Message Board Archives

1.W.G. GRACE

2. FRANK WORRELL

3.KERRY PACKER

4.DON BRADMAN

5.BASIL D'OLIVEIRA

6.C.L.R.JAMES

7.RICHIE BENAUD

8.SACHIN TENDULKAR

9.SHANE WARNE

10. GARRY SOBERS

In reply to Dukes

11. VOR

In reply to Dukes

Viv Richards ahead of Sobers to me
Tendulkar is not even in the top 50
Imran Khan is in my Top 10

In reply to Dukes

Allen Stanford

In reply to FanAttick

As a casual observer of the game, not familiar with where and for whom Garry Sobers played during his many years in the sport your position is understandable.

Garry Sobers first toured Australia in 1960-61 when world cricket was in the doldrums.It was that tour of Australia that rekindled interest in cricket ,culminating in a ticket tape parade in Melbourne at the end of the series when more than 100,000 people lined the streets to say thank you to the Frank Worrell led WI team for playing cricket the way it was meant to be played.
Sir Donald Bradman decided that the 3 architects of the West Indies powerful display needed to come back the following seasons to continue the Renaissance of Australian cricket and he chose the 3 weakest Sheffield Shield teams to put them in.The weakest team, South Australia got Sobers and the two other weak teams got Hall and Kanhai.They all had marvelous seasons and Australian cricket flourished.
Sobers was then recruited to be the face of two teams dedicated to spreading world cricket in hitherto non-cricketing nations such as Malaysia,Hong-King,Fiji, Bermuda and Toronto amongst others.
The teams were E.W Swanton's team and The International Cavaliers.
In one famous match in Malaysia more than 1,000 spectators turned up to see Sobers the phenomenal batsman and holder of the cricket world record of 365* only to see him dismissed for a duck.He made up for that by opening the bowling and taking 5 wickets in 5 overs for 2 runs including 2 wickets in his first over. which was a maiden.
It is estimated that Sobers played and/or coached cricket in more than 60 countries during his career.

In reply to FanAttick

Muralitheran needs to be on the list. His bowling I mean his flinging action I think was the genesis of the 15 degree rule.

In reply to Dukes

Ask any knowledgeable fan from Australia, England, Pakistan and India who had the bigger global impact and the answer will be IVA Richards by a country mile…Viv’s impact expanded well beyond the boundary…

Sobers was seen more for his turn up collar partying drinking culture than even what he achieved on the field…

Aside from his batting prowess Viv was arguably the most successful captain in WI history

By the way Collie Smith was way more talented than Sobers…I wont even get into the unfortunate circumstances surrounding his demise…and who may or may not have been responsible

In reply to FanAttick

Your response moves me to quote the late great Professor Rolf Carlton Richards (no relation to your hero) who once said

Young man your arrogance is only superseded by your ignorance.

In reply to Dukes

In reply to FanAttick

I would agree I am no Rolf Carlton Richards!!!!!!!


BRILLIANT MAN DAT

In reply to Dukes

This is certainly a thought provoking thread. first off let me offer my congratulations to young Chanderpaul. I hope this century will be the first of many more to come.

To give a learned response to the statement posed requires some serious research which would detract from this sunday morning exercise . My 10 are:
01. WG Grace
02. Kerry Packer
03. Bradman
04. Kapil Dev- started the Indian cricket renaissance in 1983.
05. Clive LLoyd - Leader of the Caribbean cricket miracle.
06. John Arlott - Doyen of radio commentators
07. CLR James- Led Unrelenting campaign for a Black WI captain which ultimately transformed the game. Also his success at adding an intellectual approach to cricket writing.
08. D'Olivera- centre of race struggle with SA which in the end captured attention of Commonwealth and the world
09. Richie Benaud - Really brought cricket into the TV age.
10. Chris Gayle - Greatest salesman for T20 cricket
Warne, Tendulkar, Sobers were just great players. Could add dozens more

In reply to DonD

No list like this is accurate without the name of George "Atlas" Headley. He brought the West Indies into contention.


//

In reply to DonD

Thank you for responding to this thread

That list is not my work but something I saw on Facebook.

Like you, I recognize that an in depth research endeavor would be needed to properly address this topic.

I must say however off the top of my head, that the current dominance of Indian cricket is largely due their phenomenal production of fast bowlers and the concomitant ability of their batsmen to adequately play fast bowling.This can be easily traced back to numerous fast bowling clinics instituted at the dawn of this new century as well as the production of wickets that encourage fast bowling.
A simple easy statistic.India has produced 6 fast bowlers since this new millennium who have taken 100 test wickets.In their entire test history before that, they only produced 3 fast bowlers with 100 test wickets
I say all that to say that I ascribe this change to what I suggested above rather than to the inspiration of Kapil Dev,fantastic cricketer though he was.

In reply to Ewart

Good call Ewart …without question Headley has to be in the reckoning

In reply to Dukes I included Kapil Dev because he led India to world cup victory in 1983. This success has in the long run transformed Indian cricket and world cricket. I only included 2 players because of their playing prowess, ie Bradman -his superlative test batting performances. Similarly Gayle as related to T20. T20 is the most popular and lucrative format today. I ignored Headley because it seems to me that we are more concerned with impact on world cricket more than national teams.

In reply to DonD

Would you consider the fact that some dared to call Bradman the White Headley because he was so good could be seen as inspirational to all non-white cricketers around the world.Headley was in fact the first great batsman who was not white.

In reply to Dukes
Dukes I am quite content to live with the conventional wisdom that Bradman was the greatest test batsman of all times. Calling Bradman the white Headley was a great compliment to Headley and the Caribbean people. Similarly,Headley was more frequently called the Black Bradman.

In reply to DonD

I was merely postulating that as the first non-white GREAT Batsman, Headley might have been seen as inspirational not only to West Indians but also Indians,Pakistanis and other non-white cricketing nations.

Gayle!

In reply to Dukes

On the other hand West Indies prepare spin friendly wickets while attempting to produce quality fast bowlers.