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Originally Posted by Rachael  Few Aussies seemed to worry when McGrath, Gillespie and Warne were backed up by Lee and no other. I'd guess that almost all the most successful WI attacks of the past were also 4-man attacks... |
When you have an attack of McGrath, Gillespie, Lee and Warne then yes, 4 bowlers will do especially when you have 7 top class batman constantly posting 450 scores on the board. So its not really relevant to compare this to England. England have no bowlers in that class and our batting is far weaker.
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Originally Posted by Rachael The argument based on wickets per match is also completely spurious. |
No stats are perfect but it gives you a rough indication on how effective an attack would be. If you look at the Aussie attack above that equates to about 17 ish wpm which shows it will be effective. The great WI attacks of the early 80's averages even higher which back up the known fact that they were the greatest attack of all time.
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Originally Posted by Rachael A side will probably need to take 20 wickets in at least one match of a series to emerge victorious (though declarations might lead to success with fewer wickets). |
I'd love to know where you get this from. It makes no sense to say that. Look at most recent series and quite often 20 wickets fall to one side in nearly every match.
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Originally Posted by Rachael In most games (and most conditions), no bowler (or collection of bowlers) is going to run through any decent top order: what matters is simply capitalising when an opportunity arises - with the new ball, when overcast conditions allow swing, when the ball is reversing or when cracks / rough allow exploitation of the pitch. |
But then you have to have bowlers who are good enough and have enough variation to bowl sides out. Our 5 man attack consistently bowled all sides out. Moores 4 man attack has failed to do that.
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Originally Posted by Rachael Most matches against GOOD opposition should be drawn: for either side to lose should require a pretty abject performance with both bat (giving wickets away) AND ball (leaking runs). What matters is being able to capitalise in those few matches where a result can be forced. |
But the fact is unless the pitch is an absolute joke (as per one of the ones in the India v SA series) then most matches do have a good chance of ending in results. The fact of the matter is cricket is played by humans not automatons and bowlers bowl frequent bad balls and batsmen get out . I dont want to sound melodramatic but if bowlers didnt bowl bad balls and batsmen just blocked, test cricket would be a terrible spectacle. At the end of 5 days play the team batting first would be 100/1.The would be no point in playing as there would be no challenge or chance of a result
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Originally Posted by Rachael I also find the workload arguments spurious: bowlers are only overbowled when a bowler breaks down and the occasional bowling sucks... and that's rare. |
If you look at the number of bowlers suffering injuries you will see its more than rare. Granted bowlers don't break down often in matches but they miss a lot of games due to injury. Back to back matches and the current scheduling of series isn't good for a bowlers health!
Just look at recent England bowlers for the past few years:
Jones - crocked
Flintoff - crocked
Anderson - missed summer due to injury
Mahmood - as above
Hoggard - Hardly played in the last 18 months due to injury
and i could go on....