In what is a tried and true law of the gentleman’s game… rubbish gets wickets.
From the Under-10s pie-chucker with a packed trophy cabinet to first grade’s 40-year-old keeper, somehow these things just happen and Test match cricket is no exception.
How blokes with such pure technique and tenacity in defence can get out to half-trackers is something which has baffled historians for decades.
Saying that, here are some of the best when it comes to being average.
Andrew Symonds
26 Tests, 24 wickets, one hair style for each bowling style
The hard-hitting Australian all-rounder could flog a bloke so far, he’d send him right back to park cricket.
With ball in hand it was a different story. To his credit, he brought variety to the table.
There were his medium pace wobblers off the long run and the slow pace wobblers (otherwise known as off-spin) off the short run.
He was certainly no mug when his number was called.
With scalps like Herschelle Gibbs, Jacques Kallis (twice), Mahela Jayawardene and Shivnarine Chanderpaul to name a few, It’s a wonder they didn’t throw him the new ball on day one and turn him loose come day five
Scott Styris
29 Tests, 20 wickets, a few dozen pies
The term “all-rounder” is thrown around a lot these days, but one has to think that with an average of more than 50, Styris has earned that tag.
Wait? What? That’s his bowling average?! Well, in that case, we should just rename it, “guys who don’t mind having a trundle when it gets hot,” (or above 24 degrees for the Kiwis).
To his credit though, he once got Sachin Tendulkar out.
A more than handy one-day player who was hampered by injury, Styris just never quite lived up to the lofty standards set by the mid-noughties New Zealand Test team.
Marcus North
21 Tests, 14 wickets, one miracle
If there are three certainties in life, it’s death, taxes and selectors picking the wrong player from Western Australia.
North enjoyed an immensely successful first-class career and scored five centuries for his country, but he’s probably best-known in his time wearing a baggy green for one particular innings with ball in hand.
The bloke took 6-55, in England of all places (ok, so it was against Pakistan, but still), and is a true hero to all the opening bats out there constantly in the captain’s ear. He might’ve found prolonged success at the top level if he could flip the switch on those Test averages of his.
Paul Harris
37 Tests, 103 wickets, and an awful lot of the same thing over and over again
The man who makes Ashley Giles look threatening.
Was it Harris’s job to take wickets in what was a deadly South African pace attack? No. Could he have done something different in his 8809 deliveries? Apparently not.
The lone out and out “bowler” on this list, the South African is to cricket what watching paint dry is to… well, watching paint dry. In essence, he is the embodiment of the “cricket is boring” critique.
I recall the time Ian Bell misjudged a straight one and was left shouldering arms with the bails flying. What made him think the ball would turn I have no idea.
Mark “Tubby” Taylor
104 Tests, one wicket, 26 average, two bounces
This says it all really.
No doubt I have missed a few, but when the entertainment is this underwhelming, who could blame me?
Professor Rosseforp
Guest
Andrew Symonds was lucky to have never been called for throwing, when bowling his off-spinners, and that would have given him an unusual distinction amongst pie-throwers. You've also left out Ray Bright -- something the selectors should have done. The interesting feature of cricket is that a batsman only needs to make one mistake and he is out. A good bowler can force errors, or increase the risk of errors. But a batsman's concentration, or slight error in technique means that a very ordinary bowler can take a very good wicket. I speak from experience, having taken a (very) few wickets in the lowest forms of suburban cricket, with some of the most innocuous bowling you'll ever see ;-)
Pope Paul VII
Guest
I love it when an underdog bowler has a day out. Most I can recall were proper bowlers though. Just much maligned by the ignorant public or in some cases, their own captain. Ajit Agarkar 6 for in Adelaide a few years back and Norman Cowans 6/77 in the famous Melbourne Test vs England 1982/83 come to mind.
Paul Potter
Roar Guru
Interesting article. But on his one tour of Australia Paul Harris had a habit of getting rid of well-set batsmen. It was a major reason at Perth and Melbourne South Africa didn't have even more catching up to do, and that was a big part of their wins. I rate him higher than Giles, and Giles bored me. Somehow, Harris didn't.
Samuel Laffy
Roar Guru
Mark Taylor was robbed. It appears that the umpire in the clip called it a no-ball, when in fact a ball is allowed to bounce twice. It's more than twice that's the issue. I think Tatenda Taibu may have claimed a test scalp against South Africa in a similar way!
Edison Marshall
Roar Pro
Oh man, This is right up my alley