Is Cricket losing its popularity amongst India's urban youth?

[The Outsider]

^ I started to reply to your post but still have not been able to control my laughter at the statement that Kapil has a much lesser batting pedigree than Dhoni.

[Lurker]

^ I started to reply to your post but still have not been able to control my laughter at the statement that Kapil has a much lesser batting pedigree than Dhoni.

Yep. The post is hilarious on many levels. Including one abt Dhoni and small town syndrome. As if Kapil was born in London. Suppose now I know why Dhoni is richer than Rooney...his has his own set of blind fans.

[The Outsider]

Yep. The post is hilarious on many levels. Including one abt Dhoni and small town syndrome. As if Kapil was born in London. Suppose now I know why Dhoni is richer than Rooney...his has his own set of blind fans.

The best and common part among all these diatribes is that they will have nothing to argue against the points you have raised, so they will raise some make believe arguments claiming you have made them, refute them, claim victory, and call you names. For example, in the above post jawaan bharat goes to lengths to show that Yuvraj, Jayasuriya, and Raina are not cowlashers. Where did I claim them to be cowlashers in the first place?:hysterical: Another one, the Yusuf Pathan cowlashing is taken a logical extension that I disprove attacking strokeplay of Richards and then that is refuted and more name calling. Where does my post imply that attacking batting of Richards~cowlashing of Pathan? :hysterical:

[Crookbond]

A load of uninformed garbage. Kapil clearly has much less batting pedigree than dhoni. Dhoni is a highly gifted cricketer but was not taught cricket in the right way. people from poorer schools with mediocre coaches exhibit awkward to poor technique.as a result he will never be a technical master. The problems of dhoni and raina stem from them obviously not getting the best coaching and competition in their formative years. but tier 2 town talents signal a breakthrough in indian sports nevrtheless. you cannot expect guys from tier 2 town and villages who had no access to even proper coaches and competition (until their later years) to be highly refined like gavaskar or tendulkar Simplistic. Gilchrist was not the best keeper in australia either. they were chosen for being the best batsman who can keep. keeping is not as strategic as bowling or batting where the weight of runs and wickets are very improtant. raina and jadeja have a pretty solid defence. what the hell are you whining about? yes they suffer from tier 2 town backlground a bit .Without outstanding talent and aptitude for the game , they would not have made this far. you are sounding like a madman and with no credibility because you distribute words like "cowlashing" without really understanding the difference between proper shotmakers and real cowlashers. jayasuriya, yuvraj and raina are proper shotmakers . does tendulkar himself play defence all the time? that's one part of the game. what about the other crucial part?" you have to hurt the opposition with shots haven't aggressive batsmen from WI and Aus go after the bowling in tests as well? how is it "cowlashing" when richards or greenidge murdered bowlers even in tests. who told you "shotmaking = crass slogging", ignoramus? how are top batsmen able to play shots and stay long as well? does gayle have a poor test record? does abdv has? why can't pollard or smith do the same your whining is unnecessary,ignorant and getting on the nerves. you don't really know what's going on.

:WTF:

[Marut]

He is not a poor test batsman but his averages have been inflated by making merry from 300/5 kind of scores thanks to our top order.

By this logic, can we say that Gilchrist averages have been inflated by making merry from 300/2 kind of scores put in the invincible Aussie team? Hayden, Langer, Ponting,... was the line up that preceded Gilchrist, and they clicked more often than not, unlike our batting order which was not consistant abroad, even at it best.

[Sehwag1830]

Hayden' date=' Langer, Ponting,... was the line up that preceded Gilchrist, and they clicked more often than not, unlike our batting order which was not consistant abroad, even at it best.[/quote'] You are joking right. :hysterical::hysterical::hysterical::hysterical: Have you checked away average of Australian batsmen ? Not a single bar Steve Waugh averages 50. And Steve waugh's average is inflated due to huge number of not-outs.

[youngindia]

Including one abt Dhoni and small town syndrome. As if Kapil was born in London. Suppose now I know why Dhoni is richer than Rooney...his has his own set of blind fans.

Just because you don't have certain info or can't understand it,it does not mean its no true. its just you can't relate to it. students from strong schools display a refinement in technique and they have strong competition in peers and seniors they can watch and learn.In other words, you are expected to play to a certain standartd in a highly competitive shcool or filter out. Also coaches with better reputation are there to prevent the sort of awkwardness dhoni shows in his batting. in other words, the sort of awkwardness and tentative defence shown by dhoni is not something i relate to in players from strong schools. when players from weaker schools and non city areas came to play, they were significantly weaker in technique and display some weird technique. So i am speaking from experience.

[youngindia]

and kapil is from chandigarh, not a small city BTW.he had a decent coach azad. he was not disadvantaged guy as he himself says in autbiography. As to why its ignorant to expect kapil to match dhoni's standard, here it goes. A batsman does not average 30 or 40 or 50 by accident.its a function of their technique, refinement in technique and talent. only a cricketing ignoramus ignorant of basic technique would think kapil would come anywhere near test average 40 or be as consistent as Dhoni's. for example you cannot look at ashwin's technique and say he is going to have a test average near 40. its just unrealistic .this is not a super hero film kapil is a bowling alllrounder with batting as his significantly weaker dept.it is his weaker dept becuase his technique nowhere comes close to a proper specialist.he had some batting flair no doubt but he had only a susbet of a real specialist's skills So there needs to be a certain expectation of bowling allrounders,batsman wicket keeper batsman ,specialist batsmen. expecting a bowling allrounder who has batting as his weaker dept to average in the high 30's is itself a very high standard. only imran is above 35 as far as famous bowling allrounders go . botham ,better batsman than kapil, averages 33. dhoni is in the high 30's easily,though his future is still open. doesn't it show expecting bowling allroudners to average above 35 is a tall order if not unrealistic ? In other words only the very best bowling allrounder matches dhoni at this mid stage of his career and if dhoni goes to 40(as he easily can), you can forget it. This is apart from my subjective view.on average, i have 20-30% more confidence that dhoni will crosss 30 than kapil as a rule.

[youngindia]

History of test cricket has given a guideline to what to expect from specialists and bowling allrounders. 50 average specialists % of crossing 30 in a test innings Gavaskar 49.53 Tendulkar 53.05 Ponting 50.35 Dravid 52.79 Richards 53.29 40 average specialists Gooch 46.29 kirsetn 45.45 vengsarkar 47.56 dhoni 41.5 Bowling allrounders imran 39.68 botham 38.5 kapil 38.04 cairns 39.42 klusener 31.8 isn't striking how the results indicate the consistency of the batsmen? wouldn't it be unrealistic to expect 99.8% of bowling rounders to even match dhoni's current record?

[Marut]

You are joking right. :hysterical::hysterical::hysterical::hysterical: Have you checked away average of Australian batsmen ? Not a single bar Steve Waugh averages 50. And Steve waugh's average is inflated due to huge number of not-outs.

50 is a big average for away matches. I am not sure why you think each one of the Australian batsman must average 50? Australian players always played as a team, whether it be batting, bowling or fielding that is why their away record is brilliant. The team Gilchrist played in was a team of champions and a champion team. Dhoni's was a team of champs but rarely ever a champion team when we travelled.

[Marut]

^ I started to reply to your post but still have not been able to control my laughter at the statement that Kapil has a much lesser batting pedigree than Dhoni.

By sheer natural talent, Kapil was like a avg 40 batsman. He achieved much less due to various reasons. Dhoni achieved his maximum potential inspite of being a relatively limited batsman. Dhoni, is therefore, obviously a better batsman. Kapil Dev had some great moments with the bat and his potential is unquestionable; the way he smashed fast bowlers in WI and England, the way he lofted Hemmings for four sixes to avoid a follow on; how he smashed an 175 n.o to rescue India from 17/5; his glorious century against SA when India was like six down for 80. But these memorable innings were far and few between, and Kapil's final averages are suggestive of an average batsman in both tests and ODIs. In fact, his averages resemble the hack known as Afridi and not that of greater batsmen. Dhoni is obviously superior to Kapil as a batsman.

[The Outsider]

By this logic' date=' can we say that Gilchrist averages have been inflated by making merry from 300/2 kind of scores put in the invincible Aussie team? Hayden, Langer, Ponting,... was the line up that preceded Gilchrist, and they clicked more often than not, unlike our batting order which was not consistant abroad, even at it best.[/quote'] Yeah, Gilchrist benefited from a strong Australian batting line up but he has a lot of solo performances as well and averaged a good 10-12 runs per innings more than Dhoni. With the Indian batting line up headed for a downturn we'll have to wait and see where Dhoni's batting average ends up 4-5 years from now when he won't get the cushion of 300/5 kind of scores. And yeah, it's only semantics but Gilchrist rarely batted so high up the order that he would come in two wickets down. But you've chosen to ignore the crux of my post and are picking on minor points - do you agree with the crux?

[The Outsider]

By sheer natural talent, Kapil was like a avg 40 batsman. He achieved much less due to various reasons. Dhoni achieved his maximum potential inspite of being a relatively limited batsman. Dhoni, is therefore, obviously a better batsman. Kapil Dev had some great moments with the bat and his potential is unquestionable; the way he smashed fast bowlers in WI and England, the way he lofted Hemmings for four sixes to avoid a follow on; how he smashed an 175 n.o to rescue India from 17/5; his glorious century against SA when India was like six down for 80. But these memorable innings were far and few between, and Kapil's final averages are suggestive of an average batsman in both tests and ODIs. In fact, his averages resemble the hack known as Afridi and not that of greater batsmen. Dhoni is obviously superior to Kapil as a batsman.

The value of a lower order batsman is beyond just averages - it lies more in the number of innings of impact he plays lower down the order. The same number of runs scored from 350/5 and 150/5 differentiate the importance of a lower order batsman. Kapil has played many more innings with impact than Dhoni lower down the order - only talking about tests. Both Kapil and Botham average less than Imran, but as batsmen contributed much more than Imran ever did. Heck Dhoni averages more than Botham and it would sheer madness to think Dhoni is a better batsman than Botham. I don't even know if you are interested in a serious discussion by bringing in Afridi's average to compare with Kapil, Imran, and Botham.

[Executioner]

Ok bros, just watch the IPL matches and have a look at crowd and ull see a lot of youths coming in. Now, if they came from poor background would they be able to come to the ground and watch? well no

[Marut]

The value of a lower order batsman is beyond just averages - it lies more in the number of innings of impact he plays lower down the order. The same number of runs scored from 350/5 and 150/5 differentiate the importance of a lower order batsman. Kapil has played many more innings with impact than Dhoni lower down the order - only talking about tests. Both Kapil and Botham average less than Imran, but as batsmen contributed much more than Imran ever did. Heck Dhoni averages more than Botham and it would sheer madness to think Dhoni is a better batsman than Botham. I don't even know if you are interested in a serious discussion by bringing in Afridi's average to compare with Kapil, Imran, and Botham.

The fact is he did not play that many impact innings as we would have expected from him. Why don't you cite all those impact innings ( out of the 131 tests he played), and we will take it from there. Note that I did not say that Kapil was less talented than Dhoni, but only their overall acheivments. IMO, Kapil was highly talented, but flattered to deceive.

[Marut]

The value of a lower order batsman is beyond just averages - it lies more in the number of innings of impact he plays lower down the order. The same number of runs scored from 350/5 and 150/5 differentiate the importance of a lower order batsman. Kapil has played many more innings with impact than Dhoni lower down the order - only talking about tests. Both Kapil and Botham average less than Imran, but as batsmen contributed much more than Imran ever did. Heck Dhoni averages more than Botham and it would sheer madness to think Dhoni is a better batsman than Botham. I don't even know if you are interested in a serious discussion by bringing in Afridi's average to compare with Kapil, Imran, and Botham.

Dhoni is a lower order batsman, so we must look beyond his averages too. Also define an impact innings in this context - 1) is it scoring a few quick valuable runs? or b) At least 50 runs to rescue the side from a precarious/hopeless position or to lead the side to a fighting draw/win.

[Marut]

Yeah, Gilchrist benefited from a strong Australian batting line up but he has a lot of solo performances as well and averaged a good 10-12 runs per innings more than Dhoni. With the Indian batting line up headed for a downturn we'll have to wait and see where Dhoni's batting average ends up 4-5 years from now when he won't get the cushion of 300/5 kind of scores. And yeah, it's only semantics but Gilchrist rarely batted so high up the order that he would come in two wickets down. But you've chosen to ignore the crux of my post and are picking on minor points - do you agree with the crux?

Gilchrist was obviously a better batsman than Dhoni. I can't see anyone who would dispute that. My response was only to your view that Dhoni's batting averages were high because he benefitted from playing in the strong Indian team with a strong top order before him. The one advantage Kapil Dev had over Dhoni was that Kapil was in a team of low profilers, so Kapil's performances always stood out. Even if he scored a quick 30, we all noticed it and gave him due credit. Viswanath ( and to some extent Gavaskar) was perhaps the only other batsman who could be described as an impact or big match player during Kapil's days. But Dhoni is in a team of big stars - Sehwag, Gambhir, Tendulkar all score fast and Dhoni's performances in a test match do not stand out against the crowd. We have come to the extent of branding a wicket keeper batsman as "average" when he has a test average of 37, the 7th highest of all wkt keepers to have ever played.

[The Outsider]

The fact is he did not play that many impact innings as we would have expected from him. Why don't you cite all those impact innings ( out of the 131 tests he played)' date=' and we will take it from there. Note that I did not say that Kapil was less talented than Dhoni, but only their overall acheivments. IMO, Kapil was highly talented, but flattered to deceive.[/quote'] Here is an earlier post of mine about some of the impact innings of Kapil and the kind of recognition they received when they were played: http://indiancricketfans.com/showpost.php?p=785773&postcount=23 In addition to the above there was the run a ball 80 odd he made at Chennai in the same match he took 11 wickets, one of the greatest feats of all round cricket. In the same series, he also had a run a ball 70 odd which turned out to be the highest score in a match featuring the batting of the likes of Gavaskar, Viswanath, Vengsarkar, Majid Khan, Miandad, Asif Iqbal, Wasim Raja, Zaheer Abbas. Those were the two tests India won to take the series when not many had given India a chance against what was a very strong Pakistan team. Or in the '89 tour against Pakistan India were some 70/6 in reply to Pakistan's 400+ before Kapil blasted a run a ball half century to help save the follow on and eventually save the test. To say Kapil did not play innings of impact doesn't make sense - yeah if you would say that Kapil played too recklessly at times, I would agree and that is certainly reflected in his batting average, but the entire cricketing world acknowledged the kind of innings of impact Kapil and Botham were capable of and did play often enough.

[The Outsider]

Dhoni is a lower order batsman' date=' so we must look beyond his averages too. Also define an impact innings in this context - 1) is it scoring a few quick valuable runs? or b) At least 50 runs to rescue the side from a precarious/hopeless position or to lead the side to a fighting draw/win.[/quote'] I think my post above should give you an idea about the kind of innings of impact.

[The Outsider]

We have come to the extent of branding a wicket keeper batsman as "average" when he has a test average of 37' date=' the 7th highest of all wkt keepers to have ever played.[/quote'] Because you are judging Dhoni solely on the basis of his batting average. Where would Dhoni rank on wicket keeping skills in the history of cricket, roughly? I think he would struggle to make the top 25, that makes him pretty average given wicket keeping is his main job and not batting.