Tony Becca
SIR GARY Sobers is not a talker. Although, based on his experience, his skills and his greatness he knows the game, Sobers seldom, if ever, joins in a discussion or an argument about the game of cricket - and definitely not when it involves a comparison between teams or players.
When he does speak, however, when he does get involved, as was the case a few days ago, the man rated one of the greatest batsmen ever, one of the finest swing bowlers ever, one of the best exponents of orthodox left-arm spin bowling and back-of the hand spin bowling ever, one of the most brilliant close-to-the-wicket fielders ever, and the greatest all-round cricketer of all time, is worth listening to.
According to Australians, and a few others, the Australian team of recent years is the greatest team to have graced the game of cricket. Not so, however, says Sobers.
According to Sobers, speaking to the Australian newspaper, The Australian, as good as the Australian teams under Mark Taylor, Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting were and is, not only were none of them as good as their predecessors of 1948 under Don Bradman, but also not one of them was or is as good as the West Indies team led by Clive Lloyd
He is right. In fact, as Sobers also said, it is possible that not one of those teams would have won a Test match against the West Indies of those days.
With batsmen like Mark Taylor, Michael Slater, David Boon, Mark Waugh, Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting, wicketkeeper Ian Healy, fast bowlers Craig McDermott, Glenn McGrath and Paul Reiffel, and right-arm legspinner Shane Warne in one team, Australia were good.
With batsmen like Slater, Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Mark Waugh, Steve Waugh and Ponting, wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist, fast bowlers McGrath, Jason Gillespie and Damion Fleming, and Warne in one team, they were also good.
GOOD AUSTRALIANS
With Hayden, Langer and Ponting, any three from Simon Katich, Damien Martyn, Michael Clarke and Michael Hussey, Gilchrist, fast bowlers McGrath and Brett Lee, and spinners Warne and Stuart MacGill, Australia are good - no doubt that.
In fact, all three Australian teams were great.
As great as those Australian teams were under Taylor and Steve Waugh, however, as great as this one is under Ponting, and as much as they may have been as good as or even probably better than those under Viv Richards and under Richie Richardson, not one of them was as great as the West Indies team under Lloyd.
Lest it be forgotten, it was a team that included batsmen like Gordon Greenidge, Roy Fredericks and then Desmond Haynes, Richards, Lawrence Rowe, Alvin Kallicharran, and Lloyd himself, a wicketkeeper like Deryck Murray and then one like Jeffrey Dujon, and fast bowlers Andy Roberts, Michael Holding, Joel Garner, Colin Croft and then Malcolm Marshall.
It was a team that never lost a Test match in four series and 19 matches against England while winning 11; a team that lost two in four series and 16 matches against Australia while winning nine; and a team that lost only one series between 1976 and 1985 under Lloyd and which carried on, under Richards and Richardson, without losing another series until 1995.
On top of that, it was a team that went into England in 1984 and won all five Test matches, and unlike Australia who lost in Pakistan in 1994-95, who lost successive series in India in 1996/97, 1997-98, and in 2000/01, who lost in Sri Lanka in 1999/2000 and who lost 2-1 in England last year, it was a team, but for one hiccup in 1980 when the West Indies lost 1-0 in New Zealand, that marched triumphantly around the world.
Sir Gary is right: the West Indies batting under Lloyd, the West Indies batting of Greenidge and Fredericks or Haynes, with Rowe and Kallicharran and especially with Richards and Lloyd himself, would have put Australia's bowlers to the sword, and backed up by their fielding, especially with Lloyd, Greenidge and Richards in the slips, Garner at gully, Haynes at short-leg and Holding around the boundary at fine-leg, their bowling, Roberts, Holding, Garner and Croft and even without Marshall, would have scared the daylights out of their batsmen.
