Great batsman who averaged below 50?

[Harsh Thakor]

One of the most difficult judgements in cricket is between the assesment of a batsman as 'great' or merely 'very good.' Often I am curious of what constitutes a truly great batsman.Is it consistency,technique ,ability to win games,ability to withstand a crisis,ability to break statistical records or dominate the best bowling attacks.For certain we would have Don Bradman,Walter Hammond ,Len Hutton George Headley, Sachin Tendulkar,Brian Lara,Gary Sobers,Everton Weekes.Viv Richards,Jack Hobbs,Graeme Pollock,Sunil Gavaskar,Alan Border,Greg Chappell.Rahul Dravid ,Steve Waugh or Javed Miandad.All these batsmen averaged above 50. However what about stalwarts who averaged 45+ or 40 + or even less than 40?Remember Rohan Kanhai,Geoff Boycott,Neil Harvey,Adam Gilchrist,Bill Lawry,Martin Crowe,Clive Lloyd,Ted Dexter,Peter May.Frank Worrell,Inzamam ul Haq who averaged 45+.Then remember Graham Gooch,David Gower,Zaheer Abbas,Aravenda de Silva ,Mark Waugh,Ian Chappell,David Boon,Dilip Vengsarkar,Gundappa Vishwantha,Mohammad Azharrudin ,Gordon Greenidge,Colin Cowdrey or Hanif Mohammad who averaged more than 40 but less than 45. For sheer genius Rohan Kanhai,Vishwanath ,Mark Waugh,Martin Crowe or David Gower could join the Viv Richards or Brian Laras.For mastery in technique and consistency Geoff Boycott ,Peter May or Hanif Mohammad could match Sunil Gavaskar or Len Hutton.In a crisis Ted Dexter,Aravinda de silva ,Rohan Kanhai ,Clive Lloyd or Ian Chappell could match the tenacity of Rahul Dravid ,Alan Border or Javed Miandad.In destroying great pace bowling Graham Gooch could outclass Greg Chappell and join Sir Viv Richards.On Slow batting wickets Zaheer Abbas posessed more prowess and artistic ability than Viv Richards.Inzamama- Ul- Haq or Adam Gilchrist won more matches than Tendulkar or Lara .Rohan Kanhai could save and win games like Gary Sobers while Clive Lloyd as a captain almost emulated Kanhai in his batting.Frank Worrel's batting posessed more artistry than Gary Sobers. To me to be categorized as 'great' a batsmen should consistently be able to dominate the best of bowling in all types of conditions and either be a champion as a match-winner or in a crisis.Sunil Gavaskar may not have won many matches but remember his mammoth contribution in saving games.Viv Richards and Walter Hammond were great match-winners while George Headley,Gary Sobers,Brian Lara and Jack Hobbs were champions in a crisis and match-winners. To me the batsman who averaged less than 50 but posessed all the qualities to be labelled truly'great' batsman were Rohan Kanhai,Neil Harvey,Graham Gooch,Ian Chappell,Aravind de Silva,Clive Lloyd,Inzamam ul Haq ,Gordon Greenidge,Frank Worrell,Adam Gilchrist,Ted Dexter ,Peter May.Hanif Mohammad and Geoff Boycott.I included Geoff Boycott because he was at times far too selfish but remember the number of games his batting eventually saved or even won games for England as he was great in batting for your life.Ted Dexter was an English version of Rohan Kanhai.I left out Gundappa Vishwanath and David Gower.as they were often were often careless and had patches of inconsistency.Zaheer Abbas never proved his consistency against great pace bowling or in a crisis.Colin Cowdrey on his day could bat like Ranjitsinghji but lacked the consistent brilliance. Ultimately it is a matter of opinion and as analysts on a given day we may well include David Gower,Zaheer Abbas,Martin Crowe Gundappa Vishwanath ,Colin Cowdrey,or Mark Waugh in the club of all-time great batsman.On their day they revealed prowess as much as the likes of Tendulkar or Viv Richards. I would like readers to express their views.Would having an average of 50 + necessarily make a great batsman and who were the true batting greats who averaged below 50?What is the criteria of a 'great' batsman?

[Lord]

VVS Laxman deserves a mention

[Number]

Virender Sehwag.

[Malcolm Merlyn]

Vijay Hazare.The first Indian Great batsman.Who started the tradition of performing againist the best side of the era. Sent from my GT-I9103 using Tapatalk 2

[Vilander]

Virender Sehwag.

dosent he avg above 50

[Old guy]

vvs laxman

[Number]

dosent he avg above 50

49.34.

[Old guy]

Gilchrist even today sends shivers if someone were to tell me yes we have got the aussies down by 5 to nothing but gilchrist to come Walking in at no.7 in a test match height genuine class act. Taking apart akram and co in akrams last tour was it down under and that brilliant hundred in mumbai hes the only bat that i used to be seriously scared of sochte hue ki dost ye abhi aana baaki hain.........

tbf as great as gilchrist was he never scared me it was hayden and symonds who scared me the most

[Old guy]

Yeah i know symonds in odis definitely haydos was upfront u know how it is right we all harbour hope our quicks might be able to sneak one through dampness of the wicket and what not. This fellow walked in after everbody's gone and u r half thinking aha now its going to get easier - not :).

oh yeah gilchrist is awesome..it was my mistake to derail discussion to who scared me the most sorry about that :p to me average dont matter vvs played some extraordinary knocks and had he batted in top 4 he would have averaged 50 i have no doubt

[Old guy]

Yeah with vvs he wasn't afraid of the quicks nor the spinners and always kept it ticking over - never the one for the game to meander along just 'cause it was a 5 day match i personally couldn't find any serious flaw in whatever he did :).

he did had weakness against moving ball but he was not useless and could play gem of innings even against best attacks ..

[Old guy]

from list in op i have not seen many of those oldies bat so cant comment but form current generation (mark waugh included ) i feel laxman is better or atleast deserves to be named in poll