I many times answered but every time the argument got so intense that I just escaped to be part of countless wrestling matches...
So now I decided to put The Greatest XI on this blog to end the direct arguments for once and for all because here it can never get physical....
On a serious note, undoubtedly these are The Greatest Cricket Players of All time..
There are many others but, as Sports is a draconian path where one always had to leave way for the other, only 11 spots are available.....
As this team consists of players from 1877 to 2009 so please give me liberty to choose them from all across the history....
OPENERS....
JACK HOBBS---- The Best Opener Ever... Along with "Herbert Suttcliffe" he dominated the World Cricket for 2 decades(1910s and 1920s).. Still holds the World record of 197 first class centuries, he made 62000 runs in process...
VICTOR TRUMPER----The Grandest of All..He is considered as one of the two finest batsmen ever who walked on a cricket pitch(Bradman the other).. He as said was the batsman who can score even if the pitch is made on a swamp.. He was whole and soul of Australian batting for first 15 years of 20th century and died at age of 37..
3. DONALD BRADMAN----Only 1 sentence for him..... Cricket is a game of uncertainties, unless you have a Bradman...
4. W G GRACE---- Father of Cricket, Captain of England, Captain of MCC, Captain of Gentlemen(Cricket Club)...Played from 1865 to 1913, He 29 times made 1000 runs in the month of May. Greatest Athlete who played first class cricket till the age of 65 (debut at 17).. In a survey, 110 years ago, he was second most recognised face in Great Britain in whole 19 century(Prime Minister Gladstone being the first)..Doctor by profession, he never gave up his tag of amatuer and never became a professional, but his salary could be imagined by this, in his times "Everton" was the biggest football club and salary of top 12 players of Everton was equal what his club used to pay WG !!!!
In 1880s his annual income through Cricket was 30,000 pounds. Stadium signboards those days usually displays, 6 pence if WG will play and 3 if he wont !!!!
5.GARFIELD SOBERS---- A man who can perform any(any means any) job on a cricket field.. He can bowl at 80 miles per hour with new ball, can bowl spin, can bat at any order and whatever else you cannot even imagine.. Look at an example of his greatness.. When he retired from Test cricket he held 3 main records(of course many others too).. Maximum runs,Maximum wickets and Maximum catches in Test cricket....
6.STEVE WAUGH (CAPTAIN)---- Hard,Uncompromising, Rare and Eternal like Diamond... He transformed a group of boys into the most lethal and Horrendous Team in the history.. Broke the 80 year standing record of Warwarik Armstrong and above all in the process, became a player with uncomparable will-power and infinte surrender potential... In modern cricket He The Man among Boys....
7.ADAM GILCHRIST(WK)---- Undoubtedly he is most fierce hitter of cricket ball who also took the gloves behind the wicket.. I would have loved to choose Viv Richards but he can not keep wickets or Allan Knott who do not have such dominant batting skills... Also I need a Hitter as keeper because such a batting line up needs a quick run getter so that captain can declare the innings early and no keeper can deliver this better than Adam Gilchrist....
8.SHANE WARNE---- Magician !!!! The Best Spinner in 130 years of Test Cricket.. His number of preys cannot (although they are 708) match his skills and perfection.. The bowler who if takes 3 wickets in an innings, Those 3 will obviously be top batsmen of the side..A man who revolutionized the whole scene of the cricket in early 90s with his magic deliveries, even when he will be 70, can get a place in any test team..
If you think he is the lone spinner without partner so there is always Sir Gary Sobers to share the old ball with him...
9.HAROLD LARWOOD---- The Fastesssst... A man who in a single series created a impact on the World Cricket which could never be paralleled.. Larwood was the original and peerless executioner of unfamed "BODYLINE"... Douglas Jardine once said, You keep a coin on pitch and this man can pith the ball over that coins 6 times in an over... Unfortunate for us, speed measuring machines were not at his times but nearly all claims he was a lot faster than many 100 miles bowlers along with his pin point accuracy... Many times in english cricket, First Class County sides refused to play against Larwood on grassy tracks...He holds the record of highest score by a nightwatchman(98 runs) for nearly 7 decades which Alex Tudor breaks in 1999 against New Zeland....
His career was short as he never got oppurtunity to play after bodyline series of 1932-33 but he truly deserved what he never got...
10.FREDRICK SPOFORTH---- Nickname as "The Demon".. He is the man responsible for what we today know as "The Ashes".. In 1882 he devastated England where he took first hat-trick of test cricket.. He did not let them make 10 runs with 7 wickets left which is considered as most lethal spell of all times... That Oval Test later laid foundation for Ashes...He was the bowler who many times was, by english batsmen(including WG), given money for not to tour Britain so they dont have to face the troubles of his ferocious pace..
The first bowling superstar, The Demon, is really will be a fitting opening bowler for such a team...
11.SYDNEY BARNES---- Most Successfull bowler ever... Considered as "Bradman of Bowling".. He took 189 wickets in 22 matches with unbelievable average of 16 which is still a record(My all time favourite Mcgrath is second with 22)... His duel with Victor trumper was one of the finest duels in sporting history... He is believed to be The Finest bowler by all who saw him or played with or against him...
12th Man.. FRED TRUEMAN---- LEGEND!!!! He ruled the world cricket for 15 years, in exactly mid of 20th century, Fred Trueman was a true Fast Bowler in all respect.. The first bowler to take 300 wickets, he worked whole his childhood in mines and as said his game always showed how one can fight a new battle each day...
no place for sachin.....
ReplyDeletewtf! no place for sachin....
ReplyDeleteWhom should we exclude ????
ReplyDeletewhat Steve Waugh is doing in here.....
ReplyDeleteThis team cannot stand whole day against Akram and likes of Muarlidharan. Garfield Sobers is great because he had max runs and wickets...then sachin has most runs, centuries, and so many thing.....this list is good but not the best.
ReplyDeleteJACK HOBBS---- The Best Opener Ever... Along with "Herbert Suttcliffe" he dominated the World Cricket for 2 decades(1910s and 1920s).. Still holds the World record of 197 first class centuries, he made 62000 runs in process..
ReplyDeletefirst class records are also very good of W V Raman...and G Hick....so cut all craps...Hobbs is good but not necessarily better than Glenn Turner and Sunil Gavaskar
Sir, you want to say first class is bullshit ?? bradman had 99 avg in test but 95 in first class..
ReplyDeleteLikes of Greame Hick are completely failed in test but Jack hobbs was The Champion wherever he played..
And yes about glenn turner and gavaskar.. They were legend but we have only two spots for openers and i felt Jack Hobbs is slightly better than rest...
there is no asian in the list!!!!
ReplyDeleteJust one word for the list..
ReplyDeleterubbish.....
no lara .. ?? no sachin .. ??
ReplyDeletesucks .. !!
fuck sachin mooh me lo uska...hes useless....if i play 40000 matches then i will also have all the records.he is totally inconsistent
ReplyDeleteplease do not abuse sachin... he is the asset of indian team for two decades but he is not qualified enough to share the field with such legends....
ReplyDeleteSachin is not such a big cricketer to be included in Best test XI,
ReplyDeleteExactly.... If you see last two decades he and lara are no doubt greats but in test cricket as whole there are lot better and bigger names...
ReplyDeleteWhat about bowlers in the list ????
fuck u.............no sachin, no indian.....fuck u mo' fucka..............
ReplyDeletefuck u son of a bitch......no Indians in d team........Indians are the GOD of this game.......
ReplyDeleteLeave this God crap...
ReplyDeleteNot a single Indian deserves a place...
Sunil gavaskar is no better opener than Hobbs and Trumper..
Kapil dev is no better than Sir Garfield..
You yourself name one...
kapil is better than sehwag...........he has won the world cup when they are considered just underdogs.........
ReplyDeletesorry kapil is better than steve waugh
ReplyDeleteAbviousely kapil was crucial in !983 but its just one tournament..
ReplyDeleteSteve waugh did it everytime..
See the difference in Tait and Lee, before coming to international tait was considered better...
Matthew hayden was an international faliure before but see the results now...
Steve Waugh did it every time and with every player...
He is really unmatchable...
fuck you asshole ............no sachin...........fuck ur list !!
ReplyDeletewho the hell has given u a right to make such stupid list ???
ReplyDeleteplease tell what is the problem in the team...
ReplyDeletewhom should i omit ????
why dont u put sachin eveen don bradman said that he plays like me and no one can match him
ReplyDeleteaur ha jo aaapk postkiya who the hel r u shuld know that we r the one who make anyone greatttt
ReplyDeleteand not the great payers only can make their team
steve waugh for sure u should omit and W.G. grace also.i know u will say w.g. grace was father of cricket but that was all english media and you urself said that he wasn't professional cricketer.i remember once i read it somewhere when w.g. grace got out early he told the bowler that people haven't come to see you getting me out. they have come here to see my batting and asked the bowler to continue bowling.
ReplyDeletei would say just one thing that you trust a lot on media and old articles but they were overhiped. you do not value your generation cricketers like lara,tendulkar,allen donald,gavaskar,mcgrath,vivan richards. if you will show your kids recording the recording of kolkata test match,2002 vs. australiya they will not understand how hughe it was.likewise you have just builed some assumptions based on stories which were exagrated by good writers.
only bradman,garfield sobers,shane warne,gilly and harold larwood deserve the place which means 5 out of 11.rest should be some other.imagine tendulkar and bradman batting together. wow!!
@ravi... Don bradman said about his style of play...
ReplyDeleteSehwag looks like sachin in style doesnt mean he is equivalent or even comparpble to sachin....
and i can not understand your second comment..
plzz make it clear
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@jay... Steve Waugh ???? he was better and greater than Sachin in batting leave alone captaincy factor...
ReplyDeleteAnd even Lara is greater than Sachin so i will prefer lara batting with Bradman instead of Sachin(if i have to pick one)
W G was amatuer but professional and amatuer is just a tag and nothing to do with athletes ability.. nearly all olympians are amatuers...
I also heard that story and it was just sledging..
Umpire also gave him not out.. He was not very moral but he is in team on basis of his batting skills... Cricket team is not a temple where only good guys can come...
About exaggerated stories..
Todays writer cant write good stories???? A batsman made 180 runs and helped his team to chase 350 runs when pitch was so bad that curator refused to roll it due to the fact that pitch cannot bear rollers weight.. Captain of opposite team said if he(Jack Hobbs)would not have been in that team i could get them out twice under 350.
What exaggeration this story had..
Players like mike brearely and frank tyson and richie benaud who are watching this game for more than half a century are still there and they rates how great those players were..
If bradman have statistics so do other players in this team..
Now, how many times you saw full batting videos of Don Bradman so you are claiming he was great.. How many times you saw batting of sobers to say he deserves..
No hard feelings but i do feel is, you and many others know lot about bradman and sobers but heard little about Trumper or Hobbs...
So please go through history of cricket and you will find there are many greats other than Bradman...
At last i rarely saw the videos of these batsmen but the simple explanation is, the best car i sat in is Sonata but if you will ask me for one i will definately say RR Phantom...
None of them are my favourite but i want them in my team.. plaese go through and there are many other than what we saw on TV...
very good choice of players, i cant think of any contemporary player who can find a spot in a team like this. I would have put muttiah instead of shane warne but that may be because i cant play off spin as well as leg spin. Other player all deserve their spot!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@ anonymous.... Thanks a lot...
ReplyDeleteYou are the only one who said so...
Thanks again yaar...
May i know your name
9 out of 11.. obviously lara s way ahead of steve waugh..
ReplyDeleteok u say steve s a great captain..bt its also imp tat he played wit top players..mcgra warne gilly ponting lee..even ricky have done wel wit 'em..bt when they r out..see 'em now.lot of inconsistency..
In my view waugh has no place over ther..Lara obviously my pick ahead of him..becaus of his great talent n ability to play long innings..sachin s also a finest batsman of natural ability bt he cant play long innings..bt its all my view..
Good work dude!!
bt this time prepar a team frm this 2 decades..as ppl have seen this cricket..n cricket s of same level to match da players..:-)
hahahahaha
ReplyDeleteadam is not grest in test so why he is there
and where is sachin
u losers are so fond of that dim witted little pip-squeak called sachin. These players were real men not tiny little puppies like sachin who scores on flat batting tracks made by spineless indians who piss in their pants when they see a seaming/swinging/bouncing pitch. These players played in the harshest conditions unlike that little puppy sachin,who cries mummyyy whenever some one walks in front of the sight screen.
ReplyDeleteIf India wants to produce another Sachin, Teach a monkey to play cricket, make sure he plays only on flat batting tracks and keep him in the team even if he fails or not... wake up you perverts.
".imagine tendulkar and bradman batting together. wow!!" what a joke! imagine tendulkar facing larwood. U'd need diapers for the little bastard
ReplyDelete@anonymous... hi friend i m really happy you liked the selection but using such language for Sachin Tendulkar is not at all his honest evaluation..
ReplyDelete@ANONYMOUS i beg your pardon Mr. Anonymous but this is no way you talk about Sachin, who is undoubtedly, one of the LEGEND in cricket history. I am a die-hard Sachin fan, but still I wont ask Sir Praveen to keep him in the above list of THE GREATEST XI, as none can be replaced there. But still i would not accept your comments about Sachin.
ReplyDeleteYou say that people in those days played in harsh conditions.......what do you mean by that??? Do harsh conditions mean they played in some forest, or rain, or among insects or animals.......??? Even at that time they had proper grounds and pitches for playing cricket. Only difference was that they had less protection over their bodies. But at that time there were lack of inventions........ and if they had protection kits, then they were not fool enough not to use it............
Another thing I would like to point out is that the difference between the gameplay now and then. Video recordings were not in use at that time which you can see now for each and every ball. Players of the present have to play more cautiously than those in the past. Before every match starts, the strategies of the team include watching the previous videos of the key players, their style of play, their commonly made mistakes and hence according to that the team proceeds further. The batsmen and bowler have to continuously evolve else their style of play can be judged very easily. This was not possible in olden days. There must have been some evaluation but not to this extent.
Playing on flat pitches is not Sachin's mistake. And furthermore he is not the lone person playing on flat pitches...........why don't others play like him on the same pitches??? Why is the world uncapable of producing even one player in the present, who can even come near his records??? And yes, Sachin has proved himself on the pitches all around the world...........
About your thoughts of calling him a baby, that he cries for a screen shaking in front of him.......i would ask you a very humble question- Who would be so daring enough ( or rather stupid enough) to bat opposite to a screen shining in front of him??? Mr. Anonymous, have you ever tried catching a ball coming from a height, when the sun is overhead???
And to your most disgusting statement of calling him a puppy, if you call him a puppy then what do you call the other players.........??? pigs or worms???
"COME LARWOOD, AND SACHIN AGAIN SMASHES IT FOR A FANTABULOUS 4"
yup u r partially cprrect..but wen r players like warne (a magical bowler)n and gilli (incredible wicket keeper batsmen) there shud always b a place left vacant for the legend, carved SACHIN TENDULKAR. Gilliis an xtraordinary player that none can deny but he can never be compared to SACHIN TENDULKAR.The great Shane Warne has got TENDULKAR out a many times,but never forget SACHIN goin hard aginst him a lot lot more times... i kno a little bit of cricket as far i kno the only bowler who hav dominated SACHIN TENDULKAR is none other than Mr.simplicity (nothing ,just simple and accurate. sry 100% accurate) GLEN MCGRATH.
ReplyDeleteSteve Waugh is an awesum TEAM PLAYER no doubt abt it. TENDULKAR is far far better than him.
ReplyDeleteshane warne ..708 wickets ok fine....muralitharan played 20 test matches less than him...and crossed warne's career wickets ...isnt he fit to qualify...kapil dev , imaran khan , iam botham r they not gr8 ...atleast one of them shud hav been in..and likes of sunil gavaskar, viv richards ,sachin shud hav been considered....
ReplyDeletetendulkar is way better than steve waugh. also thr should not b w.g. grace. at that time cricket ws in primary stage. ok? & also thr is story , once w.g. grace got out. umpire declared him out. grace said, these people r here to watch me not u. so it is w.g. grace. If a batsman play continuously, in spite of getting out, then he can also make many runs
ReplyDelete@praveen,
ReplyDeleteIt seems u don't follow the cricket at all!!!! or u r overcrazy abt waugh. bcz no way, waugh is better than THE LEGEND SACHIN TENDULKAR
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ReplyDeleteinstead of blogging in the most horrifying form of english possible, please go and start reading the subject all over again starting from nursery...
ReplyDelete