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Originally Posted by tiger1000
The standard am expecting is not all time, am expecting international standard, and you can't take just 2/3 years of prime, it has to be at least a good chunk of their careers
Botham simply wouldn't get into many teams averaging in his low 30's, even in his prime and taking away everything after mid 80's he averaged 34/35, that's not good enough for most test teams as a batsman today
As a bowler he could make it in that period as a bowler in most teams in my opinion
Miller from footage I've seen, was not the same level as sobers as a batsman
Sangakara record shows his superior hard work and dedication, he kept improving, Mahela half the time turned up asleep to games when he didn't need to perform, he was a great big game player, a players record certainly doesn't show who had more talent, it shows who was the better player, talent is just a small part to it
Gilchrist is also super talented as a batsman, not so much as a keeper, he practiced batting very little, it was his keeping he gave most of his attention on training, even then as a keeper, he wasn't top tier, he was excellent but not top tier, as a batsman keeper, there is no better.
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The difficult thing about botham is his averages don’t look exceptional but his strike rates are pretty good, amount of 5fers/centuries etc he got, match winning or changing knocks or bowling spells.
If bothams career ended after 5 years he’d no doubt unanimously be called an ATG and his amount of 5fers and centuries wouldn’t be much different to his ending numbers and his averages wouldn’t be either, think after about 50 tests he averaged about 36-38 with bat and about 26 with ball. After that he barely did anything, has some good performances here and there like the 80 and 8fer against WI but it was few and far between.
I’m not saying the above to disregard the poor latter half of his career, it was quite poor but it’s just insane that he achieved so many hauls and centuries in such a short time, he’s got more 5fers than some ATG, in fewer tests and a poor backend of his career.
Yes he was inconsistent hence his not so good averages but the hauls and centuries clearly show his match winning ability was just as good as any ATG and there aren’t many that have these numbers who aren’t ATG level because the ones that do usually have the averages as well.