ODI’s to me, I must admit are a bit like a Victoria Sponge Cake, sure if I’m offered it for free at the end of a meal, then I’ll probably have a bite, but would I order it off the menu, then I very much doubt it. Yet to doubt their popularity away from England would be folly, the Indian public in particular love their white ball cricket and India have become a formidable force in this format.
Regardless of what happened in the match, the build up to the game has very much been Eoin the mercenary vs. Eoin the ‘non national anthem singing,’ well mercenary. The Daily Mail has had it’s xenophobia/brexit mantra right in hand, I mean how dare an Irishman, who happens to be England captain, refuse to travel to a country that might not be safe. I mean Andrew Strauss said it was, yet the so called English ODI captain still refused to travel to Bangladesh and even worse, he still refuses to sing the Queen’s National Anthem, that’s just not cricket. I’m still half expecting an outraged Oliver Holt to fly out with a couple of stocks (not Chris Stocks, though no doubt his coverage will be in a variety of English newspapers) painted in national colours, with rotten apples or any other particularly English fruit at the ready to throw at Morgan.
The thing is, if we do well in this series, then it will be branded as Strauss’ brave new ODI side and if we do badly, then it’s Eoin Morgan’s failing England team with a lame dog captain at the helm. I mean who would want to be an England skipper, unless your name is Alastair Cook, who is supposedly being hounded (their words, not mine) out of a job with the very lightest of criticism if you choose to listen to ‘those that know’. I will freely admit, I’m not Morgan’s biggest fan and I guess you will find very few Middlesex fans that are, still I’m not a xenophobic moron either and I will happily support Morgan on the basis that whilst his batting isn’t the same as it was in 2010, and back then his batting was a revelation, his captaincy is actually pretty good.
Now do I think that Morgan is the next Mike Brearly, well of course I don’t, yet the improvements are there. The batsmen are generally posting in excess of 300 runs most innings, somewhat unheard of if you go back 2 years to the Peter Moores reign and the bowlers, whilst most would agree are somewhat limited in this format, at least have some sort a plan to work with, again a massive improvement on 2015. It does actually seem that the Captain and Coach are working in harmony, unlike the Test team, where Sir Alastair does and says what he wants, and that’s why unlike the Test team, that this team has made pretty good strides in the last 18 months. Long gone are the days where we hoped Ravi Bopara might lift us up to 270 in the final 5 overs. English cricket has shown that it can move forward given the right environment and quite possibly with the right captain too.
As for the game itself, well we gave ourselves a chance by scoring 350 on a fairly flat deck with small boundaries, yet even at half time it felt we were about 30 runs short such are the run fests that are becoming of ODI’s now. Jason Roy played a lovely knock before getting a bit too ambitious, Morgan, Moeen and Buttler had nice cameos and Ben Stokes played an absolute gem of a knock when it seemed that 320 was likely to be at the high end of England’s expectations. The strangest innings of the day was Joe Root’s, which despite Nasser Hussain’s constant praise throughout, seemed a bit of a strange affair when you know 350 is about par on this track. It is hard to criticise a player who has just flown in from England after the birth of his first child and has hit 70 odd, but England’s innings seemed to be sapped of any kind of urgency when Root was at the crease and it was only through the power hitting of Stokes at the end that we came up with something resembling a score that might be defendable. Perhaps I’m being too harsh on Root, as it’s important to have an anchor in the innings for others to play around, but equally one could also add that if we had scored another 20 runs then it could have been a tighter match.
Yet despite achieving a par score on this pitch, England’s bowlers gave us some hope by reducing India to 63-4 with some fine bowling from David Willey in particular; however England once again made the fatal mistake of not getting Kohli out early. Of course, I say this with tongue firmly in cheek, as Kohli is batting on a different planet to everybody else at the moment. His partnership with Yadav was a pure mixture of outstanding timing, outrageous shots and total skill from both batsmen to put England’s bowlers to the sword. I’m sure that one or two of our media chums will no doubt put the blame at the door of England’s spinners and I agree they didn’t bowl well, but they were never allowed to settle due to the skill of both Indian batsmen. Perhaps if Moeen or Rashid had managed to get a couple of cheap overs in early then they might have been able to settle into a routine, but that’s by the by as India attacked both with glee and no little skill, which basically forced Morgan’s hand to remove both spinners from the attack and stick with the seam bowling attack in a futile effort to stop the runs from flowing. By the time England had managed to take the wickets of both Kohli and a limping Yadav, each for a fine 100, the game was pretty much up, the run rate was under 6 and India bat pretty deep. There was the odd moment of panic in the final stages from India, but all in all, they won the game pretty comfortably with nearly two overs to spare.
So onto the next ODI game on Thursday on the same sort of pitch at Cuttack no doubt, with the question being will England have learnt anything from this game or will we see more of the same from India? An equally pertinent question may be, does the English public actually care about these ODI’s, but we’ll leave that one for another time.
Being Outside Cricket 
Usually I hit the OBO for overseas ODIs, this time I keep forgetting games are going on, until I see the odd comment on Twitter. I actually like ODIs, esp. on a weekend, so I’m not sure why this is.
But there it is…
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Good match, England’s bowling is the issue. England were favs at 63-4 but local boy jadhav & that man Kohli had other ideaas
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I think if you score 350, and lose you just have to shrug and say fair enough. Some people will blame Root, but hey, the team got 350.
Englands ODI weakness is their bowling. Not enough of their bowlers had an economy rate under 6 an over today. Only Woakes had an economy rate under 6. (5.50) and he only bowled 8 overs.
While India had 3 bowlers under 6 an over. Pandya with (5.11) Jadeja with (5) & Jadhav with (5.75) They bowled 23 overs between them. That’s the difference.
As a side issue, why is the analyst now styling himself as “inside cricket?” Is that supposed to be a sarcastic sneer at us? Strange, I thought we were irrelevant, and nobody cared what we say?
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The Anal-yst has our cards skid-marked
He still oh so kisses the ECB bike park
Yet still pretends, so as to seem not to offend
He’s a man of the people (as long as they spend)
Their fiver a month on his editorially flawed mag
What was once a good read is but now an ECB rag
At least he has a blog now out there, e’en if it shows he’s so unaware
Unlike Selfey, who still, rants from a cupboard so bare
So i presume his ex-G Lardship has something special to share
Unless his previous ‘good journalism’ is in schism, well, don’t you know?
He still won’t tell, you bilious inadequate, you ‘outside’ so-and-so’ 🙂
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Genius!
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The Analyst said he thought we would win and the match would be a ‘cracker’. I have critted him quite a bit on Twitter and have to say he has taken it in good part, unlike Lord Selvey who blocked me almost instantly. After ine exchange with said Analyst he tweeted me Elaine you are a hard woman….i agreed
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I was cooking Sunday lunch and playing host to my aged mother, so didn’t see any of the match (…on the internet streams I rely on as I don’t have Sky and currently couldn’t afford it). Still, I know those nice people at the ECB are keen to grow the game, so I’m sure I can look forward to an hour long highlights programme tonight somewhere on FTA TV… can’t I?
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Not surprised that England continue to show dynamism with the bat, but not such dynamism with the ball. However, is it possibleto blame SirJoesph a little for not really upping his scoring rate and getting out before he’d got a ton? A quicker 120 or so than the 70 odd off 90 and it might have meant a total that the limited bowling line-up at our disposal might have been able to defend.
To be honest, I’m less sold on Eoin Morgan as being vital to the team in terms of being a captain, not because I remotely think similarly to Newman, Holt or any other of the muppets who wish to pursue that rather nasty angle, but because like Sean I think he is nothing like the player of 5 or so years ago. I also believe that it is something akin to crazy that Sam Billings doesn’t get a game. The lad just has it IMO.
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I think this “350 is a normal score these days (especially in India)” narrative needs a little bit of questioning.
In their last two home ODI series (against SA and NZ), India didn’t make over 300 once. 299 was their highest score. The visitors made over 300 twice (SA 438 and 303).
In other words, based on recent history, 350 is not a usual score in India. There seem two explanations for the score in this match. One is that the pitch was the roadiest of roads. If that was deliberate by India, then fair play to them as it’s what they’re likely to get in the CT. A ragging bunsen may have made an Indian win more probable but it wouldn’t have been so meaningful in the longer term.
The other explanation is that England’s bowling is really that bad. It’s not just the quality of the bowlers as the individuals – it’s also the overall strategy of not picking specialists, the bowling strategies (was there one today?) and the support in the field. 350 is the norm – when England play against other top teams (not SL nor Pakistan).
Of course it could be both – and it almost certainly is.
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I agree with the majority of this analysis, plus I’d add in that Pune is hardly the MCG in terms of size (the straight boundaries in particular are rather short), so all in all it was very loaded towards being a high-scoring game.
I wouldn’t quite go as far to say that 350 is the norm when England play against other top teams, though (although you may have been exaggerating slightly to make the point that England’s bowling is our weakness, which I very much concur with). Since the end of the 2015 New Zealand series, where we conceded 350 twice out of five, until today the highest total England have conceded against so-called top teams (by this I’m guessing you mean the four semi-finalists from the last World Cup), or any team in fact, is only 319.
Sure, the bowling is clearly a problem, but I thought that small strides in the right direction were being made since the New Zealand series. I think more of an issue is our struggles defending a target: against those same four teams since the World Cup, England have lost six times out of nine bowling second (and two of the victories came defending scores of 408 and 399).
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The England batting on the whole are getting enough runs to say they are doing their job. If you look at T20 tournaments and ODI’s the teams that win them are the ones who have bowlers who can defend most totals. Take RCB in the IPL they have all the firepower with the bat but because their bowling can’t back them up it doesn’t matter how many runs they get.
England are in this situation where all focus needs to go on the bowling as I would say it’s near impossible for England to improve the batting much more.
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It was a full entertaining match,india got victory at last,after 4 wickets down on 60,I want yuvi and dhoni to score some runs but they failed hopefully they will in nxt match.
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Really, I don’t see the point of having someone with the batting prowess of Rashid at #10 (and that is not a criticism of Rashid). You can safely pick two specialist bowlers, who hardly know how to wield the willow.
If you have to rely on #10 and #11 to get you over the line batting wise, would it not be better to have specialist bowlers who can shave at least 10-20 runs off any total between them?
Sure, in Tests it can help, as the equations are completely different.
But in limited over games, where #10 and #11 had to score 50 runs between them to win a game, are far and few in between. There have been all of 23 50+-partnerships for the 9th and 5 partnerships for the 10th wicket combined in which those runs scored by these partners resulted in a win. And if we’re looking at chases, it is 10 partnerships for the 9th and 3 partnerships for the tenth. of 50 or more.
In other words in about 1 in 166 ODIs was the batting prowess of the tail a real issue.
Even if you lower the bar to 30 runs for a partnership, there have been 33 30+ stands for the 9th and 10th wicket in successful chases, and another 71 in successful first innings. Even that translates as a paltry 1 in 37 games it is an issue, with the vast majority of the first innings partnerships, those runs being utterly irrelevant to the outcome of the game (that is the winning margin was substantially higher what some of these partnerships amounted to).
Call me insane, but I think the bowling prowess of #10 and #11 has been relevant in a far higher number of ODIs.
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While I agree with your analysis, and the stats certainly bare it out…… I think England actually pick Rashid as a specialist bowler, who just happens to bat a bit as well. (Not that he did very well today) He may not be in the league of some international spinners, but he is one of the best we have. (The cupboard is empty.)
So it opens up the whole debate about spinners vs seam bowlers in India. I gues they want a leg spinner because they think he might take wickets. But a more economical spinner might be a different option.
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It was not particularly directed at Rashid. There might well be “bowlers” batting higher up in the order, who get in on the basis of their batting, and relatively innocuous bowling.
Moeen Ali, with a batting average of 26 and a bowling average of 45 is a case in point. On average he bowls 9 overs in an innings, so he is pretty much used as a front-line bowler. His average return is 9-0-45-1.
He has made 2 tons and 2 fifties as an opener, in 21 innings (at an average of 31), Which is so-so, but at least he strikes them at a run-a-ball when he opens. Moeen averages just 20 with 1 50 from 21 innings at #7 (with 6 not outs), with a batting strike rate of just 94 – worse than when he played as an opener.
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Ne’er mind, ne’er do sorrow
‘Nother ODI, be forgot by tomorrow
Apart from our MSM who thru ECB filled glass
Will blame the Irishman til he’s out on his arse…
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Never a truer line of prose bogfather…apparently it’s all Morgan’s fault for not being attacking enough in the middle overs (and this from Cook fanboys too?) ffs!
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Bowling dry is not easy in the modern ODI game, It’s the only plan the fan boys know, so for them to talk about attacking is priceless.
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Morgan quoted about the next match on the BBC:
“Cuttack is a bigger ground and an easier pitch to bowl on,”
Last ODI at Cuttack (the only one in the last five years):
http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/792289.html
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Quick thanks to all for the kind wishes. Thanks also for the Sean and Chris show carrying the blog in the interim.
Wish me luck. Off up to Birmingham tomorrow.
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Dmitri’s coming to Brum? I’ll be on the look out for a cool looking bearded dude of colour 🙂
Seriously, I hope things improve and work out as well as they possibly can for you.
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Newman not turning his guns on Morgan yet:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-4121744/Ben-Stokes-Joe-Root-Jason-Roy-blast-England-highest-innings-score-India-ODI.html
Just a bit of moaning about the umpiring and of course no prizes for guessing the one bowler singled out for criticism.
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I think think the problem was that Jadhav came in and knew that heroics were not required. Just get a single off every ball and hit a boundary every now and then. He dictated and outscored Kohli. I thought that Kohli was getting to the place of batting to the end and then he had a rush of blood. Jadhav was the hero, our scoring Kohli without all the eye catching stuff.
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I didn’t see the entire game last night – switched off the stream in the midst of a massive headache. India being down 4 for not much also contributed to the lack of interest.
Having seen the highlights since, I would only say that bowling will remain the concern for both sides, if the pitches continue to be flat as they usually are, for the ODIs.
For India, Umesh continues to both impress (for pace) and frustrate (for lack of control) in equal measure. I think India miss Shami for he is the best we’ve got at the moment. He might have troubled Jason Roy with balls swinging at good pace. That Ashwin has only played 3 ODIs since October 2015 has as much to contribute to his poor numbers yesterday, as him being collared by the English batsmen, who probably relished his defensive lines. He will get better. His test renaissance has also coincided with this reversal of fortunes of sorts in ODI though his economy still remains below 5.
Bumrah had an off day – he will get his yorkers under the boots at some stage in this series.
England though, can’t seem to decide on how to stack up their side. More wannabe all-rounders than pure bowlers is never a good mix to have but this England side has more of those than any other nation. I can understand that the desire to have competent batsmen till the end has made more bowlers put long hours with a bat in hand and it can come in handy at times. But, there’s no way this substitutes for a bowler that can and will always bowl his 10 overs and pick wickets.
Woakes started well, but went for plenty in his second spell and remained the only pace bowler to not take wickets. Willey went for plenty after picking up the 2 wickets upfront while Stokes, as he usually does, went for runs. That Moeen has the best career economy rate amongst all English bowlers, should scare the fans. While he remains a useful player with multiple skills, I don’t think he is doing well enough, he is not worth his place in the squad as a bowler in my opinion given that he does not consistently complete his quota of 10 overs, unlike Rashid, who certainly had an off day.
If those pitches are going to be benign and the weather conditions remain relatively decent, this attack would struggle even at home. To my mind, this English attack just doesn’t cover enough bases and rely more on opposition making mistakes.
What’s the general view of the pitches we can expect for the CT?
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“To my mind, this English attack just doesn’t cover enough bases and rely more on opposition making mistakes”.
Agreed – but I’d add that England are relying heavily on scoreboard pressure. This’ll work sometimes – but not so much against better, self-confident teams as we’ve seen in India. It’ll also work against England sometimes with batsmen knowing they need to score a pile of runs and collapsing.
“What’s the general view of the pitches we can expect for the CT?”
Whatever England want for the England games – which everyone assumes will be batting paradises. There isn’t even an attempt now in the English media to pretend otherwise. India have two matches at the Oval and one at Edgbaston. Neither ground has had much pace in recent years, both can swing sometimes, both can help spin but it’s unlikely that early in an English season – very good batting tracks again seems most likely. India might have an SF at Cardiff which tends to be very slow and to have very short straight boundaries.
The wild card in an English June is the weather. Pitches are so well drained and protected these days that rain isn’t likely to produce seaming tracks unless there’s a heck of a lot – but there could be some help for swing.
The northern grounds famous for helping seamers in early season conditions (Headingley and Durham) aren’t being used and neither is England’s best cricket wicket (Manchester). There are also no games at Lord’s.
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Thanks Simon,
I agree on English weather being the wild card for CT.
If it swings, who knows which team might win – there are plenty of teams with bowlers to cause some serious damage in those conditions and sadly, not enough batsmen with technique to cope up.
Boult, Southee in NZ; Starc, Hazlewood in Australian squad, Shami, B Kumar for India, Broad & Jimmy for England, Steyn, Rabada for SA, Amir, Junaid, etc. for Pak etc. have all got the skill to make the most out of favourable conditions.
I am not so sure of Woakes/Willey combo though – they will probably go for runs, even if the conditions favour them. I might be tempted to bring back Broad in the mix for CT.
But its a shame if some of the grounds with both character and history, are not being used. One wants to see people being tested properly. I don’t want to watch a Chennai lookalike ground in UK…
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Amit, there’s 0% chance of Jimmy playing in the CT and 1% chance Broad will play. He hasn’t played an ODI since the WC and his white-ball record since 2011 is pretty ordinary. There’s an accepted narrative among English cricket writers that he’s been left behind by the innovations of the last few years – although I’d have been inclined to stick with him and aim to develop his variations. That he’s a better bowler than any of the current ODI seamers seems kinda obvious!
I expect Mark Wood will play if fit. Finn might come into consideration if he has a stellar start to the English season but I very much doubt it.
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“….., Hales, …. had nice cameo(s)”
What?? Hales score 9 off 18 and looked very poor (as he so often does).
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Typo, was meant to be Moeen. Duly amended on the piece.
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I must admit that at 60 odd for 4 down, I expected India to be all out for around 275 at best, with Virat scoring a valiant ton.Amazing innings by Kedar, though at 31 years and not physically very fit, I doubt if he could make the first 11 for the CT or the World Cup.
The Indian bowling did not show up yesterday, especially in the last 10 overs. Yuvi might get 2 more chances, and Dhoni a few more. Rohit Sharma ought to replace Dhawan, and Manish Pandey deserves a chance too (a three-way tussle between Manish, Yuvi and Kedar I guess).
As for England, I think they did extremely well to score 350. However, I was baffled by the use of Moeen and Rashid towards the end of the chase. After Kohli and Kedar got out, there were some easy overs by the spinners allowing the new batsmen to milk the singles and the occasional two. And I think they missed a couple of run out chances as well.
Overall, a perfectly ordinary ODI in India on a pitch which had nothing for the bowlers, and where the bowlers also were content to just bowl their quota and not really tried to beat the conditions. A T20 mindset is never good for an ODI bowler.
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English writer notices KP shock:
http://www.espncricinfo.com/blogs/content/story/1076942.html
I’d prefer a bit more anger than sadness and a bit more precision on why he isn’t playing – but any acknowledgement of his existence is close to a miracle these days. Unsurprisingly, the writer is one of those horrible blogger types rather than someone with a foot in the regular press corps.
It’s a shock he’s still only 36…..
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That’s what giving up feels like…
seemed like a “fanboy” article though 😉
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Not sure if Jarvis is on a Kolpak deal, or otherwise qualifies as English. But Zimbabwe’s Kyle Jarvis is probably incorrect, as he specifically retired from international cricket to pursue a county contract.
Oh, and it was quite funny to be reminded again that Pietersen was told that he’d be considered for selection if he scored some runs in county cricket , yet that Buttler had to play all of 1 game (42 runs at a SR of 145 – that is real FC batting!) in a year to get his spot back.
In some respects, though this is the best article that could be written about Pietersen, without (having to) point(ing) to all the lies, and hypocrisy of the ECB. Well directed anger could not avoid having to do just that.
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Jon Hotten writes really well, always a pleasure to read his stuff.
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On another point, I wonder if either of Chris or Sean can start a thread called, “How did they lose in Wellington”, in reference to the Banglas spectacular fold v the Black Caps?
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I’d have thought the no-brainer was not to arrange matches that clash with the IPL after you’ve discovered what a wonderful thing it is?
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It will be really funny if The ECB and their media Wurlitzer now face the same problem they had with KP 5 years ago. Will players be threatened with having their central contracts withdrawn if they go?
They all wanted to make it a personal thing with KP…….” He is difficult, SA, not one of us” funny if it all comes around again.
Gentleman, open your secret dossiers, and start watching for those players who keep looking out of the window.
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Random ponderings…
What if england let their IPL contingent stay longer, then lose to Ireland? There would be all sorts of recriminations against Strauss et al. They have made their bed by scheduling matches at this time.
As Simon says, the IPL is either a good thing for developing players, or England matches are important. Its an insult to the fans (remember them) to put out a team with potentially half your ‘regular’ 11 missing due to other commitments. Injuries, or resting because of an insane schedule is one thing but to play a match when your ‘gun’ players are booked for the IPL is dumb. Recalling players early is equally dumb because it denigrates the whole purpose of going to the IPL. they won’t get the experience the should if the teams know they are going to lose them – why build a team arounf them.
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Exactly.
As long as the ECB schedule matches during this window, English players, who have a chance of representing England, will be less valuable, especially since the Ireland games are staged at the end of the IPL – the business end of the tournament. That, and the fact that they usually set a steep minimum price (certainly compared to the South Africans, West Indians and New Zealanders), don’t help their causes at all.
So in effect, the ECB are helping Pietersen here (by willingly reducing the competition he has to contend with to land a contract), with their own idiotic scheduling.
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It seems like an ok T20 attack – plenty of variation suggests a bowling attack who should just about be able to cobble together enough good overs, and avoid any real meltdowns, to defend 200. By the time the batsman figures any of them out, someone else is bowling.
But we don’t have a single bowler who could bowl, say, 5 overs in a row for less than 30 in the middle overs, never mind 10 overs for 50 like Jadeja.
The openers bowled ok, in contrasting styles, but after that, it was a shit-show.
Wasn’t impressed with the fielding either – as a fielder, you know you have lost the match when the batsmen just starting taking singles off every ball, no matter how tight you put your infielders. Its something that normally happens in amateur cricket where the probability of a quick pick-up and direct hit are limited. But India were just jogging 5 singles an over + a boundary = 9 an over. Cut out half of those singles, and you win the game.
Also, how often does it happen that you focus so much on the “gun” batsman, that you take your eye off the other bloke. Jadhav scored 120 off 76 balls ffs. How did England let THAT happen? What were their plans for getting him out or at least stopping him scoring?
Forget Kohli, if England had stopped Jadhav at any point, they would have won the game.
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“the impression remains that the official passing of the Test baton from Cook to his anointed successor is only being delayed while England are somehow trying to find a way to beat Virat Kohli’s India in limited-overs cricket”.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-4125578/Joe-Root-insists-ready-captain-England.html
I can’t see anything from the quotes that remotely supports that “impression” – so I wonder where Newman’s getting it from?
Root says he’s ready. What’s he supposed to say? He’s hot ready? He’s an immature little gobshite? Root says he hopes Cook will stay. What’s he supposed to say? In the name of God, go?
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Without seeing the wording of the questions, I’d reckon “I hope he’ll stay” is a very stock response, but “I’m ready” is more than a stock response. It’s a gentle prod.
I imagine Cook is doing his Kenneth Williams impression back home: “Infamy, Infamy…”
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Liew’s report of the same press conference has the same “impression” as Newman:
“Overhanging all of this, in an unspoken sort of way, is the likelihood that Root is about to become the captain of England at some stage in the next few months. With Alastair Cook on the verge of stepping down after a disastrous Test series in India before Christmas, Root is the clear choice to replace him, and thus essentially the captain-elect. We know this. He knows this”.
It’s surely stretching it to call the end of the Ashes “the next few months”?
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I do wonder if this is all the biggest con going. If Cook does go, is it really his choice or in fact is this a sacking dressed up to look like a royal resignation?
Seeing as they can’t wait to tell us continually, it is Alasdairs choice alone, and seeing as I don’t believe anything they say you do wonder if the deal is the following……
Go now, and you can go with dignity, and the promise of lucrative contracts in the future. You can imagine Strauss telling him…..” One day my boy, all this can be yours.” ……” We can get you lots of media work when you retire.”
On the other hand, refuse to go, and life won’t be quite so easy. Is Cook dilly dallying? We still haven’t had the definitive leak yet. Amazing! Just shows what the media pack can do when they don’t want to leak something.
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Is Cook maybe slowly seeing how many “so-called friends” he has in reality?
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Dullard:
“There is a a growing sense of invincibility about Kohli, the game’s most fearless chaser who lies fourth on the all-time list of one-day century makers with 27. He has passed 50 in 10 of his last 14 innings and reached three figures on five occasions”.
This isn’t the first time I’ve seen that stat about Kohli’s “last 14 innings”. He may have a personal “sense of invincibility”. What Dullard isn’t mentioning is that India actually lost 8 of those 14 matches.
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Shinny toy was on 5 live last night. He thinks Kohli is from another planet. (Not at all over the top.)
It’s not as if the worlds bowling attacks are the best they have ever been at the moment. Good luck to Kohli he is a great player, but the over action is part of the medias modern craze with ” the best ever” narrative.
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Kohli is obviously a phenomenal batsman and the best currently in ODIs (only a fit ABDV would be a serious rival).
AS for the GOAT, Viv and him have very similar SRs. However Viv’s SR was 24 above the average for his era (his 90 to 66 for overall ODIs 1975-91). Kohli’s is 9 above the average of his era (90 to 81 in overall ODIs 2008-today). Viv’s record also includes the tail-end of his career while Kohli’s stats represent him at his probable peak.
It’s like saying some of the current big drivers in golf are the GOATs without acknowledging the norms of, say, the era when Tiger Woods started out.
No surprises that Shiny Toy is one of the most egregious offenders. I get the feeling that a piece on Kohli by The Plagiarist cannot be far away…..
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I don’t think I’m overreacting when I believe Kohli is better than Tendulkar.
He’s probably the best in several generations. Indian colleagues at work think I’m nuts.
I’ve watched him closely for over a year now and I think he will finish with a Test average at 60 and well over 10,000 runs. That will be better than any of the generation before him headed by Lara and Ponting. And I would wager he has the application that would’ve seen him succeed in bowler-dominated days.
His white ball stats will be the best of anyone. They already are. So I don’t mind Shiny or FICJAM going OTT with him.
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I’m not going to tippy-toe into the Tendulkar/Kohli minefield!
I wasn’t denying Kohli’s exceptional quality for a moment. I would point out though, for example that Kohli’s number of ODI centuries is being treated, at the moment, as if it is a record way above what anyone else has achieved. Kohli is averaging one century every 6-7 matches. Amla has 23 centuries in 140 matches which is a virtually identical record and his average and SR are within 1 of Kohli’s. QDK has 11 centuries in just under 70 matches, has a better SR and has only just turned 24 years old.
I’m saying anyone here I’ve mentioned is better or worse than anyone else. They are all fantastic players. I’m just saying that Kohli’s record isn’t quite as without parallel as phrases like Vaughan’s “on another planet” imply.
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I think that the losses show that cricket is a team game and India has issues with its batting as well as bowling. We are number 3 and kohli is keeping us there as otherwise we would have sunk further down.
I do understand the fact that adding kohli to the best ever tag helps in generating eyeballs but the reality is that he has hit a very high level currently. As you rightly pointed out, kohli may have a SR lower than Viv but you have to see it in the context of the teams they play for. Viv had a great cushion in both batting and bowling. Kohli is better off than Sachin was in that the Indian team is overall better but our bowling and batting exclusive kohli is nothing spectacular.
That is why some of the extravagant sounding praise
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The future of ODIs? Shiny Toy sees one less than capacity crowd and posts a Twitter poll; Tim Wigmore produces this:
http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/1077082.html
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Therein lies the difference!
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