As long as Joe Root is best England batsmen,They can never achieve the no 1 ranking.

There were two obvious choice,One was Stokes and other was Shakib.
I would rate them

Stokes-9.5
Shakib-9.5

Players like Starc,Sharma,Archer etc weren’t even close to them in terms of performance.

Sharma as a batsmen alone wasn’t any better than Shakib.

At max,I would give williamson 9/10.

No middle order player could’ve had as much impact as Stokes.Even in the super over he was best batsmen for England.

Stokes once again showed that he is by far the greatest match-winner of this generation.

No doubt about that,

This is the international Umpire we are talking about.He only had two job for a final delivery – simply watch for no ball and LBW(for anything else,3rd umpire was already there). Heck even if he somehow missed to check the front foot,he could’ve simply asked the 3rd umpire to check for no ball.Why not simply replace current umpires with random 20 yr old fans.They can’t be much worse than 90yrs old umpires with cataract eyes and they will probably do it for free also.

I’ve seen lots of garbage umpiring in last few years,be it in Ipl or even International cricket(mainly against weaker sides ie Bd,afg,ireland).For how long can this farce be tolerated?

It’s an understatement to say that Perera knock is one of the greatest of all time.It is not only an upset but one of the greatest series win of all time.Sri Lanka are only the 3rd team after Australia and England to ever win Test series in South Africa.

Tbh Faf won’t mind missing a dead rubber test at home.

After seeing India score over 600 with pant-Jadeja 150 runs partnership,I’ve realized that Warner was actually the most valuable player for Australia before the ban and not Smith.

One thing that I’ve learned from Sandpapergate is that Cricket fans are easily one of the dumbest if not the dumbest fans across all Sports.

It is obvious that Warner was made Scapegoat by CA as they had to change the narrative from “Cheating team” to “Cheating individuals”.However Warner would’ve been luckiest player if he was left unharmed like rest of leadership groups player are right now (Haz,Starc,Lyon) who were also involved as clearly insinuated by Steve smith in PC where he and Bancroft lied about Sticky paper along with other lies.

I will go into detail next month after Warner interview will be broadcasted where he will basically take the blame of the Sandpaper fiasco.

Maxwell is a good player.nothing more, nothing less.
Overall I want to see him in Australia side across all formats.

Nice article Ronan.

Biggest plus for Lyon is that he imparts a lot of revolution on ball with good accuracy as compared to any other off spinner right now.(obviously leg spinners revs are far more).

http://www.bcci.tv/videos/id/4333/lyon-vs-ashwin-a-comparative-analysis

Ashwin in recent times is struggling in that department.It also helps Lyon that his fitness is also very good which should help him in bowling long spells with lots of revs on ball.

Hopefully we also see Warner and bancroft in advertisement soon.

So much garbage in one post I’m really confused where to even begin.

“How come not so high standards produce “great” outputs?”
What do you mean by “great” outputs?Obviously,Some players will be better than others.

“The comment was response to childish comment “why Kohli is not in the same league as Viv,Tendulkar and Lara.Kohli will not even make it into the list of modern era greats to be comparable with previous gen greats..”

See that’s the problem right there.You live in your own bubble.According to you those claims might be childish but it doesn’t mean rest of the world doesn’t rate Kohli highly.

https://www.thenews.com.pk/latest/407120-michael-vaughan-thinks-virat-kohli-is-a-better-player-than-tendulkar-lara-and-ponting

ANOTHER 100 for @imVkohli today…he’s making every single one of us that batted before him in international cricket, look like schoolboys!

So proud of you, dude!

— Kevin Pietersen???? (@KP24) December 16, 2018

“Please mention the parameters you are comparing them on,so we can understand your grand strategy of that comparison.”

Here’s what I think – In early 1900s cricket was played between low skilled cricketers (if we judge them by modern standard)where bowling was mediocre,fielding was abysmal and batting was mediocre as well.How do I come to this conclusion-simply watch the videos of cricket played those days.Just like you can conclude that international cricket standard/quality is better than domestic cricket standard.It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this out.

“it was not only about uncovered pitches, throw lack of 24/7 medical facilities, protective gears, fitness instruments in that, play like that and let us know your experience. ”
Genius this is one of the many reason why standard of cricket was low those days.You are actually proving my point but you are not smart enough to realise it.

“next time make sure the points have some substances instance.Otherwise it sounds like arrogant child’s screaming.”

Talk about irony.
Anyway I’ve wasted enough of my time and it is going to be my last post in this topic.

And you are trying to be typical bangladeshi.See what I did there.

“Either stand by your “facts” or stand with your outputs.”
Again,Cricketing Standard was not high in early 1900s.Which part of this is difficult to understand.

“You can’t have both at same time.”
Yes they were greats.Just because standard of cricket wasn’t high at that time doesn’t mean that you can’t call top players of that era as greats.Those players raise the standard of the game high only for the next generation of cricketers to raise the bar even higher.Now Next generation of cricketers will look up to the likes Kohli,Smith,devilliers etc not the likes of Hobbs etc whether anyone likes it or not.

“You can’t compare two sections of time. The output of those two sections of time is defined by elements that is present AT TIME.”
Says the guy who has no problem in saying or insinuating that kohli is nowhere near Viv,Sachin and Lara.

“Real funny how topic got changed.”
No it didn’t changed or perhaps you misunderstood here.Knowingly or unknowingly,You are giving reasons on why the standard wasn’t high which again I’m not interested in.(as I am well aware)Yes modern players are advanced is one of the reason why Standard of cricket is high nowadays as compared to players of early 1900s.You still haven’t given me a single reason on why Standard of cricket wasn’t low in early 1900s however bringing “uncovered pitches” was a nice attempt but predictable.So there is nothing to argue here.

Wonder what’s the confusion.
i) “Standards wasn’t “as high as it is now”.yep I still maintain it.
ii) “Cricket was basically played in only 2 countries(there were other minnows that occasionally played).”It’s basically a fact.

jeez why are you bringing stephen hawking and Einstein in this.For instances,
a)International cricket standard is higher than domestic standard.
b)domestic cricket standard is higher than school standard.
c)Standard of express pace has declined from early 2000s to now.
So topic is whether the standard of cricket was higher in early 1900s or today.Answer is obvious but I guess you are stubborn to waste my time here.

“Uncovered Pitches doesn’t make any difference unless pitch is affected by rain”
Once again it is simply the truth,there is nothing to laugh about.

So you don’t disagree with statement “Standard of cricket was not high in early 1900s”.Good.I can also give reasons(better ones) on why the standard wasn’t high.(Before anyone misunderstood here,I’m not saying some of them weren’t greats of the game)

“still batsman can’t make decent score against quality opposition, forget about uncovered pitches.”

Uncovered Pitches doesn’t make any difference unless pitch is affected by rain.As expected,all batsmen struggled on those rain affected pitches(which was around 10-12% from what I’ve heard) which still doesn’t make standard of cricket any higher.

You can call it amateur or whatever you want but the point is that the standard of cricket was not high in early 1900s.Cricket was basically played in only 2 countries(there were other minnows that occasionally played) and various cricketing skills like “Reversing swing” that you brought up to criticise Kohli were completely unknown.
Rest of your post is a perfect example of hyperbole which is not worth replying IMHO.

As expected, Old>>>>New nonsense.
Give me one good reason why Kohli is not in the same league as Viv,Tendulkar and Lara.(I’m not going to bring amateur era cricketers in discussion)

Both team can improve especially in batting department.Yasir Shah wasn’t that great before the NZ series.There is a reason why Pakistan were ranked no 7 before NZ series.He could’ve prevented some of the losses against WI(1),Sri Lanka(2) in UAE.Not that he was bad but he could’ve done better.Against Australia also,He wasn’t that great and they managed to draw a test there recently.

Rabada would surely end up as ATG but he has only played 32 tests,I would like to see bit more of him especially in subcontinent.Williamson is definitely in the contention of being impactful batsmen in the world after his series winning performance in UAE.He is now ranked no 2 and closing in on Kohli.One thing is for sure is that Root is the weakest of Fab 4(Smith,Kohli,KW and Root) as of now and the current England team is not highly dependent on Root like before.Any team that is highly dependent on unreliable batsmen like Root is bound to be mediocre team.

True Strike Rotation is a problem for Australian batsmen.I think chaseable( but difficult) Target actually worked against Australians.If I am being honest,No team in the world would’ve chased the target of 323 on the 4/5th day that test.However,In recent years this Australian team have shown lots of grit on the 5th day of tests and they pulled of couple of draws from loosing position(or when WIn was completely out of equation).

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/18923/game/1157370/australia-vs-pakistan-1st-test-australia-in-uae-2018-19
http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/8525/scorecard/1062575/india-vs-australia-3rd-test-ind-v-aus-2016-17

India at one stage were 6-303 but got all out for 307.Had India lower order extended the lead from 323 to 380,Australia most likely would’ve drawn this test especially now considering Ashwin bowled 52 overs and took only 3 wickets which is simply unacceptable.We would’ve seen better Shot selection from Australian batsmen.

Yep you’re rIght.

I actually put 2 link of my comments in those article but it shows the whole article instead.Seriously missing the edit option.

Things that we learned from 1st Test –

1 Toss and Pujara were the biggest difference.India would’ve most likely lost this test had they lost the toss.And,If it wasn’t for Pujara India would’ve surely lost this Test despite winning the toss.

2 We all know how important Toss is in Test cricket but it’s importance have only increased in recent years.2018 have been the year where Toss have highly influenced the result of series.
Example-Results like England 3-0 whitewash win in Srilanka and South Africa 2-0 whitewash loss in Sri Lanka where team that won the toss,won the match.

India could be lucky with tosses in this series as they have won only 3 tosses in last 18 matches against Australia(since this decade) and their recent luck with toss hasn’t been great lately(lost all 5 tosses in England),So law of averages might work in India’s favour this time around.

Random Stat-As a captain,kohli still hasn’t lost a test match after winning the toss.

3 Australian bowlers “as a unit” are not performing as they should given they are hyped by many as the best bowling attack in the world.Indian fast bowlers had slightly better stats than Australian fast bowlers in this Test.

It’s Kohli or bust for India

4 Pujara have been the biggest thorn for Australia in this decade and it’s about time he gets due credit from cricketing fraternity.Although I have no hopes from Indian fans(not all of them) – they probably think Kohli singlehandedly won the match but I expect better from Australians.There are 10 other Indian players also.

Is Cheteshwar Pujara the new Rahul Dravid?

In Test cricket,Pujara(judging purely based on performance “as of now”) is the biggest matchwinner/Gamechanger in the world right now along with Stokes.You cannot judge him purely from stats only.Heck I’d argue that amongst all batsmen that are averaging 50+ right now,Pujara have score least percent of soft/redundant/impactless runs.He’s the main reason why India is ranked no 1 right now.

5 Pujara vs Lyon is the battle to look forward to in this series.Arguably Best batsmen against spin bowling vs Best spinner in the world.If it wasn’t for Pujara,Lyon might’ve had far better stats in this test.Pujara was also struggling most against Lyon.

6 Lyon vs Ashwin battle will finally decide who is the best spinner in the world right now.In this Test,Lyon was clearly the better spinner.Just because a spinner flight a ball and put it on good length doesn’t make him a great spinner.There are lots of other aspects of spin bowling-air speed,using rough properly if available,number of revolutions(however you have to compensate with accuracy so gotta have perfect balance) and Lyon made better use of these aspects and that’s why he was looked more threatening.Before anyone bring economy of Ashwin,On that pitch you have to be attacking and not play a role of defensive off spinner.

7 It wasn’t a perfect game for India with Kohli and other batsmen not doing well.Not all is over for Australia.They can still win the series and for that to happen they have to find new heroes.This is the era of HTBs so young inexperienced players have to step up like Curran did against India or Kusal mendis did against Australia 2016 or Jayant Yadav did against England 2016 otherwise there is no chance for Australia.

Australia batsmen are Finch,harris,Khwaja,Marsh,Handscomb,Head,Paine and highest average amongst them is 42 by khwaja(only 2 batsmen average over 40).I think most of the players have not fully secured their spot.

As for India with Smith and warner missing If they don’t this time,they will have to wait for a long time to regiser their first ever series win in Australia.

Outstanding comeback by New Zealand after trailing by 74 runs.Williamson again proved his class.