Bowling without Mashrafee

[al Furqaan]

It seems to me that Bangladesh have always bowled better in test cricket without Mashrafee. Of course I have only followed Bangladesh cricket since 2003, but since Mashrafee made his comeback against India in late 2004, Bangladesh have bowled better without him.

The fact that he is, without a doubt, our best bowler in either form of the game (yes, even Rafique bhai gets smacked at times) makes this observation all the more intriguing, if not disheartening.

Now this has all been posted with absolutely no statistical back-up. It is merely my thought and observation and opinion. Now lets check cricket4.com and see what the stats show.

Disclaimer: The stats include only Test matches after the 2003 World Cup i.e after Dav Whatmore took the reigns and after Bangladesh began its first of a series of improvement steps. Mashrafee Mortaza played in Test matches before WC 03, but I didn't include those stats.

Stats With Mashrafee

Matches:11
Opponents Avg 1st Innings score: 403.73
Avg Wickets taken: 7.82
Bowling Avg: 51.64

Stats Without Mashrafee

Matches: 8
Opponents Avg 1st Innings score: 433.12
Avg Wickets taken: 8.5
Bowling Avg: 50.96

Interestingly enough, there is not much difference as a whole between our first innings bowling performance with or without Mashrafee. Though he is undoubtedly our best fast bowler for both ODIs and Tests.

Thoughts?

Edited on, March 6, 2006, 7:58 PM GMT, by al Furqaan.
Reason: finished it, but couldn't figure out how to paste the excel spreadsheet

[cricman]

Comparing with: <FONT COLOR="#FF0000">Mashrafe Mortaza vs Rafique Matches where they both played </FONT>

Filter: in matches that started after 2004-11-01, and ended by 2005-06-03.

<HR>


<FONT FACE="MONOSPACE,COURIER NEW,COURIER"><PRE>
(6 ball overs) Mat O R W BBI BBM Ave Econ SR 5 10

unfiltered 23 1045.4 2763 75 6/77 7/116 36.84 2.64 83.6 6 0
<FONT COLOR="#FF0000"> 18 523.2 1650 47 4/60 5/104 35.10 3.15 66.8 0 0</FONT>
filtered 5 249.4 640 13 5/65 5/108 49.23 2.56 115.2 1 0
<FONT COLOR="#FF0000"> 5 176.4 516 16 3/51 5/104 32.25 2.92 66.2 0 0</FONT>

v England 1 41 150 1 1/150 1/150 150.00 3.65 246.0 0 0
<FONT COLOR="#FF0000"> 1 29 107 2 2/107 2/107 53.50 3.68 87.0 0 0</FONT>
v India 2 90 269 6 4/156 4/156 44.83 2.98 90.0 0 0
<FONT COLOR="#FF0000"> 2 57 185 5 3/60 3/60 37.00 3.24 68.4 0 0</FONT>
v Zimbabwe 2 118.4 221 6 5/65 5/108 36.83 1.86 118.6 1 0
<FONT COLOR="#FF0000"> 2 90.4 224 9 3/51 5/104 24.88 2.47 60.4 0 0</FONT>

[al Furqaan]

how did my thread drop so low so fast...anyways this should put it back on the radar.

:D

[RazabQ]

It is an interesting thread. My quick take would be that unless you have a one in a millenium bowler like a Shane, Murali, or Hadlee - it's very hard for one bowler to impact the team's performance. Think of all the great or even excellent bowling attacks and immediately you have them occuring in pairs:

Trueman & Statham
Imran & Sarfaraz
Wasim & Imran
the two Ws
Warne & McGrath
Pollock & Ntini

[reverse_swing]

Ambrose & Walsh
Roberts & Marshall

[RazabQ]

er Roberts and Mashall was Roberts, Marshall Holding and Garner. I maintain that must have been the scariest bowling attack of all time. The closest probabl was England during the ashes believe it or not. Jones, Flintoff and Harmison all 90+ and Hoggy at 80-85mph while bending it around.

[Flipper]

Originally posted by RazabQ

Pollock & Ntini


Ntini is good, but not as good as Kallis, for their bowling success, in my opinion. Ntini, though a stike bowler, is very expensive at times.

[Spitfire_x86]

Originally posted by Flipper
Originally posted by RazabQ

Pollock & Ntini


Ntini is good, but not as good as Kallis, for their bowling success, in my opinion. Ntini, though a stike bowler, is very expensive at times.
I think you meant Donald, not Kallis.

[pagol-chagol]

You need to take Zimbabwue series out of this to have an apples to apples comparison.

[Flipper]

Originally posted by Spitfire_x86

I think you meant Donald, not Kallis.

Yes, thanks. I meant to say Allan Donald.

[al Furqaan]

Originally posted by pagol-chagol
You need to take Zimbabwue series out of this to have an apples to apples comparison.

the ZIM team included in stats was the ZIM team that had streak, blignaut, et al.

they posted 440 on us and won the tests, and the ODIs 2-1 (something the current ZIM team cannot dream of doing).

that ZIM team also gave the aussies and indos a run for their money in the 2004 VB series a couple of times.

they were a good team, possibly better than us now.

[Tigers_eye]

Originally posted by RazabQ
er Roberts and Mashall was Roberts, Marshall Holding and Garner. I maintain that must have been the scariest bowling attack of all time. The closest probabl was England during the ashes believe it or not. Jones, Flintoff and Harmison all 90+ and Hoggy at 80-85mph while bending it around.
The WI greats were in a class by themselves. Even though back then there were no limitation of bouncers and no helmets. Often the oppositing team couldn't play 11 members in the second innings.

Jones inclusion in this current England tour would have been fun to watch. However, Harmi can't bowl in these slow pitches.