Memories Of Greatest Cricketers - - #8 Shane Warne

[mgb]

How about Ian Botham :P

[vramesh]

Hi Friends,
I saw this thread for the first time. I have videos of most of these matches...pm me if you need them

[vramesh]

But Imran had a long team meeting and lot of strategies were discussed. Iqbal and Abdul Qadir as a part of the strategy went and met Bishen Singh Bedi and asked for tips Bedi gladly gave the same. his main advise was dont try anything extra. Pitch the ball in the right area and the turf will do the rest.

Dear Mr.Murali,
Hats off to you for your pains-taking write up. The story about Bedi appeared only in Outlook before the 98-99 series and I notice you have precisely recollected it. Cheers!

[vramesh]

Great post Mr.MuraLi. Felt like I was following the Aus-Pak match real time.

1987 England tour - Pak had played 5 tests and won 1-0. If my memory serves me right, it was the third test at Headingly (?) which produced the result. If I am not off the mark, it was an innings victory for Pakistan and of course the hero was Imran. He had a 10 wicket match haul (or was it 11?) and Pak triumphed in a low scoring match.

As you were unsure I looked up cricinfo. The match was indeed at Headingley, Leeds. 10 wickets for Imran and 5 for Wasim.

A note about the Leeds test...Pakistan came to England and were soon out of confidence, as their famed pace bowling line-up conceded big totals(440+ and 368) in the first 2 Tests. Their batsman were all at sea. It was rain that prevented their embarrassment in the first 2 Tests.

Came Headingley and its seaming wicket: It was the awesome Imran who lead from the front taking 3-37 and restricted England in the 1st knock. But credit has to go to Salim Malik, who scored a matchwinning Dravid-classic 99 to take them to 300+. Till then he had been accused of being a flat-track bully(Malik also had two gems of 82* and 84* at Leeds in the 1992 tour).

It was on that July Monday morning when I woke up to see the headline "Imran tops 300 wickets, Pakistan sitting pretty", after seeing Pat Cash win Wimbledon previous night. Imran 7-40 and innings defeat to England.

In India, Pak were outplayed totally in first 4 tests, Miandad and Qadir being flops. Came back to win at Bangalore through Qasim.

In England, Pak listless in first 2 tests...when the weather gave relief, Imran stepped in and took them to victory.

When we say 92 WC semifinal, everyone talks of Inzamamul Haq. Look carefully at the scorecard, when Pak struggled initially, there is Imran coming in at #3 and scoring an anchoring innings of 44!

That's the genius of Imran Khan. My favorite cricketer from age 6 and I used to copy his bowling action though the pronounced jump before delivery used to hurt a lot

[P_R]

Welcome to the thread vramesh.

[P_R]

Next....

Arguably one of the greatest wicketkeepers in the game

Rod Marsh

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He was the first keeper to achieve 300+ dismissals in tets - finished with a then world record of 355. As a competent batsman he also has three test centuries to his credit.

Lets hear more about him...

[vramesh]

A very competitive keeper who grew up in leaps and bounds once he got into the Test team. Forged a great partnership with Lillee and Thomson. A very aggressive and dangerous batsman, he wouldn't stay much long but if he did, would cause serious damage.

Marsh - very good to pace. Not much chance to spin(mallett) or seam(Gilmour).

Australia had a long history of legendary keepers and it wasnt easy for Marsh to step into their shoes. Tallon, Oldfield and Grout are reputed to be their all-time greats, Healy might join them too.

A quick recap of keepers since 70s and their strengths:
Knott - easily outstanding of the lot. Kept well to raw pace(Snow/Willis), quality spin(Emburey/Underwood), seam/swing(Hendrick/Arnold). Excellent player of top quality spin bowling(Bedi/Pras/Venkat/Chandra). If we had thrown in Bangladesh/Lanka teams in his time, his stats would have been phenomenal.

Healy - Next all time great. Valuable bat. Outstanding to spin(Warne/Bevan/May). Good to pace although McGrath/Gillespie not in same class of Lillee/Thomson. Not much opportunity to prove himself to medium pace.

Taylor - Very ordinary bat and very good classic keeper.

Gilchrist - Extraordinary bat, very okay keeper.

Dujon - Delightful batsman, when he made the test team as a batsman, he was not yet regular keeper for his state. Grew rapidly to be a great keeper for pace. Very acrobatic in movement though little op for spin.
I read somewhere by an aussie guy describing a chance dropped by Parthiv Patel, "Dujon would have caught this while flirting with a woman and holding a glass of wine in his other hand"

[vramesh]

I heard that before Somerset he was signed to play for some other county. But his contract was terminated because they were annoyed with his behaviour of throwing his wicket away when he didn't find the bowling challenging enough

Can someone confirm if that is true !

I have 2 different autobios of his - will check and let you know...I do recollect that relations got very sour between them and it involved bit of Garner, Botham too...

[vramesh]

I heard that before Somerset he was signed to play for some other county. But his contract was terminated because they were annoyed with his behaviour of throwing his wicket away when he didn't find the bowling challenging enough

Can someone confirm if that is true !

Somerset were having a lean time around mid 80s so it does mean the bowling was challenging enough Viv and Garner were rumoured to be not giving their best. But the real issue was that Martin Crowe was considered next to Viv as their second-choice overseas player. At that time, Border prematurely terminated his contract with Essex and Essex approached Somerset for permission to take Crowe. Fearing they might lose Crowe to Essex, Somerset went ahead and fired Viv and recruited the kiwi.

On hearing of Viv's sacking, Botham promptly stepped down.

[P_R]

Ok thanks for the clarification vramesh.
Crowe for Richards !!
Even I, who haven't followed either closely enough, find that atrocious.