All-Time Test XIs

[sifter132]

There is no World XI if you don't have two spinners IMO... and they have to be opposite types too. Murali and Warne both walk in for me.

Tell that to the 2 greatest teams ever: 80s Windies and late 90s/early 00s Aussies. Zero spinners, and one spinner. I think it's nice to have 2 spinners for variety's sake, but there are way more good fast bowlers in history than spinners. I can think of only 5/6 excellent spinners (Warne, Murali, O'Reilly, Grimmett, Laker and Underwood) and after that you are digging for guys like Kumble, Bedi and Benaud, good bowlers certainly, but hardly close to all-time XI material. So in 100+ years of Test cricket I can only find a handful of great spinners, yet we need 2 in an all-time XI??

I guess it's the same with left arm quicks, nice to have, but hardly essential and I personally prefer picking the best 3/4 quicks available rather than trying to force a leftie in there. It's also interesting that this trend of picking 'variety' in bowling attacks doesn't extend to picking batsmen. No one has picked a team with 3 or more left handers in the top 7 yet. So in that spirit here's my diversity XI - for the day 4 lefties in the top 8, and 3 in the top 6.

1 Hobbs
2 Hutton
3 Bradman
4 Lara
5 Sobers
6 Sangakkara (wk)
7 Imran
8 Alan Davidson - yes, over Wasim Akram...
9 Warne
10 Muralitharan
11 McGrath
Missing for variety's sake: Richard Hadlee (out for Davidson's left arm), Malcolm Marshall (out for a 2nd spinner), Ponting/Tendulkar (out for a left hander)

That's the only reason I skipped Sobers, a player who many argue is the greatest the game has seen, for the fast bowling allrounder in Imran. Then I can have a stellar 5 man attack - and a top order that is good enough - to not require Sobers.

But of course Sobers was a pretty damn good batsman in his own right. Much better than his bowling which was honest, rather than brilliant. In fact I think I'd pick Sobers over Viv Richards straight up if neither could bowl. So when I went over to cricinfo I was annoyed that you couldn't pick 2 ARs + 4 bowlers, or 3 ARs + 3 bowlers because that stopped me picking a 5,6,7 of Sobers, Sangakkara (as keeper) and Imran.

 

[Shoaib87]

My Team

OPENERS
Sir Jack Hobbs
Sir Leonard Hutton

MIDDLE ORDER
Brian Lara
Sir Donald Bradman
Sir Viv Richards

ALLROUNDERS
Imran Khan
Sir Richard Hadlee

WICKETKEEPER
Alan Knott

BOWLERS
Malcolm Marshall
Muttiah Muralitharan
Wasim Akram

In batting order,it would be:

Sir Jack Hobbs
Sir Leonard Hutton
Sir Donald Bradman
Sir Viv Richards
Brian Lara
*Imran Khan
+Alan Knott
Sir Richard Hadlee
Wasim Akram
Malcolm Marshall
Muttiah Muralitharan

As much as I appreciate Tendulkar,Headley,McGrath,G.Chappell,Gavaskar,Hanif Muhammad,couldn't fit them into my side.But I'm also offended at the lack of Andy Flower's option amongst wicket keepers.He was as good a keeper as Gilchrist and arguably a better batsman with better record playing for a minnow!

 

[kirksland]

Just for the record to me this should have been the short list.
Openers
Jack Hobbs, Barry Richards, Len Hutton, Matthew Hayden, Sunil Gavaskar, Virender Sehwag, Gordon Greenidge, Arthur Morris.
Middle Order
Donald Bradman, Viv Richards, Sachin Tendulkar, Wally Hammond, Brian Lara, Greg Chappell, Graeme Pollock, George Headley, Ricky Ponting, Rahul Dravid.
All Rounder
Gary Sobers, Imran Khan, Keith Miller, Jacques Kallis, Richard Hadlee, Aubrey Faulkner.
Wicket-Keeper
Adam Gilchrist, Allan Knott, John Waite, Godfrey Evans.
Fast Bowler
Malcolm Marshall, Dennis Lillee, Fred Trueman, Glenn Mcgrath, Curtly Ambrose, Wasim Akram, Michael Holding, Allan Donald.
Spin Bowler
Shane Warne, Muttiah Muralitharan, Jim Laker, Bill O'Reilly.
I more or less stuck to Benaud's system of choosing 3 finalist for each position.

 

[Cricketman]

I think having variety in my attack would make it a better team. Sure, the Windies dominates without a spinner - but if we somehow managed to invent a time travel machine + some sort of Cloning mechanism just for the purposes of finding an all time cricket xi () I would think a head2head between Windies of the 80s and my 'Variety' World XI, the latter would come out on top. The bowling attack, with 2 spinners and the lefty, would help a lot IMO.

 

[kirksland]

So when I went over to cricinfo I was annoyed that you couldn't pick 2 ARs + 4 bowlers, or 3 ARs + 3 bowlers because that stopped me picking a 5,6,7 of Sobers, Sangakkara (as keeper) and Imran.

Yeah, was going to choose Hutton, Richards, Bradman, Tendulkar, Sobers, Gilchrist, Khan, Marshall, Warne, Muralitharan, Mcgrath, but combination wasnt posible. Would have been only plausible way to select two spinners.

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

good system kirksland but I have some points.

Just for the record to me this should have been the short list.
Openers
Jack Hobbs, Barry Richards, Len Hutton, Matthew Hayden, Sunil Gavaskar, Virender Sehwag, Gordon Greenidge.

hayden is not in the class of the other guys, he's not even the best australian opener.

Middle Order
Donald Bradman, Viv Richards, Sachin Tendulkar, Wally Hammond, Brian Lara, Greg Chappell, Graeme Pollock, George Headley, Ricky Ponting, Rahul Dravid.

Dravid? again, out of his depth in that company. Arguably ponting is too.

All Rounder
Gary Sobers, Imran Khan, Keith Miller, Jacques Kallis, Richard Hadlee.

hadlee is not an all-rounder imo, very useful bat but not that great. also no Aubrey Faulkner?

Wicket-Keeper
Adam Gilchrist, Allan Knott, Denis Lindsay

alan knott getting selected for the all-time england team has blown his repuatation out of proportion. although england maybe do have the best wicket keeper of all time in geodfrey evans. but because he wasn't much of a bat he's been lost. Hendricks and Dujon, I'd consider Healey as well.

Fast Bowler
Malcolm Marshall, Dennis Lillee, Fred Trueman, Glenn Mcgrath, Curtly Ambrose, Wasim Akram, Michael Holding, Allan Donald.

trueman out, hadlee and roberts in and imran given secondary consideration.

Spin Bowler
Shane Warne, Muttiah Muralitharan, Jim Laker, Bill O'Reilly.
I more or less stuck to Benaud's system of choosing 3 finalist for each position.

not Laker, lets be honest, you only need murali and warne in here. picking anyone over those two would be insane.

 

[kirksland]

I agree about Faulkner, he was next in line, Evans along with Waite/Cameron were considered, but decided to stick with the best combo batsman/keeper. With Hayden, I must disagree, he was the foundation of that great Aussie team, and made life easier for Punter, Gilly and co., while Morris feeded off Bradman ect. Statistically Roberts just doesn't cut it, and to me a tad over rated. Dravid is seen by plenty as a better and more important bat than Tendulkar, and for years the Wall stood between India and defeat. Laker, well just wanted best two of each variation. But Faulkner definately should have been there, just ran out of space, as I wanted to fit in 8 fast bowlers plus Hadlee, and sorry don't see why Trueman should be dropped, explain please.

 

[Cricketman]

And where's Kapil Dev in your allrounders list?! I demand that the only decent AR we have produced gets at least SOME consideration

 

[Shoaib87]

good system kirksland but I have some points.


hayden is not in the class of the other guys, he's not even the best australian opener.


Dravid? again, out of his depth in that company. Arguably ponting is too.

hadlee is not an all-rounder imo, very useful bat but not that great. also no Aubrey Faulkner?
alan knott getting selected for the all-time england team has blown his repuatation out of proportion. although england maybe do have the best wicket keeper of all time in geodfrey evans. but because he wasn't much of a bat he's been lost. Hendricks and Dujon, I'd consider Healey as well.

trueman out, hadlee and roberts in and imran given secondary consideration.

not Laker, lets be honest, you only need murali and warne in here. picking anyone over those two would be insane.

If Hadlee is not an allrounder then Sobers should also not be consdered an allrounder.He took just 31 wickets @ 50 in his 30 tests with such a high S/R that you can't even think of!Was absolutely crap for one third of his career,mediocre for another one third and just useful for rest of the one-third as well.And yes,Faulkner should've been there amongst allrounders & Flower amngst wicket keepers.

Shoaib87 added 4 Minutes and 44 Seconds later...

And where's Kapil Dev in your allrounders list?! I demand that the only decent AR we have produced gets at least SOME consideration

I really feel for great Kapil Dev.Only if he had not played 50 more tests than he should've just to break the world record,he would've ended with a bowling average of 27 and batting average of 33 or 34,hence woud've been considered over allrounders like Botham.A great player but not great enough to make all-time xi.

 

[kirksland]

Made some adjustments to short list, and added a few names to make it a nice round number of players (40)

Is it possible to use this or a comparable list to start a poll in a new thread.

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

With Hayden, I must disagree, he was the foundation of that great Aussie team, and made life easier for Punter, Gilly and co., while Morris feeded off Bradman ect.

this is odd reasoning. You suggest hayden made the more succesful batsman in the team better for his inclusion and yet say morris was only succesful because there was a more succesful batsman playing along side him. Why can't you say morris set it up for bradman and hayden fed off punter?

Hayden isn't even as good as sehwag, you don't need stats you just need to watch them. (and stats wise, there isn't a stat he can touch sehwag on)

 

[kirksland]

When Punter came in there was less pressure because they were runs on the board and after Haydos's assault, the bowlers were already broken, plus knowing the batting strenght behind him, Pontings job was half done.
Dont get me wrong, Ponting is a great batsman, but Hayden, along with Gilchrist made that team unbeatable and more importantly feared.

 

[CG123]

I think only sifter's really mentioned this, but what about playing five specialist batsmen, one wicket-keeper, Hadlee at seven (slightly bias), then two spinners (Warne and Murali), plus two specialist quick's.

The best keeper of all time really should be as good as a specialist batsman, so it doesn't make sense having him down at seven. He should be able to hold his place in any side as a batsman, so therefore bat him at six.

I know very little about players before the last few decades, so I'm not going to bother naming a proper XI (on cricinfo and here), as it would mainly be on stats, but what about something like this:

1. Opener 1
2. Opener 2
3. Sir Donald Bradman
4. Middle Order 1
5. Middle Order 2
6. Wicket-Keeper (Most people are saying Knott, I don't know anything about him though, maybe Sangakkara)
7. Sir Richard Hadlee (As I said above, slightly bias, I need a NZer in there)
8. Warne
9. Murali
10. Fast Bowler 1
11. Fast Bowler 2 (or another AR above Hadlee)

 

[Cricketman]

That is basically my team except Imran rather than Hadlee.

I'd play him at 6 though. Averaged 50+. Plus the whirlwind Gilly right after him...
A batting order of Gobbs, Gavaskar, Bradman, Tendulkar, Richards, backed by the hard hitting Imran and Gilchrist absolutely menacing. With the ball, you've got Imran again, then Wasim, Marshall, Murali and Warne. Holy crap.

I think it's perfect IMO.

Here's a better shot at a second XI, no guys previously mentioned.

1. Len Hutton
2. Virender Sehwag <- He he he
3. Ricky Ponting
4. Graeme Pollock
5. Brian Lara
6. Garry Sobers
7. Allan Knott
8. Anil Kumble/Derek Underwood, depending on what you want in a spinner
9. Dennis Lillee
10. Curtly Ambrose/Michael Holding
11. Glenn McGrath

I think it's pretty decent. Thoughts?

PS, I don't know much about Wally Hammond but a lot of people are including him in their XI (over guys like Tendulkar). I probably should be shot as a cricket fan, but fill me in!

 

[kirksland]

Wally Hammond exists in the same statosphere as Tendulkar, Richards ect, and Englands at worst 3rd best batsman and best middle order batsman. He was also a useful medium pacer and a superb slip fielder, which always acts as a tie-breaker for me when constructing a team.

If we are using that format then Hutton/Hobbs (just cant definitively decide), B.Richards, Bradman, Tendulkar (wavering on this one too, mabe Richards/Lara/Hammond), Sobers, Khan, Gilchrist, Warne, Marshall, Muralitharan, Mcgrath.

But balance wise, do you really need 5 specialist bowlers, and how many teams really won with two spinners, even Australia with Warne seldomly used Mcgill unless faced with a real spinning pitch. Warne and Mcgrath can both bowl long spells, with Marshall and Imran providing short bursts at full speed. For a 5th bowler, Sobers at his best (which is what we are basing selections on) was more than good enough.

P.S. In light of todays India's victory, I was wondering how many games has Sachin really won for India in the 4th Innings. No disrespect intended but what are his signature innings.