Sheek's cricket selections: 1877-1966 and 1967-2016

Agree, one was a decent fast bowler, the other was Dizzy... Bloody fantastic in his day...

Sheek, Congratulations on Great Oz XIs, all six of them. But how can you bypass Richie Benaud?

I haven't seen norman o'neil's name mentioned in any probable all time list here.how good was he?

Syd barnes misses out.ryan harris could come in for mcdermott i think.he's so underrated and will continue to be so it seems.haven't seen him bowl badly in a match.

No Ryan Harris? Pushing for inclusion in the first XI but should easily make the 2nd XI.

Not sure about Maxwell (although they would have marvelled at his fielding) but Macartney almost certainly would have seen T20 and thought "I'd be pretty good at that".

Huh? It isn't remotely a close call. Dizzy over Lee every day of the week and twice on Sundays.

sheek shield attacks in the 90's were better than most Test-bowling attacks. Warne I think has a worst ODI and 1st-class bowling average than Tests.

Great read sheek, Not knowing a huge amount about pre-WWII players, I find these articles great when I have the chance to get into them. One player I'll admit to not knowing about was Charlie Macartney. Fascinating reading about his approach to batting, but also his comments on what was "modern" cricket in his later days (I presume the '40s and '50s). Apparently he found the batsmen boring and a bit pathetic or soft(?). We frequently bemoan the potential death of "proper" cricket, but I often wonder if some of the long dead greats of the game might watch a player like Maxwell and love what they see.

You selected Jason Gillespie ahead of Brett Lee. Was that partly influenced by Gillespie's double hundred ? .... only joking! I think its a close call, but while Brett Lee took more wickets per match, he did concede around 40% more runs compared to Gillespie. Also, would you consider a swing bowler like Terry Alderman in your second XI ? I wonder what his record might have been had it not been for injuries and the rebel tour.

lol kiwi JGK. Lance was a bigger crowd favourite anyway, hitting DK Lillee for 6 with 1 hand.

Well you could claim WG Grace kind of invented modern cricket as we know it (cricket as a game having been invented by no one in particular of course), and some would say he is the greatest cricketer ever. He certainly dominated his era like no other person apart from, possibly, Bradman. But yes, you're right, influence on the game is only one aspect. And i'm not at all suggesting that it should be a dominating factor. My point was more that, in lists, honours etc of this kind there is usually a bias toward those you have seen yourself, or you have heard about from relatives who saw them, or who are still relatively fresh in a lot of memories. Those who played in the time outside living memory can rapidly be forgotten. How many times does the name of Blackham come up in a list of our greatest ever keepers? Yet he was a colossus of his era as much as Marsh or Healy or Oldfield or Tallon or Grout, perhaps even more so as his era is so crucial

No Chris Cairns, Johnno??

Sheek, I think David Warner is destined to replace Justin Langer in your Second IX (1967-2016) team. I would already pick him ahead of the other opening batsman from that era including Simon Katich, Michael Slater, Mark Taylor, David Boon, Geoff Marsh, etc, but not sure if he'll perform well enough to replace Bob Simpson or Bill Lawry in your First IX. Most of your batsman in the 1967-2016 teams have batting averages above 47, which is one of the reasons why Mark Waugh always falls short. But his average of 41.81 is only marginally lower than Ian Chappell's average of 42.42. Have you selected Ian Chappell on batting alone or because of his Captaincy ? I like your idea of the "favourite IX" but I would have Dean Jones at No. 3, drop Chapelli and let Warnie Captain the team.

Dean Jones+Greg Matthews, have to be in the favourites 11. Steve Smith, already I'd put ahead of "Mike Hussey" in the 2nd 11.

Agree generally with your team, and don't think it'd be a lot of fun trying to get a set AB and S Waugh out, let alone face Johnson and Lillee on a WACA pitch that actually has bounce. Just re. the M Waugh comments (and I'm a massive fan, and you've partially hinted at it), one thing that works against him is that stats don't necessarily rate the quality of a dig. He was a bit of a master at frustrating fans, but at the same point swung a lot of games and often played the innings that few others could (Port Elizabeth, being the attacking batsmen with a hundred when S Waugh got his 200). Hard to quantify that ability. I, for instance, rate him much higher than Taylor in terms of being able to influence a match (and one of the few that was better in the slips than Tubby).

This is an interesting post. I ranked Bradman, Miller and O'Reilly in my top six - I don't think that shows modern prejudice. The main criteria I used was the impact the players had on Australia winning games. In the end, that's the important thing, to win. I do give a tiny bit of regard to other things - like Warne reviving, modernizing, fashioning, the art of leg-spin. Gilchrist changing the role of keepers whereby they sort of have to be keeper-batsmen. All that stuff I give a bit of regard to... And when I put Spofforth in my second all-time side, it wasn't his numbers that got him in - it was his impact on the game. But the criteria you used there doesn't dominate my thinking. What about the English person who invented cricket? He surely had the biggest influence on the game by inventing it? Is he the greatest English cricketer ever? Sarfraz more or less modernized reverse swing. But I'm not saying he's a better bowler than Khan or Akram or even Waqar...