Everyone on this forum knows how big a fan of Jaques Kallis I am, and watching him against India I think that he is the most underrated cricket of all time. In a era of bash and crash he is a rare sight for the true cricket lover, people talking about Gilchrist, Gayle, Pietersen & Symonds because of there smash and bash styles wheree the technique, patience and skill of players like Kallis, Dravid, Martyn and Yousuf were seen as boring to the uneducated eye.

I thought it would be fun to make an underrated XI.

Just look at the career so far for a man that is 32 years old

Test
Batting - 117 mat, 9509 runs at 57.28, Hs 189*, 29x100, 47x50
Bowling - 117 mat, 229 wickets at 31.22, BBI 6/54, BBM 9/92, econ 2.80, Sr 66.8, 7x4w, 5x5w

ODI
Batting - 260 inn, 9541 runs at 45.21, Hs 139, 16x100, 65x50
Bowling - 241 inn, 239 wickets at 31.53, BB 5/30, econ 4.80, Sr 39.2, 2x4w, 2x5w

He is worthy of being in any team in the history of the game purely as a batsman but when you add his handy bowling I see him as the modern day Sir Gary Sobers.

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Bill Ponsford - The only one who could play in Bradman’s company and make it a duet.

Its going to be hard.. so here it goes....

Marvan Attapatu
Akash Chopra
Brendon Mccullum
Jayawardane
Damien Martyn
Younis Khan
Daryl Tuffey
Arshad Khan (Always thought he was a very good off-spinner, and should have been given more oppurtunities)
Chaminda Vaas
Steve Harmison
Ashish Nehra

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"They look like a team destined to win the world cup"......
Ian Chappel during Ind v SA in the World Cup 20-20

Well here is my side, the players that are in this side may be rated outside of Australia but in Australia people wouldnt even know who half these players are, it is all decently modern players except for Ponsford because for an Australian he is not even mentioned.

1. Bill Ponsford (c)
2. Graeme Smith
3. Jacques Kallis
4. Damien Martyn
5. Mohammad Yousuf
6. Younis Khan
7. Andy Flower (wk)
8. Heath Streak
9. Jason Gillespie
10. Michael Holding
11. Stuart MacGill

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Bill Ponsford - The only one who could play in Bradman’s company and make it a duet.

I dont think g smith, or andy flower have ever been underrated, infact i think they are crowd favourites.

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"They look like a team destined to win the world cup"......
Ian Chappel during Ind v SA in the World Cup 20-20

When it comes to his batting, it seems to me that you get as many people saying Kallis is over-rated as you get people who say he's under-rated: all we really know is that he's got great discipline and mental toughness allied to a game that makes him unlikely to contribute to his own downfall.

I don't doubt for one moment that his bowling is generally under-rated... but I have some sympathy with those who question whether Kallis (like Hayden and Sangakkara) has been sufficiently tested as a batsman to warrant comparisons with all-time greats.

Bottom line: Kallis still seems somewhat mechanical compared to (for example) Lara and Jayawardene. Putting it another way, he seems to have triumphed more through hard work / training than through an instinctive feel for batting. I've nothing against that... but if there's any basis for that view, I'm not sure a claim to all-time greatness is warranted.

Oh, come on. Plenty of batsmen with a claim to greatness triumphed because they squeezed the most out of their ability. Ken Barrington started as a dasher, came back as a stonewaller and averaged 58- are you saying that he wasn't a great batsman? In fact, there's another Australian batsman who triumphed more through hard work while other batsmen around him had more natural ability. His name was Sir Donald Bradman.

I think the popularity depends which part of the world you are from. Hayden is none the greatest batsman to play the game, a batsman job is to score runs and he does it at a great strike rate and his average is up there with the best. He bullys bowlers and scores hundreds. What else can a batsman do? Rach you say that Hayden & Sangakkara has never been tested, if thats true then batsman like Lara, Tendulkar and Ponting to name a few have never been tested either.

The modern era has had some of the best bowlers ever.

Muralitharan - 729 wickets at 21.90
Warne - 708 wickets at 25.42
Wasim Akram - 414 wickets at 23.62
Waqar Younis - 373 wickets at 23.56
Donald - 330 wickets at 22.25
McGrath - 563 wickets at 21.64
Ntini - 340 wickets at 27.90
Pollock - 421 wickets at 23.12
Bond - 79 wickets at 22.39
Vaas - 339 wickets at 29.06
Ahktar - 178 wickets at 25.70
Gillespie - 259 wickets at 26.14
Kumble - 607 wickets at 29.02
Walsh - 519 wickets at 24.44
Ambrose - 405 wickets at 20.99

To say that Sangakkara and Hayden has never been tested is a little over the top, they have both played with and against some of the best bowlers ever, both pace and spin.

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Bill Ponsford - The only one who could play in Bradman’s company and make it a duet.

Not really. Lara, Ponting and Tendulkar all scored big runs in the 90s, but Hayden in this period only averaged a meagre 21. It was only after he came back when the bowling attacks were much weaker that he really started to dominate.

That's true, the modern era has had some terrific bowlers- but the standard of the overall attacks IMO has decreased a lot since 2001. Whereas West Indies had Ambrose, Walsh and Bishop in the 90s, they only had Taylor, Lawson, Edwards and Collymore in the 00s. Pakistan used to have Wasim, Waqar and Mushi- since then they've had Shoaib on a semi-regular basis, Sami and Kaneria. Even New Zealand used to have a handy pace attack of Cairns, Nash and Doull, since then they've had an intermittent Bond, Martin and Tuffey. South Africa' attack, it can be argued, is about as strong on paper as it used to be, but they haven't really performed up to their previous standards. So basically, although Hayden's had success against some good individual bowlers, he hasn't really proven himself agaisnt decent all-round attacks.

And if you're going to talk about the opposition that Hayden's faced and excelled against, the names of Warne, McGrath, Gillespie, Donald, Walsh, Ambrose, Wasim and Waqar really should be chopped from that list.

You also have to remember that Hayden at the start of his career was only a fringe player. I get very annoyed when people say a batsman have not proven themselves because of the bowlers they have faced. A batsman can only play against the bowlers that are around, guys like Hayden have dominated all that he has played against. What else can a batsman do?

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Bill Ponsford - The only one who could play in Bradman’s company and make it a duet.

There's no doubt in my mind that Hayden is the best opener in the world right now, along with Sehwag, and you're right that every batsman can only face the opposition put in front of him. What I'm saying is that I don't think he's proved himself enough against genuinely great bowlers, just several very good ones, so I'm not sure if that's enough to call him an all-time great batsman.