Kaspa v Lee

[Leafy Seadragon]

Seamer, firstly no dramas on the time to reply - I often don't get to the boards for a few days myself. In terms of the Gillespie V Kaspa discussion, I'm not sure that I would have tried justifying such an argument with more stats, particularly when they contradict those on the Cricinfo Statsguru. According to Statsguru, Gillespie's taken 42 wickets and Kaspa 35. To follow through on your discussion, I checked the dismissals. I'm not suggesting that this is perfect, but I took more time than I wanted to and came up with:

Kaspa:
Bats: 24 (69%)
Bowls: 11

Dizzy:
Bats: 28 (67%)
Bowls: 14

So, there's no difference there, and if you include the full year, the basis for my original point, then Dizzy edges it. However, this aside, I don't agree with the line of argument - how do you compare Sehwag, Tendulkar or Dravid with Fleming the way Flem batted over the summer?, or even a batsman on a batting wicket against one on a bowler's wicket? With such a small sample set, sub-sets such as this IMO are even less rigorous an argument than the broad descriptive stats.

Given that we agree that raw stats don't tell all the story, we're reliant on our interpretation of how the bowlers have performed. I too have watched over the past year (much of the NZ tour aside) and have formed a distinctly different opinion on the value of batsmen & dismissals (the India tour in particular). I'm happy to hear any argument that this perception is wrong, but looking over the scorecards basically just emphasised how much Gillespie and Kaspa are supporting bowlers to McGrath (important supporting nonetheless), rather than emphasised any particular suggestion that Kaspa or Gillespie has contributed more.
I think that we also agree on who the debate probably focuses - its probably Gillespie V Lee. In any case, I would expect that, provide Gillespie continues his improvement over the next few matches, the lineup will be the same as the last test. As a further thought, I think that should the Aussies go with a twin spin attack (something else I doubt), I think that it would probably be Kaspa that's rested, athough I wouldn't be 100% sure that SCG is the second spinner - two leggies seems a very brave tactic. The fact that the offie touring is untried at test level and basically on a learning trip would suggest to me that the four bowlers that have done it in the past will be asked to front up again for the first couple of tests.

[Seamer]

I won't argue with the stats you have provided Leafy. I manually went through each test and i think i might have missed the SL tour in the Aussie winter. The overall performance between the two is pretty even and very good, so deciding who has bowled better would have to come down to perception and opinion, and i suppose we will have agree to disagree.
I do agree that if we play two spinners, Kasprowicz will be the man to go and if they play Lee, Gillespie will be the man to go. Looking at the above stats, neither deserves to be replaced by Lee, but IMO, both Dizzy and Kaspa are bowling very poorly at the moment. I hope they come good soon, because i harbour strong reservations about Lee and feel he will be hammered once the shine has come off the ball.