

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[Guest BossBhai]

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