Best Caribbean Cricketing Nation.

[Etienne]

Just to make the thread title even more inaccurate, I was wondering about a greatest all time XI where you couldn't pick more than one player from a country.

I came up with

Hobbs
Gavaskar
Bradman
Kallis
Shakib
A Flower +
Sobers
Imran
Hadlee
Rashid Khan (or Bart King?)
Murali

Some players are definitely the best players ever from their country (Bradman, Shakib, Flower, Hadlee, Rashid) while others might be a bit more touch and go but got in to balance the side.

[Satchmo Distel]

There are no obviously questionable ones there. You could argue that Sachin or Kapil Dev are greater than Gavaskar but the reshuffle you'd have to do would weaken the side. Maybe you don't need Sobers because the batting is so strong and you'd get more by replacing him with Marshall?

[George C.]

Worcestershire

Doug Kenyon
Glenn Turner (O)
Graeme Hick
Tom Moody (O)*
Moeen Ali
Basil d'Oliveira
Ted Arnold
Steve Rhodes +
Norman Gifford
Reg Perks
Jack Flavell

A strong batting line-up, but their bowling isn't really good enough at this elevated level. Perhaps they could merge with Northants.

You missed out Botham, Kapil Dev and Imran Khan who all played for the county.
Which would also strengthen the bowling too.

[Etienne]

As with the Aussie states, when someone has played for more than one county then the one they played for most gets the nod. [...] I've allowed 3 overseas players for this as that was how many counties had when I started watching and thus is the right amount. But they are chosen on their contribution to the counties, not how good they were in general - which obviously means that players from the seventies and eighties who played for years for the counties are more likely to be picked than the modern ones who drop in for (part of) a season or two, however world class they may be.

Botham played far more for Somerset (and wasn't good enough when he played at Worcs to get in this team), Imran played far more for Sussex. Kapil only played a couple of seasons at Worcs.

[George C.]

I disagree, having seen them all play though.

[Satchmo Distel]

If you're picking world-class players who were there for a two-year payday, you might as well call it a franchise side. I think there should be a five-year minimum of service (or more) unless his career was cut short by war or injury.

[George C.]

You could, but surely it depends on their popularity, at the time partly, which applied to those 3.
Richard Illingworth in with a shout too.

[Lobachevsky]

Great work on this thread.

id have to have Grenidge opening with Richard’s for Hampshire. Has there ever been a more exciting opening partnership?

[jwdd27]

Great thread. I think it's only fair that Yorkshire be allowed two teams, and while I like the "taking the piss" angle of having a specialist keeper batting at 11 (with a first class average of 12), I think D Bairstow would be a better selection behind the stumps, especially if these teams will be playing some one day cricket (even if it's the old fashioned kind, where it's 60 overs and over 200 is a decent score).

[Etienne]

These teams are first class only. I think I'd have to pick different sides for one day stuff.

[jwdd27]

I think I'd have to pick different sides for one day stuff.

That would be great, thanks!

[Etienne]

Haha.

I'm a bit busy at the mo.

[Etienne]

Time to get this thread going again, with India.

The difficulty is that the Ranji Trophy has too many teams and they have changed around too often, so like the Indian cricket administrators I will do it on a Zone basis.

Central Zone
1 Mushtaq Ali
2 CK Nayudu
3 Vijay Hazare
4 Sandeep Patil
5 Mohammad Kaif
6 Naman Ojha +
7 Jalaj Saxena
8 Piyush Chawla
9 Bhuvi Kumar
10 Mohammad Nissar
11 Pankaj Singh

The central zone (primarily Uttar and Madhya Pradesh) has not been a hotbed of cricketing talent. They have a top three of greats from India's early days of cricket, Nayudu reputedly the best ever Indian cricketer has ever produced though he'd passed his best when test cricket began. But they only have those because the Maharajah of Indore bought the biggest stars to play for his team in the 1950s.

The middle order is the weak area Patil and Kaif provide some attractive shots, Ojha is a solid keeper. Saxena has some prodigious domestic allround stats (6500 runs at 34, 410 wickets at 25) but never got international recognition and Chawla was a fine spinner and useful bat but never really able to secure an Indian place.

They do have a good pace attack, Kumar is a very very good bowler, Nissar was very fast and very effective before World War 2, and Pankaj became the first seamer to get 400 Ranji trophy wickets.

East Zone

1 Manoj Tiwary
2 Pankaj Roy
3 Saurav Ganguly
4 Saurabh Tiwary
5 Ishan Kishan
6 Laxmi Shukla
7 MS Dhoni
8 Shahbaz Nadeem
9 Mohammed Shami
10 Shute Bannerjee
11 Dilip Doshi

Given Kolkota's size and reputation as a cricketing hotbed, you'd expect Bengal (and Jharkand) to produce a stronger team than this. The two Tiwary's have scored shedloads of runs domestically, Shukla was a solid all rounder, Shahbaz a useful bowler. But only Dhoni and Shami are world class players. Kishan gets in on promise.

North Zone
1 Virender Sehwag
2 Sidhu/Gambhir
3 Virat Kohli
4 Mohinder Amarnath
5 Lala Amarnath
6 Rishabh Pant
7 Kapil Dev
8 Madan Lal
9 Harbhajan Singh
10 Bishen Bedi
11 Ishant Sharma

Very strong top order, though neither father or son Amarnath scored as many runs as their talent suggested they should. Pant and Kapil Dev batting together would be fun. As in the Eighties Dev probably doesn't have the seam bowling support he deserves but Bedi and Harbhajan are a fine spin combo.

South Zone
1 Abhinav Mukund
2 Rahul Dravid
3 Gundappa Viswanath
4 Mohammed Azharuddin
5 MAK Pataudi
6 VVS Laxman
7 Ravichandaran Ashwin
8 Anil Kumble
9 Syed Kirmani
10 Javagal Srinath
11 Chandrasekhar/Venkat/Prasanna/Ghulam Ahmed

You could probably pick Agarwal as a specialist opener, both he and Mukund have scored loads of runs at a high average just at a time when India have lots of top order options. But "The Wall" would be a fine opener. The middle order would be fantastic to watch, as would the plethora of spin options. Srinath does have to shoulder the pace bowling on his own though.

West Zone
1 Sunil Gavaskar
2 Wasim Jaffer
3 Sachin Tendulkar
4 Vijay Merchant
5 Nawab of Pataudi
6 Vinoo Mankad
7 Ravindra Jadeja
8 Farokh Engineer
9 Amar Singh
10 Jasprit Bumrah
11 Subhash Gupte

Incredible batting riches, Jaffer (the highest run scorer in Indian cricket history) is picked ahead of Rohit Sharma, Umrigar, Pujara and Vengsarkar all miss out in the middle order. Two great all rounders and a fantastic keeper batsman down at 8. Singh and Bumrah are as good as any opening bowling attack - Hutton thought Singh the best bowler he faced in the 1930s. Spin is a slight weakness though Gupte and Jadeja are still a good pair.

[ursus arctos]

Seems to me to come down to the North vs the West, with the latter's appearance being unsurprising given Mubai's 41 Ranji titles (Karnataja being second with eight)

[Etienne]

I think West would definitely be favourites, but I think South would have a great chance of making the final if they got a turning pitch.

[Satchmo Distel]

I think the South might win the whole thing on a raging turner.

[Greenlander]

Given the nature of many of the Indian test match pitches over the last few years it'd surely be South Zone all the way.

At Lords or the MCG I'd fancy the West.

[Etienne]

Ah, but the BJP isn't very popular in the South, and the final will naturally be at the Narendra Modi stadium in Ahmedabad in the West Zone, so I'd expect the strip to resemble Headingley in the 80s and 90s.

[ursus arctos]

Beat me to it

[tee rex]

Another case of youthful impressions vs historical record: Madan Lal in my mind was around forever, and he did in fact play Tests for over a decade. But only 71 wickets. Would have guessed double that. He probably got 3 overs with the new ball before handing it to the spinners.

[Etienne]

Yeah, I picked him more for his domestic form where he had a fantastic record as an all rounder, 10,000 runs at 42, 625 wickets at 25. Hardik Pandya would surely beat him on talent, and if this was an ODI side, but his average is 30 with bat and ball in FC cricket.

I went back to look if the South really has produced no other top seamers than Srinath, and the best I found was Vinay Kumar. So they are going to have to rely on spin. They could have Kris Srikkanth as a specialist opener too.