Best Allrounder of all time

[StinkyBoHoon]

not really, no. I actually find that "they would have been awesome if all their teammates hadn't been more awesome." arguement pretty rubbish.

In all my years watching cricket I've never seen anyone suffer for playing with superior players.

 

[puddleduck]

Not really the point I just made was it

Had Sobers needed to be a bowler and hadn't been as amazing a batsman, I'm sure he would have been. Had Kallis needed to be the 2nd seamer throughout his career and had been a batsman that could only average mid 30's, would he be a better all-rounder? Had either been 3rd choice quicks and been able to bowl at tail-enders rather than always getting to bowl when batsman were normally set would their bowling averages both be high 20's with another 50 wickets? Who knows, all we know, with a degree of statistical certainty, is that they are the two most awesome all rounders to ever play the game.

----------

To answer your non question though, would Warne have less or more wickets than Murali had he not had a consistently awesome bowling attack supporting him?

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

well you kinda suggested kallis would have better bowling stats if he hadn't played with such good bowlers. I don't think that he would have been, the bowling at set batsman thing works both ways anyway. if someone is piling on the runs, say sehwag in chennai, or flemming at cape town type innings. kallis bowls about half the number of overs as his team mates in the effort to dismiss them. so for every opportunity he misses to take some easy wickets he dodges getting carted about when someone is well set.

batting all-rounders have the luxury of not bowling when they're not finding their rythm, when the conditions aren't suitable to their style or when another player is on top as they're not the go to options. bowling all-rounders don't have this luxury, imran khan couldn't just decide not to go out to bat because it was a bouncey pitch and he's not very good at dealing with bounce.

anyway, has anyone actually looked at kallis' bowling? 2 of 5 5-fers come against bangladesh, if we do the old murali thing of taking out zimmer and bangladesh his average goes up to over 35. he averages 37 against australia, 42 against india, 38 against pakistan and over 35 against england. it's decent but the only teams he's under 35 mark are NZ and the WI. it's hardly a magnificent record.

 

[puddleduck]

How many of his wickets are batsman from 7-11 though?

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

I have no idea, I dunno if that's even possible to work out unless you go through every stat. not sure it matters that much though, in the series in india just now some of australia's best partnerships have been for the lower wickets.

and having watched england over the last few years and seen broad scythe through the tail while anderson struggles without a shiney new ball I'm not sure I'd always just say the lower order wickets were gimmes and that anderson is entitled to feel aggrieved about his 30 average because broad is a better lower order wicket taker. unless I saw something to contradict it I'd imagine it was roughly the same as most bowlers

 

[puddleduck]

Certainly applies to Sobers' era though. Tail enders were gimmes, and he never got to bowl at them.

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

I wouldn't dispute sobers place at the top, he actually bowled as a bowler, but I think you have to look beyond the flattering bowling averages, his 34 was harder earned than kallis' 32.

 

[puddleduck]

I still hold Sobers as the number 1 of all time. Good enough as a seamer to have been picked. Good enough as a spinner to bowl long spells, and one of the finest batsman of his generation. Add to that he was a superb fielder, and he's the comfortable winner, but since him, only Kallis has ever got close to his numbers.

----------

Everything I ever read always said he never got to bowl to tailenders either, so pretty much all his wickets are top order batsman.

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

for me sobers is in the top 5 batsmen ever, probably 2nd or 3rd, let alone all-rounders. kallis isn't even the 2nd or 3rd of his generation (though lets not split hairs, still pretty blooming outstanding)

but his bowling numbers aren't close, they just look close, he's played twice the matches and still hasn't bowled as much as sobers. imran is the 2nd best all-rounder for me, like sobers probably in the top 5 ever in his chosen discipline and personally I'd put his 6 tons and 18 50s (over a much shorter career) as a bigger contributions than kallis' 288 wickets coming at under a wicket an innings. I've mentioned this before but people really should take more note of how many wickets a bowler takes per innings/match.

----------

I suppose all of this is "just my opinion"

but it is also right.

 

[puddleduck]

Surely wickets/innings is massively effected by strength of the others bowlers in the attack?

Fact is, it's all fairly subjective, and there's never an actual right answer to any of it

----------

(except that Sobers is the greatest all rounder to ever play the game of course)

----------

Ha. Funny we both basically posted the same addendum at the same time with exactly the same slant

 

[StinkyBoHoon]

Surely wickets/innings is massively effected by strength of the others bowlers in the attack?

I don't really think so, it's difficult to find definitive pairings but out ones I could think of the mcgrath/warne, vaas/murali, akram/waqar (I'm not getting into cross-referencing more than two players while doing the windies of the 80s), all 6 of them, perhaps contrary to what should be possible, took more wickets per innings at a better average with their partner than they did without them. it doesn't make sense in some ways but I guess with your best players on your winning more matches and taking 20 wickets more often so there are more chances. I dunno, I wouldn't be prepared to put my mortgage on that one but it's definitely one reason I've never really bought the arguement about warne being robbed wickets while murali got loads of freebies.

(oh wait, lillee and thompson didn't they were both better without each other)

 

[puddleduck]

He did get loads of freebies though, he took like 100 wickets against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe

 

[Adarsh]

Has to be Sir Ravindra Jadeja.