The ICC Greatest Test XI

Ginger:
From the link hoggy provided, it seems Tyson was timed using an ingenious mechanism.

From that one can deduce that he was probably consistently 95 and could have touched close to 100 a few times, or even beaten that.

He was seriously fast- that's certain.

Oh, as for Donald, from the same link, he was mid 150s, which is probably about the same speed as Tyson if not more.
White Lightning indeed.

Rex.
All you keep doing is making statements with no proof.

"I don't think MIller/Lindwall's speed was emphasized so often or was considered as immensely great even during their time."

But it was.
Both Lindwall and Miller were counted as being very, very quick.

"It's quite easy to reason that bowlers of the 70s and 80s were faster than their predecessors."

Why is it?

"There is proof since almost everyone agrees that Thommo was the fastest."

Do they?
Among those who saw both Thompson and Tyson play?
Benaud didn't.
Alex Bannister of the Daily Mail didn't.
I'm sure there are others.

"You simply give a random number here. But if Lindwall was super fast, he never was mentioned in the same breath as Holding or others- and that's proof enough to show that he was not a 90-95 MPH bowler but surely slower than that."

It's proof of nothing of the sort.
Not being mentioned as being as fast as Tyson or Thompson or even Holding doesn't prove that he wasn't a 90-95 MPH bowler.

"But I don't see how you can generate Lindwall's pace from the above information about Holding."
Yet you took the quote I provided earlier about Lindwall's faster ball only being equalled by Holding as proof that he wasn't that fast.
Now that I've provided evidence that Holding was a 95MPH+ bowler we suddenly can't draw any conclusions about Lindwall from this fact?


Whatever Rex,
You believe what you want to and I'll believe what I want. I don't think we're going to agree.
Thing is, though, that if you're going to make statements like 'Lindwall and Miller bowled at less than 140km/h' etc try to give some evidence rather than arguments based on stuff you say people have said.

Your entire comment above is confusing to say the least.
Once again you're picking off random sentences from my posts and trying to contradict them.

I dismantled your line of reasoning that extended from Thommo right up to Larwood in my last few posts, but you have no response to that.
Instead of that you pick one sentence out of that huge comment and say it is flawed, following which I have to write another lengthy post to explain that, following which you pick another sentence and so on.

You have not provided a single valid proof to suggest that I was wrong. Not one!

You talk of Richie Benaud's comment but you don't tell me as to when he made this comment.
Same with Alex Bannister- who is he by the way? Roger Bannister's cousin?
When did he make this comment? How old was he? Was he a contemporary of Tyson?

I don't know the exact speed with which Lindwall and Miller bowled- so the 140 statement was just extempore, but I later kept stressing on one thing- that these two bowlers would have been just Edwards pace, which is pretty quick.

If they maintained that consistently, they would have been a tough proposition no doubt, but nothing the modern batsman hasn't faced. Of course, without helmets it would have been a big problem, but then again, batsmen would have gotten used to it after a time.
I don't remember Sehwag getting hit on the helmet before (I may be wrong) so it wouldn't have matter anyway.

But like the original argument regarding Sehwag and Hobbs, even with Miller/Lindwall bowling in tandem, it wouldn't have been extraordinary compared to what the modern openers face.

And what's more, I don't know if they had to face spinners the likes of Murali on spinning pitches. (Not suggesting spin wasn't in vogue at all- I know Benaud and Laker were excellent, but once again, there is reason to suggest that English players could suffer in alien conditions like India/SL)

What I had originally spoken about is- think out of the box.
Don't stick to the same rhetoric regarding players you never knew!

It's quite natural that bowlers and batsmen progress. Batting techniques change, and so do bowling techniques. That's called evolution.

Think as to why can't Sehwag be part of a world XI? Why can't Kapil be?
Why should it always be Hobbs? Think from other angles- like would play spin as well? Would they score fast or dominate the opposition?
Would they be great fielders/captains?

People keep saying Miller/Lindwall was seriously fast, yet how often do we hear their names mentioned when talked about serious pace- the likes of Lee, Akhtar?

Discuss- rather than simply throw quotes. Try to have an open mind.

In conclusion- I couldn't care less what you think. They're both no more. May they RIP.
But you merely denigrate the present players in your eagerness to extoll them. You merely embarrass them by such behavior.

Rex
I'm not trying to denigrate anyone
It was you who started all this by making claims that English batsmen like Hobbs, Sutcliffe and Hutton never faced bowlers faster than Darren Sammy or Ravi Rampaul, and that Lindwall and Miller never bowled at more than 140 km/h, etc.
I don't see why I'm denigrating modern players by disputing these assertions, especially as you've provided virtually no evidence to back them up

Hoggy:
Hobbs, Sutcliffe and Hutton never faced bowlers faster than Darren Sammy or Ravi Rampaul, and that Lindwall and Miller never bowled at more than 140 km/h, etc.
_____________
Once again you're prevaricating the truth.
I said most of the time they faced bowlers with the pace of Darren Sammy/Ravi Rampaul.
I also said that those bowlers weren't as fast as 140 kmph and I have since said that it wasn't an exact assessment and hence chose to keep Fidel Edwards pace as yardstick and stuck to it.

The reason I mentioned that is because, there wasn't much of a difference facing bowlers on uncovered pitches or covered pitches, unless it always rained before the start of a Test.

2ndly one must remember that the outfield takes longer to dry than the pitch, so if there was lots of rain, it would affect the runup of a bowler and consequently reduce his pace.
So even on a sticky wicket, you don't have to expect thunderbolts.

As for protective clothing- with or without a helmet, the batsman's reflexes are the same.
Just because you're wearing a helmet doesn't mean your technique will change- you won't just stand upright and play your shots knowing the helmet will save you from harm.

You will still stand back and hook or pull.
So the modern masters wouldn't have been all at sea 50 years back either.
The more lessons they have learned facing faster men consistently and more often would have come in handy when facing slightly slower men without a helmet.

That is what I was trying to say.

Even in modern times, there aren't many men who can bowl as fast as Lee. But since there are more countries and tougher competition, there are more men than 50 years before who are fast.

"comment by Rex (U3513) posted 1 day ago

Of those bowlers you put up- only Keith Miller and Ray Lindwall are bowlers of any repute. Michael Holding bowled in the mid 140s to early 150s. Thomson close to 160. That's the fastest it got. Imran touched 140 but mostly in the 130s and these were at that time the fastest ever known.

There were no speed guns then but I'm sure everyone who had seen both Miller and Holding would agree that Miller was nowhere close to the lanky West Indian.

Sehwag faced bowling even more ferocious than that- the likes of Brett Lee, Akhtar etc.

That is not to suggest that Miller and Lindwall were pushovers- just that many stories from that time are exaggerated since there was nothing better.

Anything from that time would have been no faster than Ishant or Fidel pace."

You seem to have accepted that Frank Tyson, who was from that time, was a lot faster.
Don't see why it's so difficult to accept the idea that Lindwall and Miller might have been faster as well.

hoggy:
I accepted Frank Tyson was faster because I have heard a lot about him from just about any player- English, Australian, Indian etc. and read a lot about him.

What do you expect from a guy nicknamed "Typhoon"?

But I had not heard Miller/Lindwall spoken about in the same breath.

I had heard that Larwood was pretty fast but once again, he wasn't often mentioned as the fastest.

The fans idea of fast is the not same as the players or most importantly batsmen.

Ponting was helpless against Roach's pace during the 2009 series against WI and Roach was just in the 140s.

It's true Ponting was out of form and getting old too, but just to cite an example.

Similarly, Tendulkar has been hit on the helmet by Anderson who hasn't crossed 140 I think (I'm not sure), and Mcgrath too- who was mostly late 120s to 130.

So its not all about pace. Miller/Lindwall were undoubtedly skillful bowlers and even without pace they can be fearsome to batsmen.

But since the modern player has faced similar bowlers very often, he would be able to handle those two.

Once again, its not a foregone conclusion that the modern player will succeed, but he wouldn't find it any different facing these bowlers on uncovered pitches without body-guards than playing at present conditions.

That was the point I was trying to make.
A ball at 120 or 140 or 160 hurts just as bad when it hits you in the glove/arm/wherever, with or without chest pad.

The only thing the helmets/chest pad do is to save your life, but pain is not reduced enough to tempt batsmen into thinking of standing up to the ball like a wall.

Oh, as for Donald, from the same link, he was mid 150s, which is probably about the same speed as Tyson if not more.
White Lightning indeed

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The Saffers also had a lad named Schultz who apparently was quicker than Donald.

Other fast bowlers who were really fast but are not often mentioned because they were frankly not great are:

Patterson
Sami

And a young Ian Bishop who was as quick as anyone before his back problems and COULD have been a great like Curtly.

Yes I remember reading about Tendulkar falling to Schultz first ball during India's first defeat in South Africa in the 1992 tour.
Before the start of that day, Donald had remarked that Indians ran away from fast bowling.
In response to that Kapil Dev, with one arm injured, hit a blistering hundred.
Although SA won the match, his hundred was the high point of the series I'd say.
129 out of a total of 215- 60% of the runs scored by Kapil!
http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63588.html