So how do you explain Ramprakash's return in his 6 games in Australia: the toughest away Tests faced by any batsman of his generation.That's an average of 50 but WITHOUT the distortion introduced by a single, unrepresentative super-score. Look at the actual innings and they are even more impressive: Ramps didn't just surpass his colleagues in those games... he towered over them.

In Crawley's case... you could have argued for ditching him BEFORE his final tour of Australia... but ditching him AFTER it made no sense whatsoever: he held his head as most around him failed... and his two unbeaten innings.... though doing little for his stats.... were more impressive than many knocks that have returned far, far bigger totals. No matter what had gone before.... the series justified sticking with him:Sure, he had spent the early part of his career looking suspect outside off stump... but not half as suspect outside off stump as young Cook. The guy was at least as worthy of sticking with as Tresco, Butcher and Hussain... and I believe the selectors / management of the time agreed as much. I can't recall my sources.. but as I understand it, Crawley made way so that the management had scope to try others in the hope of finding a latter day Bradman - not because he was any less worthy of a spot than his colleagues.

Rachael - in 02/03 Crawley was extraordinarily tentative, with a huge fear of getting out. Although his stats seem impressive, I recall his painstaking innings at Sydney - it was fine when Stewart was in, but then he displayed a complete inability to take any initiative whatsoever, and did not change his game when the tail joined him. England's last five wickets fell for around 30.

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Hugely tentative... or supremely professional? Crawley batted like a man committed to going on, and on, and on: Stewart came in a flailed like a man convinced he couldn't last and just rode his luck to the inevitable delivery.

For all his bravado... Stewart never graduated much beyond a schoolboyish obsession with putting bat to ball. He could manage to leave balls that demanded to be left... but he was never at ease unless playing cricket as if it were a poor man's baseball.

Crawley's career since that successful tour has gone from strength to strength: few batsmen have been as difficult to dislodge in recent years, or as good at turning solid starts into matchwinning knocks.

Shame it hasn't been with England

Gosh how exciting, let's play 'cherry pick the stats game' and see how much fun we can have.

So, how do you explain this -

v Zimbabwe 2 3 0 75 56 15 4 25.00 0 1 0

or this -

v Pakistan 3 5 1 31 17 12* 2 7.75 0 0 2

or this -

v New Zealand 7 11 1 204 69* 31 30 20.40 0 1 2

I could go on but it's boring isn't it? It doesn't mean anything just pulling stats out and holding them up as an example to prove what is an extremely tenuous point.

In answer to your question, I have no doubt that Ramprakash raised his game against Australia and showed glimpses of the potential that he clearly had, but sadly wasn't able to reproduce consistently enough against all opposition to realistically maintain a place in the Test side, but as far as you're concerned you would have selected him regardless because of his returns against Australia, did I get that right?

You do not select players because they 'happen' to have good returns against specific countries, you select them produce consistent performances against all opposition - home and away and that should continue to be the criteria for selection in my opinion, and that's precisely the reason Ramprakash was not persisted with, regardless of his returns against Australia.

Mark Ramprakash is a wonderfully fluid and elegant strokemaker with excellent technique, as his returns in Country Cricket demonstrate, it's a great shame he wasn't able to reproduce that kind of form on the Test stage consistently enough to hold his place.

It doesn't matter that Ramps was 'elegant', at the end of the day he's judged on his returns and an average from 52 games of just above the mid twenties simply isn't good enough in International Test Cricket.

I know why our perspectives and opinions on cricket are so diverse - we look at it from totally different perspectives. You appear to enjoy the technical and skill aspect to the game whereas I look at it from a results orientated perspective. That's why I like gritty street fighters like Hussain and Collingwood who may not be the most elegant players around but they grit it out and dig deep when it matters to grind out results, which is presumably why you dislike them so much - they're not always nice to look at and watch but they get results - and that's what really matters at the end of the day.

I've no objection to arguments that Fletcher was right to dispense with Ramps: I disagree, but they are fair enough - I'd just like to see them made without the unsustainable argument that Ramps "couldn't make the step up to Test Cricket": one only need prove one's worth once against the strongest opponents to dispense with that argument.

The argument that ditching Ramps was right can be made (more coherently) without that argument.

For what it's worth.... I long defended Fletcher's right to pick bits-n-pieces nobodies and folk with more temperament than talent because (quite aside from anything else) it was quite self-evidently the only way he stood any chance of delivering. I also felt that for so long as he was coach.. he needed the opportunity to show just how far his approach could take the side.

Whilst defending Fletcher's right to build a side around the temperaments of Tresco, Hussain and Collingwood.. I never lost sight of the fact that other ways existed: the fact that Fletcher didn't have the skills to get the most out of key players should certainly not, to my mind, be taken as evidence that those players were incapable of fulfilling their potential.

I continue to regard getting the most out of such talents as the principle responsibility of the coach: I don't doubt for one moment that a different coach could have got much, much more from Crawley, Ramps and Caddick back then... and from Bell, Read and Harmison more recently.

Now we just need to hope that Moores might be the man to do that for the next more fragile temperament...

An average of 20 odd from 52 games shows he couldnt.

To be fair it took us quite far. I'd happlily have him back as coach as long as he wasnt a selector.


I doubt it, Moores is to cricket what MacClaren was to football and we all know where that ended up!

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Mark.

As Pie Chucker rightly mentioned, a Test Cricket average in the high 20's IS a sustainable argument not just beleived by me, but pretty much the whole world, or are you happy for our middle order batsmen to have an average in the high 20's after 52 tests, because I sure as hell know that I don't.

Ummmm, okay !

Fair enough, I think we simply need to agree to disagree on this one. As far as I'm concerned Fletcher has been this countrys most successful cricketing coach in the past 50 odd years and certainly within my own cricket watching and playing lifetime which is now about 30 years. He not only took the side from virtually bottom of the rankings to second, he won back, albeit briefly the Ashes, something else not really achieved in recent times. To me, that's some achievement, and demonstrates quite unequivocably, that his methods worked, because the results show they did.

Some people may not have liked some of the methodologies and techniques he employed as a coach, but no-one can say they were not effective.

But you're arguing that he could have got a lot more out of his players than he did and I simply do not agree and the results speak for themselves.

How? You ditch players because they don't perform. How do you know that they don't perform? Looking at their stats. Ramprakash, as a top-order batsman, has an average roughly on the same lines as Daniel Vettori, Richard Hadlee or Shaun Pollock- not even close to being good enough.

Perhaps, but ultimately it's the player's responsibilty to step up to the plate. Ramprakash couldn't do that, which is why he was dropped.

I find the most laughable thing about the Ramprakash debate is the fact that because he won a z-list celebrity dancing competition that he must be mentally tougher now and will be able to adapt to international cricket again.If anybody believes that then they are mad.

Ramps,like Hick and Crawley had more than enough chances and they failed,end of discussion.

What does this have to do with Matt Prior????

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