International cricket is littered with players who were only fortunate enough to represent their country on one occasion. As it currently stands, there are 386 One Test wonders, 173 One ODI wonders and 65 women have played just the solitary One Day International match. Of course, some may yet continue their international careers, but here we present a tribute to those cricketers who achieved the highest Reliance Mobile ICC Player Ranking after their fleeting moment in the sun.
Starting in the Test arena, there is a surprising name at the top of the list. Drafted into England’s team for the final Ashes match this summer, Jonathan Trott distinguished himself with 41 in the first innings before becoming the eighteenth Englishman to make a century on his Test debut second time around. That double enabled him to reach 445 points and 52nd place overall. Of course, when he plays his next Test – in all likelihood on England’s upcoming tour of South Africa – the record will revert to New Zealander Rodney Redmond, who reached 434 points after scoring 107 and 56 against Pakistan at Auckland in February 1973. He couldn’t adapt to wearing contact lenses and never represented his country again.
With the ball, it is far more clear cut. Charles “Father” Marriott was picked to play the final Test for England against the West Indies at The Oval in the summer of 1933. Things didn’t look so good when he was dismissed for a duck by Manny Martindale, but he roared back to take 5-37 and 6-59 with his leg-breaks as England triumphed by an innings and 17 runs. Marriott turned 38 before England toured India the following winter, but he wasn’t selected for any of the Tests and never played again. In a distant second place is Aubrey Smith – the only England captain to star in a Hollywood film with Elizabeth Taylor – who reached 262 points after taking seven wickets in England’s first-ever Test in South Africa in 1889.
The late 1980s and early 1990s was a time when the England selectors were notoriously fickle with their selections, so it is perhaps unsurprising that two more Englishmen top the respective lists in the shorter format of the game. Kim Barnett only played one ODI which was against Sri Lanka at The Oval in September 1988. His innings of 84 from 146 deliveries enabled England to chase down their target of 243 with fourteen balls to spare. He was rewarded with the man-of-the-match award and a Reliance Mobile ICC Player Ranking of 243, one point clear of Ashok Mankad who made 44 for India against England at The Oval in 1974.
For David “Syd” Lawrence, his career was very much a case of what might have been. Often considered too wild to be viable in limited overs cricket, he was playing just his fifth Test when his knee gave way against New Zealand at Wellington in early 1992 at the age of just twenty-eight. His solitary ODI came the previous summer against the West Indies at Lord’s when he took 4-67 in eleven overs in a West Indies total of 264-9. Graeme Hick and Neil Fairbrother added a memorable 213 as England cantered home by seven wickets. Lawrence achieved 211 points for his effort, clear of Lonwabo Tsotsobe’s 188 for his 4-50 against Australia at Perth this January.
Looking at the women’s game, the same player heads both batting and bowling charts. Patricia Whittaker made her only One Day International appearance for the West Indies against England at Worksop in July 1979. Her 3-36 in ten overs helped restrict the home side to 167-6 and she followed up with an unbeaten 40 to help her side to a narrow two-wicket victory with just two deliveries to spare. After that sole appearance her batting rating stood at 216 and her bowling rating 128. However, that was the Caribbean team’s last taste of international action until the Women’s World Cup 1993 and so thirty years on from her moment in the sun, Whittaker is still top of both tables.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Associating with the Best
It is a tough life being an Associate cricketer. Twenty-five representative teams have played official One Day Internationals, and it is often in just the major tournaments that the smaller nations have the opportunity to pitch themselves against the big boys. In that respect, it is especially hard for those players to make an impact on the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings as the matches they play are so few and far between. However, by virtue of their performances on the highest stage of all, some have managed to make their presence felt in the higher reaches of the tables.
Perhaps the greatest sustained performance by any Associate Member was Kenya’s staggering effort in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003. Buoyed by victories over Canada, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, it reached the semi-finals before it was out-gunned by a Sourav Ganguly-inspired India at Durban. It was in that tournament that opening bowler Martin Suji achieved the highest-ever Rating by an Associate Member player. He ripped out the Zimbabwean top order at Bloemfontein on his way to figures of 3-19 in eight overs to set up a convincing seven-wicket triumph. By doing so, he lifted his bowling rating to 646 – good enough for twelfth place overall in a list headed by Shaun Pollock.
Suji’s team-mate Peter Ongondo is the only other Associate player to have reached the lofty heights of 600 points with either bat or ball. In October 2007, he sneaked up to 610 after taking 3-16 and 1-10 in consecutive victories against Bermuda in Nairobi. He is still hovering around the 500-point mark with young left-arm spinner Hiren Varaiya close behind him who could possibly be the man to challenge Suji’s long-standing record. Another one to watch is Kyle McCallan of Ireland who is also currently in the top fifty with the ball.
Moving to the batsmen, one player currently stands head and shoulders above the rest and that is the Netherland’s Ryan ten Doeschate. He reached 1,000 runs in One Day International cricket in just 23 innings – a feat only surpassed by Viv Richards and Kevin Pietersen – both of whom took twenty-one. He currently stands 32nd with the bat with 593 points – the second-highest by an Associate player in the history of the game only behind Zimbabwean David Houghton.
Long before Zimbabwe were elevated to Full Member status, its batsman/wicket-keeper achieved the giddy heights of 597 points and 29th position overall after making a half-century against New Zealand at Kolkata in the Cricket World Cup 1987. Third on that particular list comes Canadian tyro Rizwan Cheema, whose big-hitting to the tune of twenty-one sixes in just eleven ODIs saw him rise to 551 points and 39th overall in August this year. In fourth is Steve Tikolo – long regarded as possibly the finest batsman outside the Test arena. The mainstay of the Kenyan batting for more than a decade, he has been incredibly consistent over that period, peaking back in 1999 at 535 after an innings of 67 against South Africa at Nairobi.
One final word on ten Doeschate. Not content with achieving the highest-ever batting Rating by a Dutch player, his bowling Rating of 473 after he bowled his side to a narrow eight-run victory over Afghanistan at Amsterdam this August is also the current national record. This unique double is without parallel for any of the other countries to play ODI cricket.
So we should celebrate these fine cricketers who – despite limited exposure to big-time cricket – have put together some great performances and thrilled crowds around the world.
Perhaps the greatest sustained performance by any Associate Member was Kenya’s staggering effort in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003. Buoyed by victories over Canada, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, it reached the semi-finals before it was out-gunned by a Sourav Ganguly-inspired India at Durban. It was in that tournament that opening bowler Martin Suji achieved the highest-ever Rating by an Associate Member player. He ripped out the Zimbabwean top order at Bloemfontein on his way to figures of 3-19 in eight overs to set up a convincing seven-wicket triumph. By doing so, he lifted his bowling rating to 646 – good enough for twelfth place overall in a list headed by Shaun Pollock.
Suji’s team-mate Peter Ongondo is the only other Associate player to have reached the lofty heights of 600 points with either bat or ball. In October 2007, he sneaked up to 610 after taking 3-16 and 1-10 in consecutive victories against Bermuda in Nairobi. He is still hovering around the 500-point mark with young left-arm spinner Hiren Varaiya close behind him who could possibly be the man to challenge Suji’s long-standing record. Another one to watch is Kyle McCallan of Ireland who is also currently in the top fifty with the ball.
Moving to the batsmen, one player currently stands head and shoulders above the rest and that is the Netherland’s Ryan ten Doeschate. He reached 1,000 runs in One Day International cricket in just 23 innings – a feat only surpassed by Viv Richards and Kevin Pietersen – both of whom took twenty-one. He currently stands 32nd with the bat with 593 points – the second-highest by an Associate player in the history of the game only behind Zimbabwean David Houghton.
Long before Zimbabwe were elevated to Full Member status, its batsman/wicket-keeper achieved the giddy heights of 597 points and 29th position overall after making a half-century against New Zealand at Kolkata in the Cricket World Cup 1987. Third on that particular list comes Canadian tyro Rizwan Cheema, whose big-hitting to the tune of twenty-one sixes in just eleven ODIs saw him rise to 551 points and 39th overall in August this year. In fourth is Steve Tikolo – long regarded as possibly the finest batsman outside the Test arena. The mainstay of the Kenyan batting for more than a decade, he has been incredibly consistent over that period, peaking back in 1999 at 535 after an innings of 67 against South Africa at Nairobi.
One final word on ten Doeschate. Not content with achieving the highest-ever batting Rating by a Dutch player, his bowling Rating of 473 after he bowled his side to a narrow eight-run victory over Afghanistan at Amsterdam this August is also the current national record. This unique double is without parallel for any of the other countries to play ODI cricket.
So we should celebrate these fine cricketers who – despite limited exposure to big-time cricket – have put together some great performances and thrilled crowds around the world.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Number Ones to Watch
The ultimate achievement for any international cricketer is to be ranked number one in the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings. Not many have managed it but the upcoming Champions Trophy in South Africa will give viewers the opportunity to watch some of the all-time greats of the game who have dominated over the past decade or more. So here we present the ‘number ones to watch’ – in other words – the players who will be featuring in South Africa who at some stage have topped the ODI batting, bowling or all-rounders table, ranked by the length of time they spent at the number one spot in terms of days:
Batsmen
Ricky Ponting (547 days). He first hit the top spot after his unbeaten 57 against the West Indies at Kingston in May 2003 and fell from the number one place for the last time in March 2008 after three consecutive scores of one in the space of five days against Sri Lanka and India.
MS Dhoni (379 days). He had a one-match stay on top sandwiching Ponting and Adam Gilchrist from 19-22 April 2006 after scoring 59 against Pakistan in Abu Dhabi, but returned to the number one spot in August 2008 with a vengeance and has hardly been bettered since.
Sachin Tendulkar (338 days). He became the youngest player to top the ODI Batting Ratings as a 22-year-old in February 1996, and after a four-year gap managed to return to the top of the tree for five days in March 2008 after scoring 91 against Australia at the Gabba.
Michael Hussey (177 days). Mr Cricket first reached number one in September 2006 when his batting average stood at 81.75! But after a six-month stay on top his form started to dip and he fell behind team-mate Ponting and England’s Kevin Pietersen.
Graeme Smith (168 days). An unbeaten century against Bangladesh in Chittagong in early March 2008 sent the South African powerhouse to number one, and he held the position unchallenged until Dhoni snatched it away from him in August.
Jacques Kallis (150 days). Ratings-wise the 2004-5 period was Kallis’s golden period as an ODI batsman. He nudged ahead of Adam Gilchrist in February 2004 after scoring 95 not out and 139 in consecutive matches against the West Indies. He enjoyed his last day on top was in July 2005.
Sanath Jayasuriya (142 days). The original pinch-hitter really made his name in the 1996 World Cup but it wasn’t until 2002 that he topped the World Ratings. By April 2003 his time in the sun had come to an end, but he continues to ply his trade very effectively at the age of forty.
Mohammad Yousuf (2 days). Blink and you would have missed it. On 10 and 11 October 2003 the world had a new number one after the Pakistani maestro scored 60 against South Africa at Rawalpindi. However, he was out for a duck in the next match, and that was that.
Bowlers
Muttiah Muralitharan (687 days). No spinner has spent as long as the ODI number one bowler as the Sri Lankan wizard. He reached top spot following his seven for 30 against India at Sharjah in October 2000 and he was eventually overtaken for the last time by long-term team-mate Chaminda Vaas four years later.
Nuwan Kulasekara (199 days). The surprise package on the list, he has led since 3 March this year despite never having managed to break the 750 point barrier. Whether or not this points to a lack of depth in ODI bowling talent nowadays, he still enters the competition on top of the world.
Nathan Bracken (196 days). 2008 was very much Bracken’s year as the Aussie one-day specialist rose to the top of the tree in late June after an excellent series in the Caribbean. Not quite as dominant this year, but a good Champions Trophy could push him back into contention.
Daniel Vettori (189 days). The first Kiwi spinner to top either Test or ODI Bowling Ratings, he achieved this feat on 12 February 2008 during the home series with England. He was top for most of the rest of the first half of the year, before returning for another month on top in early 2009.
Brett Lee (21 days). Lee managed to upset the Glenn McGrath / Shaun Pollock double act in early 2006 albeit very briefly. Five for 22 against South Africa at Melbourne did the trick and four for 30 against the same opposition a fortnight later also helped, but Pollock recovered his form and Lee’s time at the top was done.
All-rounders
Jacques Kallis (1175 days). The world’s leading all-rounder of the decade first reached number one in March 2000 and held onto that position for the vast majority of the next three and a half years, before finally relinquishing it to Andrew Flintoff in November 2003.
Sanath Jayasuriya (336 days). His pinch-hitting exploits coupled with some canny left-arm spin carried him to the number one spot in March 1997 and he stayed there for most of the next year. However, after Shaun Pollock’s retirement in February 2008 he became the oldest man ever to top the ODI all-rounder list at 38.
Shoaib Malik (172 days). It was a Pakistani double-act for the first half of 2008 with the former captain the first to reach the number one position after a sequence of excellent performances against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. He regained it briefly from team-mate Afridi before slipping below Andrew Flintoff and Jacob Oram.
Jacob Oram (103 days). The gentle giant of Kiwi cricket enjoyed a brief week-long stay on top in February 2008 during the home series victory against England. However he returned for a longer stint after some great performances in Bangladesh in October the same year.
Shahid Afridi (18 days). Another fleeting stay for the mercurial Pakistani all-rounder whose career has been littered with innings which could be similarly described. Three for 19 against Bangladesh at Dhaka on 8 June 2008 was enough to take him top, but eighteen days later it was all over, as team-mate Shoaib Malik nudged him down to second.
Batsmen
Ricky Ponting (547 days). He first hit the top spot after his unbeaten 57 against the West Indies at Kingston in May 2003 and fell from the number one place for the last time in March 2008 after three consecutive scores of one in the space of five days against Sri Lanka and India.
MS Dhoni (379 days). He had a one-match stay on top sandwiching Ponting and Adam Gilchrist from 19-22 April 2006 after scoring 59 against Pakistan in Abu Dhabi, but returned to the number one spot in August 2008 with a vengeance and has hardly been bettered since.
Sachin Tendulkar (338 days). He became the youngest player to top the ODI Batting Ratings as a 22-year-old in February 1996, and after a four-year gap managed to return to the top of the tree for five days in March 2008 after scoring 91 against Australia at the Gabba.
Michael Hussey (177 days). Mr Cricket first reached number one in September 2006 when his batting average stood at 81.75! But after a six-month stay on top his form started to dip and he fell behind team-mate Ponting and England’s Kevin Pietersen.
Graeme Smith (168 days). An unbeaten century against Bangladesh in Chittagong in early March 2008 sent the South African powerhouse to number one, and he held the position unchallenged until Dhoni snatched it away from him in August.
Jacques Kallis (150 days). Ratings-wise the 2004-5 period was Kallis’s golden period as an ODI batsman. He nudged ahead of Adam Gilchrist in February 2004 after scoring 95 not out and 139 in consecutive matches against the West Indies. He enjoyed his last day on top was in July 2005.
Sanath Jayasuriya (142 days). The original pinch-hitter really made his name in the 1996 World Cup but it wasn’t until 2002 that he topped the World Ratings. By April 2003 his time in the sun had come to an end, but he continues to ply his trade very effectively at the age of forty.
Mohammad Yousuf (2 days). Blink and you would have missed it. On 10 and 11 October 2003 the world had a new number one after the Pakistani maestro scored 60 against South Africa at Rawalpindi. However, he was out for a duck in the next match, and that was that.
Bowlers
Muttiah Muralitharan (687 days). No spinner has spent as long as the ODI number one bowler as the Sri Lankan wizard. He reached top spot following his seven for 30 against India at Sharjah in October 2000 and he was eventually overtaken for the last time by long-term team-mate Chaminda Vaas four years later.
Nuwan Kulasekara (199 days). The surprise package on the list, he has led since 3 March this year despite never having managed to break the 750 point barrier. Whether or not this points to a lack of depth in ODI bowling talent nowadays, he still enters the competition on top of the world.
Nathan Bracken (196 days). 2008 was very much Bracken’s year as the Aussie one-day specialist rose to the top of the tree in late June after an excellent series in the Caribbean. Not quite as dominant this year, but a good Champions Trophy could push him back into contention.
Daniel Vettori (189 days). The first Kiwi spinner to top either Test or ODI Bowling Ratings, he achieved this feat on 12 February 2008 during the home series with England. He was top for most of the rest of the first half of the year, before returning for another month on top in early 2009.
Brett Lee (21 days). Lee managed to upset the Glenn McGrath / Shaun Pollock double act in early 2006 albeit very briefly. Five for 22 against South Africa at Melbourne did the trick and four for 30 against the same opposition a fortnight later also helped, but Pollock recovered his form and Lee’s time at the top was done.
All-rounders
Jacques Kallis (1175 days). The world’s leading all-rounder of the decade first reached number one in March 2000 and held onto that position for the vast majority of the next three and a half years, before finally relinquishing it to Andrew Flintoff in November 2003.
Sanath Jayasuriya (336 days). His pinch-hitting exploits coupled with some canny left-arm spin carried him to the number one spot in March 1997 and he stayed there for most of the next year. However, after Shaun Pollock’s retirement in February 2008 he became the oldest man ever to top the ODI all-rounder list at 38.
Shoaib Malik (172 days). It was a Pakistani double-act for the first half of 2008 with the former captain the first to reach the number one position after a sequence of excellent performances against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. He regained it briefly from team-mate Afridi before slipping below Andrew Flintoff and Jacob Oram.
Jacob Oram (103 days). The gentle giant of Kiwi cricket enjoyed a brief week-long stay on top in February 2008 during the home series victory against England. However he returned for a longer stint after some great performances in Bangladesh in October the same year.
Shahid Afridi (18 days). Another fleeting stay for the mercurial Pakistani all-rounder whose career has been littered with innings which could be similarly described. Three for 19 against Bangladesh at Dhaka on 8 June 2008 was enough to take him top, but eighteen days later it was all over, as team-mate Shoaib Malik nudged him down to second.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Past ICC Champions Trophies – a Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings Review
At the first competition in Bangladesh in late 1998, it was two victorious South Africans who took advantage of the low, slow conditions to make the biggest impact. Jacques Kallis’s match-winning unbeaten 113 against Sri Lanka enabled him to leap ten places to 11th and Pat Symcox – revelling in being thrown the new ball – found the conditions in Dhaka much to his liking as he moved up to within touching distance of the top ten in the bowling rankings.
New Zealand were the surprise winners when the show moved to Kenya in 2000. Their hero was diminutive left-hander Roger Twose, whose three excellent innings moved him up to fourth place. Tournament top-scorer Sourav Ganguly closed the gap on top-placed Michael Bevan to just twelve points, and an average of 209 was a welcome return to form for Saeed Anwar who ended the tournament knocking on the door of the world’s top ten. The competition saw the debut on the world stage of Brett Lee as he entered the world’s top twenty for the first time, despite his Australian team being beaten by India in their only game.
India and Sri Lanka shared the trophy in 2002 and Virender Sehwag’s 271 runs lifted him twenty-nine places to eleventh. Team-mate Zaheer Khan’s eight wickets saw him ruse to his career-best position of seventh. The top two at the time – Muttiah Muralitharan and Glenn McGrath – continued their domination of the bowling Rankings with healthy hauls of wickets and the gap between second placed McGrath and Shaun Pollock in third grew to over 150 points by the end of the competition.
England came within a whisker of winning the competition on home soil in 2004. Their hero with the bat was Marcus Trescothick who scored nearly a hundred more runs than anyone else, and rose to second in the world, just seven points behind Jacques Kallis. Played late in the season, it was not surprising that pace bowlers made the biggest impressions with Shaun Pollock, Andrew Flintoff, Makhaya Ntini and Shoaib Akhtar making strides. Steve Harmison – showing no ill effects with the white ball which were to plague him later in his career – took eight cheap wickets and moved into the world’s top twenty for the first time.
Back in the subcontinent in 2006, three left-handed openers became the batting stars. Chris Gayle slammed three centuries to move up to second in the world, behind only Michael Hussey. Sri Lanka’s rookie Upul Tharanga hit two centuries of his own to move into the world’s top twenty, and not to be outdone, Shahriar Nafees hit a then-National record unbeaten 123 to move into the top forty. With the ball, Ian Bradshaw continued his love affair with the Champions Trophy to reach his career-best second place. Jerome Taylor lit up the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai with a memorable hat-trick against Australia to move into the world’s top thirty, alongside Lasith Malinga.
It remains to be seen who the stars of the 2009 competition will be, but if past tournaments are anything to go by, it is a golden opportunity to make an impact on the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings.
New Zealand were the surprise winners when the show moved to Kenya in 2000. Their hero was diminutive left-hander Roger Twose, whose three excellent innings moved him up to fourth place. Tournament top-scorer Sourav Ganguly closed the gap on top-placed Michael Bevan to just twelve points, and an average of 209 was a welcome return to form for Saeed Anwar who ended the tournament knocking on the door of the world’s top ten. The competition saw the debut on the world stage of Brett Lee as he entered the world’s top twenty for the first time, despite his Australian team being beaten by India in their only game.
India and Sri Lanka shared the trophy in 2002 and Virender Sehwag’s 271 runs lifted him twenty-nine places to eleventh. Team-mate Zaheer Khan’s eight wickets saw him ruse to his career-best position of seventh. The top two at the time – Muttiah Muralitharan and Glenn McGrath – continued their domination of the bowling Rankings with healthy hauls of wickets and the gap between second placed McGrath and Shaun Pollock in third grew to over 150 points by the end of the competition.
England came within a whisker of winning the competition on home soil in 2004. Their hero with the bat was Marcus Trescothick who scored nearly a hundred more runs than anyone else, and rose to second in the world, just seven points behind Jacques Kallis. Played late in the season, it was not surprising that pace bowlers made the biggest impressions with Shaun Pollock, Andrew Flintoff, Makhaya Ntini and Shoaib Akhtar making strides. Steve Harmison – showing no ill effects with the white ball which were to plague him later in his career – took eight cheap wickets and moved into the world’s top twenty for the first time.
Back in the subcontinent in 2006, three left-handed openers became the batting stars. Chris Gayle slammed three centuries to move up to second in the world, behind only Michael Hussey. Sri Lanka’s rookie Upul Tharanga hit two centuries of his own to move into the world’s top twenty, and not to be outdone, Shahriar Nafees hit a then-National record unbeaten 123 to move into the top forty. With the ball, Ian Bradshaw continued his love affair with the Champions Trophy to reach his career-best second place. Jerome Taylor lit up the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai with a memorable hat-trick against Australia to move into the world’s top thirty, alongside Lasith Malinga.
It remains to be seen who the stars of the 2009 competition will be, but if past tournaments are anything to go by, it is a golden opportunity to make an impact on the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
The ODI 800ers
In mountaineering they are known as the 8000ers – the fourteen summits in the world which rise to more than eight thousand metres. Seventeen people have managed to make it to the top of all of these peaks – no mean achievement.
The Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings have a similar threshold of greatness – the achieving of 800 points in either the batting or bowling tables. Less rare than the mountaineering achievement above, these players still form a select band as only 43 batsmen and 26 bowlers have attained this level of success in One Day International cricket.
First, we need to examine what 800 points in the Ratings actually means? The first batsman to achieve this mark was Greg Chappell back in December 1980 when his innings of 48 against New Zealand at Melbourne saw him rise to 803 points. His Australian team-mate Dennis Lillee had the honour of being the first ODI bowler to reach this level – on 31 January 1981 – when he took two for 25 in eight overs also against the Kiwis at the M.C.G.
As more matches have been played, naturally more players have achieved 800 points. The ‘golden age’ of ODI batting came in early February 1985 when there were a record nine batsmen above this level: Viv Richards, Zaheer Abbas, Allan Lamb, David Gower, Kepler Wessels, Gordon Greenidge, Desmond Haynes, Clive Lloyd and Javed Miandad.
For bowlers, the peak came the previous year – in April 1984. At that time, eight bowlers stood at this level: Richard Hadlee, Joel Garner, Ewen Chatfield, Bob Willis, Geoff Lawson, Michael Holding, Kapil Dev and Malcolm Marshall. By way of comparison, as we currently stand, only MS Dhoni with the bat is above 800 points and no bowler has reached the magical 800 figure since Shaun Pollock hung up his boots in February 2008.
So – in the shorter format of the game – who has spent the longest time at or above 800 points? Does this measure produce a true measure of the greatest ODI players of all time? Here are the figures – and there is no surprise who tops the batting charts:
No real surprises there – as all of these players can be considered among the greatest batsmen to play One Day International cricket. Perhaps some may be surprised to see Allan Lamb in third place but he ended his career with an average of 39 and a strike rate of nearly 76 in an era when scoring rates were far lower than they are today. Who can forget his 18 from Bruce Reid’s last over at the S.C.G. in January 1987.
Here are the bowlers:
Again – plenty of familiar names here and only one spinner. Shaun Pollock is far ahead of the rest – his miserly economy rate of 3.67 runs per over was achieved in an era when the overall economy rate was 4.82. The one surprise in the top ten is New Zealand’s Ewen Chatfield. Often playing second fiddle to Richard Hadlee, Chatfield had his brief moment in the sun when he topped the Ratings for just two days in March 1988, but he spent a large part of the 1980s above 800 points in second place to Joel Garner. Even in that era, his final bowling average of 25.84 and economy rate of 3.57 were superb.
The average for the top ten batsmen is 2,181 days and for the top ten bowlers 1,624 days perhaps illustrating the fact that top-class bowlers spend less time at the peak of their form than batsmen due to the wear and tear on their bodies.
Next time, we’ll look at the equivalent tables for Test cricket. Can anyone topple the Don?
The Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings have a similar threshold of greatness – the achieving of 800 points in either the batting or bowling tables. Less rare than the mountaineering achievement above, these players still form a select band as only 43 batsmen and 26 bowlers have attained this level of success in One Day International cricket.
First, we need to examine what 800 points in the Ratings actually means? The first batsman to achieve this mark was Greg Chappell back in December 1980 when his innings of 48 against New Zealand at Melbourne saw him rise to 803 points. His Australian team-mate Dennis Lillee had the honour of being the first ODI bowler to reach this level – on 31 January 1981 – when he took two for 25 in eight overs also against the Kiwis at the M.C.G.
As more matches have been played, naturally more players have achieved 800 points. The ‘golden age’ of ODI batting came in early February 1985 when there were a record nine batsmen above this level: Viv Richards, Zaheer Abbas, Allan Lamb, David Gower, Kepler Wessels, Gordon Greenidge, Desmond Haynes, Clive Lloyd and Javed Miandad.
For bowlers, the peak came the previous year – in April 1984. At that time, eight bowlers stood at this level: Richard Hadlee, Joel Garner, Ewen Chatfield, Bob Willis, Geoff Lawson, Michael Holding, Kapil Dev and Malcolm Marshall. By way of comparison, as we currently stand, only MS Dhoni with the bat is above 800 points and no bowler has reached the magical 800 figure since Shaun Pollock hung up his boots in February 2008.
So – in the shorter format of the game – who has spent the longest time at or above 800 points? Does this measure produce a true measure of the greatest ODI players of all time? Here are the figures – and there is no surprise who tops the batting charts:
| Player | Total days |
| Viv Richards | 3,235 |
| Dean Jones | 2,610 |
| Allan Lamb | 2,560 |
| Desmond Haynes | 2,526 |
| Brian Lara | 2,276 |
| Michael Bevan | 2,134 |
| Sachin Tendulkar | 2,006 |
| Gordon Greenidge | 1,690 |
| Javed Miandad | 1,500 |
| Graham Gooch | 1,275 |
No real surprises there – as all of these players can be considered among the greatest batsmen to play One Day International cricket. Perhaps some may be surprised to see Allan Lamb in third place but he ended his career with an average of 39 and a strike rate of nearly 76 in an era when scoring rates were far lower than they are today. Who can forget his 18 from Bruce Reid’s last over at the S.C.G. in January 1987.
Here are the bowlers:
| Player | Total days |
| Shaun Pollock | 2,778 |
| Joel Garner | 1,862 |
| Richard Hadlee | 1,862 |
| Glenn McGrath | 1,762 |
| Muttiah Muralitharan | 1,749 |
| Curtly Ambrose | 1,441 |
| Ewen Chatfield | 1,321 |
| Michael Holding | 1,274 |
| Malcolm Marshall | 1,250 |
| Kapil Dev | 941 |
Again – plenty of familiar names here and only one spinner. Shaun Pollock is far ahead of the rest – his miserly economy rate of 3.67 runs per over was achieved in an era when the overall economy rate was 4.82. The one surprise in the top ten is New Zealand’s Ewen Chatfield. Often playing second fiddle to Richard Hadlee, Chatfield had his brief moment in the sun when he topped the Ratings for just two days in March 1988, but he spent a large part of the 1980s above 800 points in second place to Joel Garner. Even in that era, his final bowling average of 25.84 and economy rate of 3.57 were superb.
The average for the top ten batsmen is 2,181 days and for the top ten bowlers 1,624 days perhaps illustrating the fact that top-class bowlers spend less time at the peak of their form than batsmen due to the wear and tear on their bodies.
Next time, we’ll look at the equivalent tables for Test cricket. Can anyone topple the Don?
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Botham v Flintoff
As the Ashes merry-go-round moves on to Leeds, memories will no doubt be stirred of the great deeds from twenty-eight years ago when first Ian Botham and then Bob Willis upset the odds of 500/1 to give England the most unlikely of victories.
While Bob Willis’s eight for 43 was crucial in applying the coup de grace, it was Ian Botham’s unbeaten 149 which really captured the imagination and secured his status as a true legend of the game.
Fast-forward to 2009 and the headlines are again being made by a weighty all-rounder whose off-the-field exploits often provide tabloid headlines – this time Andrew Flintoff. As if his Herculean efforts of 2005 were not enough, he bowled throughout the morning session in the second Test at Lord’s to give England their first victory over Australia at Headquarters since the Hedley Verity-inspired triumph of 1934 – when the average house price in England was a princely £515.
So – how do the two of them compare Ratings-wise? As Flintoff comes to the end of his Test career, what can the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings tell us about these two greats of the modern game?
Batting
Botham: Highest Rating 811 (1982). Highest Ranking 3rd (1982). Average 586
Flintoff: Highest Rating 646 (2006). Highest Ranking 20th (2006) Average 468
Not much comparison there on first inpection. Botham was a good enough batsman in his own right to reach the top three in the world and it is often forgotten that he scored fourteen Test centuries and ended with an average of 33.54. However, Flintoff’s average is just a fraction less at 32.06 but with just five centuries. One area in which Freddie has suffered is while Botham converted 39% of his fifties into centuries, Flintoff has only managed 16% and so he hasn’t posted the eye-catching big innings which his predecessor managed.
Bowling
Botham: Highest Rating 910 (1980). Highest Ranking 1st (60 matches) Average 687
Flintoff: Highest Rating 810 (2005). Highest Ranking 4th (2005) Average 485
Botham first topped the bowling tree in August 1978 after taking eleven Kiwi wickets in just his eleventh Test. He stayed there for most of the next two years before he was nudged out of the top spot by Joel Garner. Only seven bowlers have ever surpassed his career-best Rating of 911 which he achieved after his thirteen wickets in the Golden Jubilee Test at Mumbai in February 1980. While Flintoff has had his moments, a career-haul of just three five-wicket hauls compares disappointingly with Botham’s then-record of 27. Missing numerous Test Matches due to injury hasn’t helped his cause, but even had he stayed fit for all of those, he still would have struggled to close the gap on the 1980s star.
All-round
Botham: Highest Rating 646 (1980). Highest Ranking 1st (120 matches) Average 415
Flintoff: Highest Rating 501 (2005). Highest Ranking 1st (6 matches) Average 259
Botham’s peak Rating of 646 really deserves a second look. With a Batting Rating of 709 and a Bowling Rating of 911 it has only been surpassed by one man in the history of the game – Garry Sobers. There is no denying the fact that at the time, he was the most dynamic cricketer in the world. He was also able to top the all-rounder charts for 120 Tests despite the presence of the other three greats of the time – Richard Hadlee, Imran Khan and Kapil Dev. Flintoff did have his moment in the sun – not surprisingly in his annus mirabilis of 2005, but a certain Jacques Kallis has dominated ever since.
In conclusion, there is no denying the fact that Flintoff has been a very good player for England for the past decade. However when put in context with his predecessor in the England middle-order, it really becomes clear that despite his last eight Tests coming when he was clearly past his peak (averaging 14 with the bat and 48 with the ball) Botham was a truly great player, and that Flintoff comes up some way short – as do most of the other 2,564 players to play Test cricket.
While Bob Willis’s eight for 43 was crucial in applying the coup de grace, it was Ian Botham’s unbeaten 149 which really captured the imagination and secured his status as a true legend of the game.
Fast-forward to 2009 and the headlines are again being made by a weighty all-rounder whose off-the-field exploits often provide tabloid headlines – this time Andrew Flintoff. As if his Herculean efforts of 2005 were not enough, he bowled throughout the morning session in the second Test at Lord’s to give England their first victory over Australia at Headquarters since the Hedley Verity-inspired triumph of 1934 – when the average house price in England was a princely £515.
So – how do the two of them compare Ratings-wise? As Flintoff comes to the end of his Test career, what can the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings tell us about these two greats of the modern game?
Batting
Botham: Highest Rating 811 (1982). Highest Ranking 3rd (1982). Average 586
Flintoff: Highest Rating 646 (2006). Highest Ranking 20th (2006) Average 468
Not much comparison there on first inpection. Botham was a good enough batsman in his own right to reach the top three in the world and it is often forgotten that he scored fourteen Test centuries and ended with an average of 33.54. However, Flintoff’s average is just a fraction less at 32.06 but with just five centuries. One area in which Freddie has suffered is while Botham converted 39% of his fifties into centuries, Flintoff has only managed 16% and so he hasn’t posted the eye-catching big innings which his predecessor managed.
Bowling
Botham: Highest Rating 910 (1980). Highest Ranking 1st (60 matches) Average 687
Flintoff: Highest Rating 810 (2005). Highest Ranking 4th (2005) Average 485
Botham first topped the bowling tree in August 1978 after taking eleven Kiwi wickets in just his eleventh Test. He stayed there for most of the next two years before he was nudged out of the top spot by Joel Garner. Only seven bowlers have ever surpassed his career-best Rating of 911 which he achieved after his thirteen wickets in the Golden Jubilee Test at Mumbai in February 1980. While Flintoff has had his moments, a career-haul of just three five-wicket hauls compares disappointingly with Botham’s then-record of 27. Missing numerous Test Matches due to injury hasn’t helped his cause, but even had he stayed fit for all of those, he still would have struggled to close the gap on the 1980s star.
All-round
Botham: Highest Rating 646 (1980). Highest Ranking 1st (120 matches) Average 415
Flintoff: Highest Rating 501 (2005). Highest Ranking 1st (6 matches) Average 259
Botham’s peak Rating of 646 really deserves a second look. With a Batting Rating of 709 and a Bowling Rating of 911 it has only been surpassed by one man in the history of the game – Garry Sobers. There is no denying the fact that at the time, he was the most dynamic cricketer in the world. He was also able to top the all-rounder charts for 120 Tests despite the presence of the other three greats of the time – Richard Hadlee, Imran Khan and Kapil Dev. Flintoff did have his moment in the sun – not surprisingly in his annus mirabilis of 2005, but a certain Jacques Kallis has dominated ever since.
In conclusion, there is no denying the fact that Flintoff has been a very good player for England for the past decade. However when put in context with his predecessor in the England middle-order, it really becomes clear that despite his last eight Tests coming when he was clearly past his peak (averaging 14 with the bat and 48 with the ball) Botham was a truly great player, and that Flintoff comes up some way short – as do most of the other 2,564 players to play Test cricket.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Oldies but Goodies
With apologies to those who have been waiting to discover the elder statesmen of the game who have made their mark on the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for One Day International cricket, it is a case of better late than never.
Viv Richards spent the vast majority of the 1980s on top of the ODI Batting Ratings and he also holds the distinction for having played the greatest-ever innings as calculated by the Ratings computer. His unbeaten 189 at Old Trafford has still not been bettered in the last twenty-five years which have seen a further 2,597 matches played. He first topped the charts on 23 December 1979 after his unbeaten 85 from just 77 deliveries lifted the West Indies to a nine-wicket victory over England at Brisbane and saw him sneak above Greg Chappell. Ten years later, on 19 October 1989 his very un-Richards-like innings of 24 from 48 deliveries against Sri Lanka at Rajkot saw him overtaken for the last time by Javed Miandad. However, Richards was aged 37 years and 226 days, still the greatest age at which anyone has been the number one batsman in the shorter format of the game.
With the ball, it is another of the greats of the 1980s who holds the record for being the oldest bowler to look down on the rest of the world. Richard Hadlee ended his glorious career in 1990 with a knighthood and the record number of Test wickets, but it was earlier that year that he reached the ODI number one spot for the final time. On 10 March he bowled ten economical overs against Australia at Auckland to maintain his Rating of 776 from the previous match which enabled him to enjoy the final match of his 148 spent on top of the bowling tree. However, nine wicket-less overs in a heavy defeat to the Aussies the following day saw him slip below Wasim Akram and his reign at the top was over for good. Hadlee was 38 years 250 days old at the time, and no bowler – paceman or spinner – has bettered that.
In terms of all-rounders, perhaps it is not surprising which veteran holds the honour as the oldest player to top the Ratings. Imran Khan achieved many things in his career – perhaps the highlight of which was leading his Pakistan team to victory in the 1992 World Cup. But two years earlier he took his final bow as the number one all-rounder in the world at the age of 37 years 82 days after taking 1/28 in his ten overs against Sri Lanka at Hobart. In the following match against the same opposition at Adelaide, his ten overs went for 60 and fellow subcontinent legend Kapil Dev took over.
So – it appears that the age of 38 is the upper age limit to reach the top of the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for One Day International Cricket, but a number of older players have achieved greatness in the longer format of the game. They include a 49-year old topping the batting tree and a 50-year-old who managed to be rated the number one bowler, and we will unveil them at a later date.
Viv Richards spent the vast majority of the 1980s on top of the ODI Batting Ratings and he also holds the distinction for having played the greatest-ever innings as calculated by the Ratings computer. His unbeaten 189 at Old Trafford has still not been bettered in the last twenty-five years which have seen a further 2,597 matches played. He first topped the charts on 23 December 1979 after his unbeaten 85 from just 77 deliveries lifted the West Indies to a nine-wicket victory over England at Brisbane and saw him sneak above Greg Chappell. Ten years later, on 19 October 1989 his very un-Richards-like innings of 24 from 48 deliveries against Sri Lanka at Rajkot saw him overtaken for the last time by Javed Miandad. However, Richards was aged 37 years and 226 days, still the greatest age at which anyone has been the number one batsman in the shorter format of the game.
With the ball, it is another of the greats of the 1980s who holds the record for being the oldest bowler to look down on the rest of the world. Richard Hadlee ended his glorious career in 1990 with a knighthood and the record number of Test wickets, but it was earlier that year that he reached the ODI number one spot for the final time. On 10 March he bowled ten economical overs against Australia at Auckland to maintain his Rating of 776 from the previous match which enabled him to enjoy the final match of his 148 spent on top of the bowling tree. However, nine wicket-less overs in a heavy defeat to the Aussies the following day saw him slip below Wasim Akram and his reign at the top was over for good. Hadlee was 38 years 250 days old at the time, and no bowler – paceman or spinner – has bettered that.
In terms of all-rounders, perhaps it is not surprising which veteran holds the honour as the oldest player to top the Ratings. Imran Khan achieved many things in his career – perhaps the highlight of which was leading his Pakistan team to victory in the 1992 World Cup. But two years earlier he took his final bow as the number one all-rounder in the world at the age of 37 years 82 days after taking 1/28 in his ten overs against Sri Lanka at Hobart. In the following match against the same opposition at Adelaide, his ten overs went for 60 and fellow subcontinent legend Kapil Dev took over.
So – it appears that the age of 38 is the upper age limit to reach the top of the Reliance Mobile ICC Player Rankings for One Day International Cricket, but a number of older players have achieved greatness in the longer format of the game. They include a 49-year old topping the batting tree and a 50-year-old who managed to be rated the number one bowler, and we will unveil them at a later date.
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