The Cricket Society III

Apologies, I have just watched some videos and seen Saqlain bowling. He is significantly better than Harbhajan Singh. I still uphold that Muralitharan is better than him though. This is due to the simple fact that Saqlain was dropped from the Pakistan team due to the overbowling the Doosra. He began to bowl it 3-4 times an over. He almost stock bowling his stock ball and seemed to be unable to bowl a big offbreak towards the end of his career. He was also dropped, and unable to claim his place from Danish Kaneria.Murali maintained consistency throughout his career, allowing him to excel, and in my opinion become the best spin bowler of all time.

Well in tests Murali is better, no question from me. If you're simply talking about spinners, Warne > Murali for me, my opinion regardless of stats or whatever. I think.

But in ODIs, Saqlain can genuinely make a case for being the greatest ODI spinner, yes he overused the doosra at the end, but have a look at what he accomplished before that?

Kaneria was hardly ever chosen for ODIs, if I can remember Danish didn't even play 20 ODIs.

But put it this way, Saqlain:

Average: 21
SR: 30.4
Econ: 4.29

What do people think on scrapping the ODI's?

What do people think on scrapping the ODI's?

What do people think on scrapping the ODI's?

LOL we'll find out then won't we...? You couldn't handle the spin of Jadeja during the ODI series and don't tell me you had a second class team playing - you had cook, bopara, pietersen, bell playing who are arguably england's best spin players..

Superb innings from Sanga, 199* should have got the 200.

It doesn't need scrapping, we just need better administrators to run the game.

We should introduce a Test league table in which 10 teams play and there are 18 games each a year - both home and away for each team (or alternatively 3 games per pairing but the 3rd being played in a neutral venue)

Depending on your results, you place in the league table and whoever is ranked 1 each year can say that they are the best Test team in the world.

ODI's should be restricted to 3 games per series, with a world cup styled knock out tournament every year (no group or small groups to reduce the sheer number and length of games - think 16 teams ala the Euros).

So you would have 2 years of ODI qualification against a wide range of teams, then an ODI world cup, then 2 years of T20 qualification against an even wider range of teams, then a T20 world cup, then repeat.

Finally, just suck it up and give the IPL a window in April and the champions league a window in October (to allow county teams to compete). Specify that for the CL, only 2 foreign born players per team and if a player plays for 2 teams, he will compete for his domestic team in the CL. IPL can make up its own rules, I couldn't give a ****.

You're mental. You're suggesting 18 tests a year, hell why not go for 27 tests a year, for each team. Younus Khan has been around since the bloody 1990s and he only has 70 odd tests, and you expected him to play a quarter of that in just one year? Even England, who play two teams at home and then one or two away tours each year wouldn't be able to play 18 tests a year, that is literally a quarter of the year in game time in just test matches, let alone preparation time, other forms of the game, IPL, domestic stuff, and of course, that much undervalued thing, holiday time with the family. New Zealand players get paid more for one week of IPL than being contracted to play a whole year of test matches, just FYI.

An ODI knockout tournament each year. With no underdogs like Ireland or Bangladesh. This is a tournament that no-one likes much already and you want to just stuff it in their faces and make them kick it out all together? Overkill mate.

If it's such a big deal, just make it a 2 year league and play the 18 games across the 2 years so that it is 9 Test matches a year. Wasn't that a simple solution? If Test cricket was more popular, they could attract more money to pay players.

How would there be no underdogs? I'm proposing an ODI tournament with 16 teams. Follow the Euros format - 4 groups of 4 teams, everyone gets a minimum of 3 games and then a QF, SF and final. Would be restricted to around 3 week. 24 group games, 4 QF, 2 SF and a final - that's 31 games.

ODIs are not liked now because they are overplayed. You get countries like India/England, who will tour each other within a season and then play 7 ODI series against each other, twice in short succession. It becomes boring.

You have 1 T20 window, 1 window for an ODI WC and then 9 Test matches to be played in the year. After that, every country can organise their own tours, so long as there are no clashes.

This just smacks of naivety to be honest, so I'll let it go.

The teams, the players, the boards, the fans, the media all would never accept it, for various reasons, which you can work out yourself.

Other than in the sub-continent (and only moreso in recent years), I can't think of any other country which has cricket as their nation's sport.

Australia? Cricket is their national sport. The others (rugby league, Aussie rules etc) are all largely regional in popularity.

Knew I was forgetting a country. Either way, my point still stands that cricket is not that popular.

Isn't it supposedly the second most popular sport in the world?

Either way, other than football, no sport is dominant everywhere in the world. Cricket is as popular as any of the other 5/6 big team sports that are played around the world.