Healy's abilities behind the stumps to be able to keep to Warne and take those catches and make those stumpings is reason enough to give him best keeper.

Back on the All-Time discussion

I think batting of the keeper definitely has to considered when looking at who to put in the team. You can make the argument that sure, you don't need the runs because the top 6 will declare at 4/1000 every game, but then you make the argument you don't need the legside stumpings off Warnie either because your three prong pace attack will just skittle the top order for 60 anyway.

The gap between Gilchrist and the finest keepers of previous era isn't nearly as big as the gap between his batting and theirs, relatively speaking.

+1 Gilchrist started off pretty scratchy but was a pretty good keeper by the end. Also in terms of recent keepers I can't think of that many better than him in recent times - they all seem to be rubbish these days.

I think it's pretty likely that the best keeper in the world is probably playing grade or state cricket tbh

Yeah Healy was a great keeper, just not as good Berry. Just found this on Berry's wiki page, pretty good endorsement imo:

"Warne, his Victorian teammate, said that "Darren Berry up to the stumps has probably been the best keeper that I've ever seen in my time ... I really wish he did get the opportunity to show how good a keeper he was, with a baggy green cap playing for Australia."

It's a shame that we didn't get to know how good he would have been on the international stage then.

Australia A v England XI Scorecard

LOL

STRALIA

So Sachin is finally returning after this series?

2nd day of England's tour match has been delayed due to rain.

Can't you guys get anything right?

Would be an epic troll.

Hey guise, thanks for the 100,000 rose petals showered from a helicopter and moving tours around and ****ting on other boards just so i can play my 200th test at home, but i'm feeling good to go for another decade.

I assume you meant retiring....



Dude was absolutely one of the all time great batsmen, but now he's just not good enough any more and should probably have gone a couple of years ago. Since the start of the 2011 England-India series he's averaging just 31 in 22 Tests, and he hasn't managed a single ton. Such a poor return would have done for anyone else's career ages ago, and I don't really understand why it hasn't done for him. Gambhir, Sehwag and Laxman all had similar stats in the same period, and all have now had the chop, though VVS at least managed to jump before he was pushed.


Why not pick a team that has a better chance of winning, instead of picking some old bloke for sentimental reasons? Nobody is bigger than the team. Fact is, that there are now better young batsmen who are being denied a place in the team, and continuing to indulge him like this is pretty absurd. Doesn't matter how good he was in the past, because the past has gone and it isn't coming back.



I do regret never having seen him make a ton though, apart from on the TV. The closest I got was his 91 at the Oval two years ago, when Bresnan trapped him in front to precipitate a collapse of something like 7 for 20 as they subsided to an innings defeat in the 4th Test, so I suppose in that regard I'm glad he hung on that far.



Anyway, I will probably pmsl if he gets injured before the 2nd Test and has to retire on 199 Tests anyway

I remember that innings at the Oval, that would have been his 100th international ton, and I would have seen it live

damn bresnan.

good player but Lara was better imo

Yeah, would have been happy to settle for a 10 wicket win, rather than the innings win, just to have seen him get 9 more runs.

This is always going to be a difficult argument, and hard to justify either side of it. They were both great, but they went about it in slightly different ways.

To see Lara was to be entertained; he was an artist. Felt like Tendulkar was more of a machine, thinking through how to beat the bowler with ruthless efficiency.

If I had to choose, I'll say that I preferred watching Lara, but they were the two best batsmen of their generation, and leave it at that.

One edge I would definitely give Lara is that he called it quits before he began to embarrass himself, whereas Tendulkar is almost becoming a walking wicket these days. He's mostly getting bowled or LBW, so basically missing straight ones, which is no way for a batsman to be out.

Yeah they're far and away the best two batsman of the modern era. It pisses me off to no end that Kallis and to a lesser extent Ponting get compared to them.

I give Lara the edge since he was every bit as good a technician as Tendulkar but he was also a more dominating player. Watching him dominate a bowling attack was as good cricket could get imo. I expect to be in the minority on the Lara v Tendulkar debate though.

Even though most of my countrymen vehemently disagree, I always preferred watching Lara bat too. He had an elegance about him with that high backlift that no one else could match. On his day he was alot more destructive than Tendulkar as well.

The one thing I noticed following both careers was that even though both had very similar stats Lara's career had alot more peaks and valleys, he'd have some really ordinary series where he'd fail to get past 50 in 3 tests mixed with some extraordinary ones (600 runs in 3 tests in SL), while Sachin would consistently score a hundred and a couple of 50's every tour and wouldn't really have those big dips in form or those insane highs. This ofcourse doesn't include Sachin's last two years where he averages less than some tailenders, wish he'd gone the Dravid route but oh well.

Wasn't there a period of 50 matches or so where Ponting averaged way more than anyone else over that many matches? If you judge by how good someone was over a year then Ponting is way up there. He tailed off a lot at the end but at his peak he was as good imo, though I'd go for:

a prime Lara over anyone else I've seen for one game
Tendulkar over a whole career
Ponting or Lara over a year (ie you factor in consistency when at their peak).

Wasn't Lara considered to be a better player of spin? If so, there could be some merit in placing his name ahead of Tendulkar.

I also have to say that Tendulkar was probably a bit more consistent than Lara with the bat. When Lara failed he failed miserably but when he was on, he could really rack them up.

Nah technically he wasn't as good as Tendulkar.

I mean Tendulkar has been compared to the great Sir Don in terms of technique.

McGrath had Lara's measure at times bowling short of a length outside off-stump where he would nick it through to keeper or slips.

In terms of flare and pretty to watch, Lara gets my vote - that half back foot cover drive is a shot that I'll never forget.

Have you seen our bowlers?

**** me Cutting is a better bat than bowler these days and Copeland shouldn't even be playing for NSW he is that slow. Henriques and Holland look like they are carrying injuries with the former also a better bat than bowler. And then the rest of the bowling is made up by Maxwell who is bowling pies.

If the Australian selectors wanted to give the England batsmen an incredibly easy go in this lead-up game where they would hardly work up a sweat, they have succeeded.

Well Hobart weather is notoriously the closest to English weather

Also my prediction as someone who lives in the city where the first test is being played at is that we are at least going to get one day/afternoon's worth of rain.

Just hope it isn't the first day as that is the day I'm going to

Well, he was left handed; everyone knows they're the spawn of Satan and should be strangled at birth......

I'm in some stupid city where it is practically too cold to go outside, yet there's the Ashes (re)starting. Ergo, we should do a draft.

I'm too lazy to remember what everyone suggested in January, but I propose that we have 11 rounds and be picking a test side (I guess, if fussy for details, to play home and away against the other sides).

The great minds of SE (+dkgo) suggest either excluding a distorting #1 pick or going ABCBC.. where C is as A but with the team drafting first going last.

Can people remind us what their views were re: restricted to players active after xxx-time discussion again. Iirc the main suggestions were post-WW2 - though post 1948 would avoid the Bradman problem - and post 1970. If we can have some consensus - of at least people not objecting strongly to something I(we) can make a thread, imo.

I like post 1948 because there are a few players who missed 1970 who would almost certainly be drafted. The other option is to just ban Bradmans since I think last time quite a few people wanted the option of being able to draft players from any period.

Yeah - I think (but don't really recall) I was an any period person, but post-48 seems to make more sense to me atm. But I'll be up for whatever seems likely to give the best draft.