BBC Greatest ODI XI

[HippoSucks]

IQ is a decent measure but not perfect.

Not at all. All IQ shows is that if it is below 100, you will probably have some problems in life. Nothing more.

[zen]

I still :hysterical: at how Indians picked Dev over Sobers for the cricinfo world x1 by peoples vote. If that is not blind nationalist what is?

I missed this^ gem So your problem is that people in India voted for Kapil over Sobers because Indians were guided by blind nationalism For this to be a problem for you vs. Indians - your assumption would be that the entire world except for Indians voted for Sobers For your assumption to be true - only Kapil (India vote) and Sobers (ROW vote) would have got votes Now, if players other than these two got votes, it would imply that people of other countries would have acted out of blind nationalism too. So why single out Indian cricket fans? Unless ..... :P

[Guldozer]

I missed this^ gem So your problem is that people in India voted for Kapil over Sobers because Indians were guided by blind nationalism For this to be a problem for you vs. Indians - your assumption would be that the entire world except for Indians voted for Sobers For your assumption to be true - only Kapil (India vote) and Sobers (ROW vote) would have got votes Now, if players other than these two got votes, it would imply that people of other countries would have acted out of blind nationalism too. So why single out Indian cricket fans? Unless ..... :P

Kapil is not even rated THAT highly outside India.

[zen]

Kapil is not even rated THAT highly outside India.

Could be but why should that be Indian fans' problem? .... Javad Miandad too (or whoever your best batsman is) is not rated THAT highly outside Pak. Does that make you sleepless at night or does that make Javad ordinary vs. others? :hmmmm:

[Bublu Bhuyan]

Isolating 1 set of returns but ignoring the bigger picture. :giggle: Murali is about 10 times greater than Kapil as a cricketer in tests or ODIs. Kapil is rated this highly here alone. Rarely does an expert pick him for anything. You are trying to present x or y picture to promote this gentle medium pace bowler who has a test strike rate which is a joke for a strike bowler. As an ODI cricketer he may have been a decent containing bowler but not much more. Oh sorry he scored 1 ton v Zimbabwe a decade or so before they got test status. Must be the best all rounder then. :hysterical:

Murali ain't even a bowler in the first place, if you know what I mean. You might however consider him a cricketer based on his batting and fielding.

[BlueBee]

[Muloghonto]

No, I dont. See my X1 - JS was not picked. These AR are better than Dev by the fair measure of bat ave - bowling ave: Sobers Imran Miller Botham Hadlee Kallis Cairns Pollock Proctor Grieg Want me to continue? Yet you place him so highly. He was moderate. His bowling was average at best and his batting was not much better. If you play 100000 games you may get a few wkts - that doesn't make him the best. Yet you folks are so blind you flood cricinfo and all vote for him in a world X1 - showing how little Indians generally know about cricket.

On what basis are these names greater than kapil dev in odis ?? Speaks volumes about your blind anti Indian bias when you are rating people who havnt even played a dozen odis as better than dev.

[Marut]

SRs don't mean much unless averages are added. What was his average in Australia? Mid 20s? Whoopty ****ing Doo!!

You realize he was a #6,7 batsman, right? Mid 20s is quite decent for a lower order batsman in the 80s and at that strike rate he was the best lower order batsman of the 80s. Kapil's impact as a batsman on an ODI game was easily more than a top order bat like Gavaskar. You can check out this table and judge for yourself. Lower order batsmen in the 80s comparison chart. Kapil dev pretty much owns everybody, both in quantity as well as quality. A guy averages 30 at a strike rate of 100 in the eighties over an entire decade!!!

[Marut]

Blaming Kapil's moderate returns on being 'over worked' is just silly. Hadlee was a 1 man army and his returns were amazing. Dev just wasn't as good as Indians make out. I know Marut is going to freak but those who saw him and the evidence as shown to the world shows that he a solid bowler and a slugger with the bat. This refers mainly to ODIs. In tests he was clearly the weakest of the 4 great ARs of his time. His bowling S/R is pathetic for a strike bowler. He averages just a shade under 30 with a SR of about 63.

NZ did not play as much as India. India played 50% more matches than NZ did, yet Kapil did not skip matches.

[Marut]

Blaming Kapil's moderate returns on being 'over worked' is just silly. Hadlee was a 1 man army and his returns were amazing. Dev just wasn't as good as Indians make out. I know Marut is going to freak but those who saw him and the evidence as shown to the world shows that he a solid bowler and a slugger with the bat. This refers mainly to ODIs. In tests he was clearly the weakest of the 4 great ARs of his time. His bowling S/R is pathetic for a strike bowler. He averages just a shade under 30 with a SR of about 63.

Imran bowled on flat tracks but he did extensive ball tampering by his own admission. He had decent support bowlers like Sarfraz, Akram and Younis. Botham bowled on friendly English wickets and his peak was short and he was a total flop against WI, the bench mark era of his times. Hadlee was a lone warrior but operated mostly on friendly wickets. Kapil dev was a lone wolf and mostly operated on flatbeds/dustbowls and did not have decent support bowlers either. And he raised his game against WI, the benchmark team. Paaji was also excellent in Australia. Kapil had the most difficult conditions among all the four bowlers - playing on tracks unconducive to pace bowling, having poor support bowlers, overworked etc. Who is the weakest bowler of the 4 great ARs? Don't conditions have any say? Do you blindly look at stats and claim that Agarkar was better than Akram?:haha::haha:

[Marut]

Isolating 1 set of returns but ignoring the bigger picture. :giggle: Murali is about 10 times greater than Kapil as a cricketer in tests or ODIs. Kapil is rated this highly here alone. Rarely does an expert pick him for anything. You are trying to present x or y picture to promote this gentle medium pace bowler who has a test strike rate which is a joke for a strike bowler. As an ODI cricketer he may have been a decent containing bowler but not much more. Oh sorry he scored 1 ton v Zimbabwe a decade or so before they got test status. Must be the best all rounder then. :hysterical:

Murali was a blatant chucker above all his achievements. Another bowler in the mould of Ajmal.

[Bublu Bhuyan]

An all rounder is known by his exploits in Test cricket. Hadlee was the best bowler closely followed by Imran. Botham and Kapil were pretty much on the same level. I'd say there's a humongous gap between Hadlee/Imran and Botham/Kapil as bowlers. In batting, Botham and Kapil were impact players capable of dominating attacks and play impact innings. Imran was more of an innings builder who valued his wicket a lot, and improved his average by his tuk-tuk. Definitely not some one whom the opposition feared as a batsman. And Hadlee was outright below average as a batsman. That's about Test cricket. As for pyjama cricket, who cares!! When guys like Chris Gayle and Brett Lee can made this BBC list, it speaks more so about the format.

[Marut]

he is on par with mcgrath/pollock as an odi bowler. stats are pretty clear in this.

Kapil was below Garner, Roberts, Holding, McGrath, Donald, Bond, Ambrose, Hadlee,and Akram as an ODI bowler. He was on par with ODI bowlers like Pollock and Imran. In tests, he was below Marshall, Garner, Ambrose, McGrath, Donald, Hadlee, Styen, Waqar, Akram, Imran, Asif, Lillee, Bishop, Holding, Walsh, Roberts, Pollock and Akhtar

[Bublu Bhuyan]

Kapil was below Garner, Roberts, Holding, McGrath, Donald, Bond, Ambrose, Hadlee,and Akram as an ODI bowler. He was on par with ODI bowlers like Pollock and Imran. In tests, he was below Marshall, Garner, Ambrose, McGrath, Donald, Hadlee, Styen, Waqar, Akram, Imran, Asif, Lillee, Bishop, Holding, Walsh, Roberts, Pollock and Akhtar

Please! It's an insult to the rest of those gentlemen to name those two disgraceful "village idiots" alongside them.

[rkt.india]

Please! It's an insult to the rest of those gentlemen to name those two disgraceful "village idiots" alongside them.

How does it matter? What matters is their bowling. Even Akram should be under clouds if consider their off field or unethical activities. Akram was also involved in a drug incident once.

[Marut]

Please! It's an insult to the rest of those gentlemen to name those two disgraceful "village idiots" alongside them.

This is about cricketing achievements. Don't see the need to bring in any other factors into this. Both were incredibly good bowlers, who never achieved their potential.

[Marut]

No, I dont. See my X1 - JS was not picked. These AR are better than Dev by the fair measure of bat ave - bowling ave: Sobers Imran Miller Botham Hadlee Kallis Cairns Pollock Proctor Grieg Want me to continue? Yet you place him so highly. He was moderate. His bowling was average at best and his batting was not much better. If you play 100000 games you may get a few wkts - that doesn't make him the best. Yet you folks are so blind you flood cricinfo and all vote for him in a world X1 - showing how little Indians generally know about cricket.

Bat avg - bowl avg is a stupid measure without context. Even Tendulkar has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Ganguly has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Yuvraj has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Gayle has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Prabhakar has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Prabhakar has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Even Border has better batting - bowling averages than Kapil. Is he a better all rounder?:haha: Should I continue? I better stop.

[Marut]

Having any specialist batsman in your team who has an average of 20 is ridiculous. I don't care if he always gets those 20 runs in 5 balls. What will you do if your batting collapsed and he had to come before the 40th over (which happens pretty often). I like Kapil, but saying he is a better ODI bowler than McGrath or a better pick in some All Star XI than any Australian is ridiculous.

You are mistaken here. We are talking of the 80s era, not the modern era. Batting average of Indian batsmen during the 80s with strike rates Srikkanth 29 @ 72 Vengasarkar 36 @ 68 Kapil 27 @ 102 Gavaskar 35 @ 64 Shastri 29 @ 66 Azhar 31 @ 68 Amarnath 32 @ 58 Sidhu 41 @ 72 S.Patil 25 @ 82 Who do you think is the most impactful Indian batsman here? Kapil averages nearly the same as top order bats at a much higher strike rate. Only Sidhu is better as a batsman in the 80s, every other batsman (including specialist batsmen) is inferior to Kapil in overall value. It was not without good reason that Kapil topped the all rounder charts by a big margin for the entire decade. Batting average of 30 was a decent one even for an opener in the 80s. Kapil's game dropped dramatically in the 90s and affected his overall stats. He kept playing without retiring in the 90s. But his overall stats do not tell us how good he was in the 80s at his peak.

[Raghav_12]

Isolating 1 set of returns but ignoring the bigger picture. :giggle: Murali is about 10 times greater than Kapil as a cricketer in tests or ODIs.

the only game where Murali is ten times better than Kapil is known as Javelin Throw, not cricket.

[Muloghonto]

An all rounder is known by his exploits in Test cricket. Hadlee was the best bowler closely followed by Imran. Botham and Kapil were pretty much on the same level. I'd say there's a humongous gap between Hadlee/Imran and Botham/Kapil as bowlers. In batting, Botham and Kapil were impact players capable of dominating attacks and play impact innings. Imran was more of an innings builder who valued his wicket a lot, and improved his average by his tuk-tuk. Definitely not some one whom the opposition feared as a batsman. And Hadlee was outright below average as a batsman. That's about Test cricket. As for pyjama cricket, who cares!! When guys like Chris Gayle and Brett Lee can made this BBC list, it speaks more so about the format.

In general I agree but odi cricket deserves its own benchmark. Odi cricket is no place for an awesome test batsman like Alistair cook or Mark Taylor because they had what it takes to succeed in tests: wait for the bad ball and block everything else. But in odis where one has to be a stroke maker, they fail. Same with Dale Steyn for the first 8 years of his career:out and out attack bowler who struggled with line and length.