The Quintessential Outsider

Once again, I am back on my blog after a long time, this time in the garb of a cricket lover. It’s been a roller-coaster ride in the last few months for Indian cricket fans, with the World Cup debacle, the drama around the new coach, a few redeeming victories against Bangladesh and South Africa, and now the Test series victory against England, but instead of talking about any of these things (about each of which a lot has been and is being said and written), I am going to indulge in some cricket fantasy in the run-up to a hectic ODI season for India – an all-time ODI Dream Team.

Why ODI? Because for a Test Dream Team, I mostly agree with Richie Benaud’s Greatest XI (except that maybe Muttiah Muralitharan could figure in it instead of Shane Warne) and his shortlist for it, and the other form, Twenty20, is not old enough. For ODIs, I searched around for any existing ‘Dream Teams’, but all I found were time-specific or country-specific ones. So here’s my attempt at one.

Firstly, the criteria:
1.) Statistics (average and strike rate for batsmen; average, economy and strike rate for bowlers). Especially in ODIs, the strike rate assumes as much, if not more, importance as the average. Also, for batsmen, the runs scored per innings (whether out or not out) instead of the actual average, so if a lower middle-order batsman has a very high average due to many not-outs, because he acted as a ‘finisher’ in an exceptionally successful team, that has to be taken into account.
2.) Length of career, so that short-lived thunderbolts, or new players with blazing statistics, do not get more credit than they should.
3.) Fitness and other issues which keep a player in or out of the team, which means injury-prone or controversy-prone players, especially among fast bowlers, lose out.
4.) General reputation as a player, overall utility, and the balance of the team.
5.) Lastly, the player should have played ODIs, which means that even if someone believes Sir Don Bradman would have made a great ODI player, he cannot be considered.

So, based on these criteria, here’s a shortlist, divided according to playing role, with the number in each category being approximately three times the requirement:

Openers: Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Sanath Jayasuriya, Gordon Greenidge, Desmond Haynes, Matthew Hayden
Middle Order: Vivian Richards, Brian Lara, Rahul Dravid, Ricky Ponting, Jacques Kallis, Zaheer Abbas, Dean Jones, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Kevin Pietersen
All-Rounders: Imran Khan, Kapil Dev, Richard Hadlee, Ian Botham, Lance Klusener, Shaun Pollock
Wicket-keepers: Adam Gilchrist, Mark Boucher, Kumar Sangakkara, Mahendra Singh Dhoni
Spinners: Shane Warne, Muttiah Muralitharan, Anil Kumble, Saqlain Mushtaq
Fast Bowlers: Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Glenn McGrath, Joel Garner, Allan Donald, Brett Lee

And now, let’s look at these categories one at a time:

Openers:
Four of the choices in this category become obvious simply because they made up two of the most successful opening pairs in ODI history. Sourav Ganguly with Sachin Tendulkar, and Gordon Greenidge with Desmond Haynes. Sanath Jayasuriya’s huge impact on the role of an opener and the ODI game in general can not be overlooked either. His batting average is on the lower side, but his bowling abilities more than make up for it. And of course, a major component of the invincible Australian team is their opening combination. Adam Gilchrist anyway appears as a wicketkeeper later, so Matthew Hayden had to be in.
Mark Waugh was a close contender, but his statistics were not as good. Saeed Anwar was another close call, for in the mid-90s, he was one of the best in the world, but he could not sustain that for as long as any of the names in the final list. Slam-bangers like Virender Sehwag, Mark Greatbatch, Navjot Sidhu, Shahid Afridi did not have good averages, and some old-timers with great averages, like Glenn Turner, were just too slow.
Finally, out of these six names, Greenidge and Haynes lose out because of their low strike rate. Though it can be argued that they played in an entirely different era and that they could have adjusted to the modern game, it must be remembered that both played into the early 90s, and were not able to stop the slide in West Indies cricket. Also, while both were important members of Clive Lloyd’s team, they were not as dominant as Tendulkar and Ganguly have been in the Indian team. Ganguly loses out for two reasons – poor fielding and a lower strike rate than Hayden, Sachin and Jayasuriya. His technical weaknesses and temperament can also be counted, but he seems to have worked on those fronts.
Out of the remaining three, it is a really tough call, but eventually, the two players with the longest careers and more versatility (i.e. bowling skills), make the final cut: Sanath Jayasuriya and Sachin Tendulkar.

Middle Order:
This was probably the toughest category to deal with, both for the shortlist and the final names. The sheer number of contenders is so high that I had to just go to the record charts and look for the top few names in batting averages. If that meant forgetting some names altogether, it was for a good reason – their averages were not good enough. That should more or less explain the shortlist. And if there are still some doubts left, you are free to comment.
Out of those who made it, Kevin Pietersen will probably have to wait a little longer. Maybe, in a few years’ time, his name will appear at the top of all record charts and in every dream team, but for now, he has to wait. Ramnaresh Sarwan just made it to this list because of his high average and his importance to the West Indies team, but he cannot go further in the face of such stiff competition. Dean Jones also just made it due to his high average, but not any further. Brian Lara may have been an exceptional talent, and the highest Test run-getter, but his ODI record is simply not as good.
Out of the remaining five names, Zaheer Abbas’s strike rate was exceptionally high for his era, but the number of matches played was not as much as any of the others. Not his fault that they didn’t play too many ODIs back then, but that still leaves some doubt over whether he would have been able to sustain these statistics for 200-300 matches. Vivian Richards simply has to be in, because of his high average, high strike rate, better bowling ability, and exceptional fielding. Ricky Ponting is in for pretty much the same reasons, except the bowling. The remaining two names, Kallis and Dravid, are similar in many aspects, like a strong technique, patience and ability to anchor an innings, and a cool head. Eventually, Kallis wins because he is also a useful bowler.
So, the final cut: Jacques Kallis, Ricky Ponting and Vivian Richards.

All-Rounders:
Four of the names here are almost always thrown up in a discussion on a Dream Team, and the competition between them is as fierce as it was when they played for four different countries in the 1980s. The other two, Lance Klusener and Shaun Pollock, along with Jacques Kallis, were the backbone of Hansie Cronje and Bob Woolmer’s South Africa in the 1990s. Cronje and Woolmer died tragic deaths, and Lance Klusener just fizzled out as abruptly as he had burst onto the scene, but Shaun Pollock goes on and on and on, and makes it to the final list.
That leaves just one name to be chosen out of the Big Four. Richard Hadlee may have been a great fast bowler, but he was not the best batsman among these four. Ian Botham’s first few years in international cricket were exceptional, and his bowling or batting statistics alone at that time would make the case for a great player, but the latter half of his career was equally mediocre. The remaining two names, Kapil Dev and Imran Khan, have many similarities. Both are considered the greatest all-rounders ever (if not the greatest players) in their countries, both led their teams to World Cup glory, both began as medium-pacers and moved on to become all-rounders. Kapil Dev once hit 175 not out, but Imran Khan played in that same tournament as a pure batsman. It’s a close call, but finally, one name wins due to better statistics.
The final cut: Imran Khan and Shaun Pollock.

Wicket-keeper:
Besides the four names here, we can make a long list of keepers who tried to become batsmen, batsmen who tried to become keepers, keepers who were sent up the order as pinch-hitters, keepers who were great ’sloggers’ or ‘finishers’, keepers who grafted their way to a rare century, and so on.
But which wicketkeeper-batsman has played for a top team for more than a decade, and it’s no longer surprising if he hits a 50 in 25 balls? Mark Boucher.
Which wicketkeeper-batsman has scored so many Test double hundreds that he can pass off as a pure batsman in any team in the world? Kumar Sangakkara.
Which wicketkeeper-batsman emerged from a second-rung domestic team and burst onto the international scene with 183 not out, the highest ever ODI score by a keeper? Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
But who was the first star wicketkeeper-batsman who made it absolutely necessary for all the other teams to search for keepers who could bat, who opens the batting for the best team in the world, and it will not be surprising if he becomes the first ever batsman to score a double century in ODIs?
Adam Gilchrist, and he’s the one who makes it to the final list.

Spinner: Three of those names are anyway considered among the best spinners ever, but in the mid-to-late-1990s, there was another name who fought with them for the top slot, Saqlain Mushtaq. He faded away for some reason, Shane Warne ended his ODI career to prolong his Test career, Anil Kumble did the same this year after a bad World Cup, but there’s just one name that goes on and on. He may opt out of an ODI often, but at least he’s not given it up completely. And he’s comfortably ahead of the others in the record charts: Muttiah Muralitharan.

Fast Bowlers:
Here again, there was a long list of contenders, so long that to sift out the pretenders, I just consulted the record charts. So out of the West Indian pace attack of the 80s, Roberts, Holding, Croft were all good, but the name with the best statistics was chosen – Joel Garner. Malcolm Marshall had surprisingly bad figures for ODIs, compared to his Test record. Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis made it straightaway by virtue of being at the top of the record charts for ODI bowlers. The spearheads of 1990s South Africa and 21st-century Australia, Allan Donald and Glenn McGrath, also had to be in.
And we need at least one brash super-fast bowler. Jeff Thomson was just too long back to have played a significant number of ODIs, and so was Dennis Lillee. In the present era, Brett Lee is not as controversy-prone as Shoaib Akhtar or as injury-prone as Shane Bond, so he makes it ahead of them.
However, in the final cut, it is better to be precise with your control of the ball and have the ability to fox the batsman with variety, rather than try intimidating him with your speed, stare, sledging, height, appearance, or a deadly bouncer/beamer or toe-crushing yorker. And coincidentally, the two names who make it, one left-armer and one right-armer, were known for precisely that, variety and control: Wasim Akram and Glenn McGrath.

So, here’s the final list:
Sanath Jayasuriya, Sachin Tendulkar, Jacques Kallis, Ricky Ponting, Vivian Richards, Adam Gilchrist, Imran Khan, Shaun Pollock, Wasim Akram, Muttiah Muralitharan, Glenn Mcgrath.
Good depth in batting (upto No. 9), nine players who can bowl, two exceptional fielders (and no really bad ones among the rest). And yet, if you make another dream team with eleven other players (from the above shortlist or elsewhere), it will be difficult to predict who will win on a given day. That is the ‘glorious uncertainty’ of cricket, and more so of the one-day game. You are free to comment.