Trying to pick an all-time eleven or a best eleven subject to some criterion is a time-honoured hobby of cricket fans. While most sports do dabble in this sort of activity, it is only cricket that seems to take it to the extreme. It’s this type of thing that just illustrates why cricket is so different to any other sport: it seems to promote a mindset in its spectators more focussed on the strategy and skill of the game rather than any testosterone-fuelled bashing of bodies. As such, cricket’s governing committee, the ICC, goes to the effort of producing what they believe to be the best Test elevens and ODI elevens of the year every year. So, what I want to do is to just take a quick look at what they’ve managed to come up with.
ICC Test Team of the Year (in batting order)
- David Warner
- Alastair Cook (c)
- Kane Williamson
- Younis Khan
- Steve Smith
- Joe Root
- Sarfraz Ahmed (wk)
- Stuart Broad
- Trent Boult
- Yasir Shah
- Josh Hazlewood
12th man: Ravichandran Ashwin
As with any best eleven, one of the things you marvel at is just how good such a side they would be if somehow these eleven players were available to play together. While, of course, this was attempted in 2005 by the ICC as they selected the best non-Australian elevens in world cricket, such a thing probably won’t work in reality as a World XI could hardly be expected to congeal as a team and test themselves when patriotic pride is not on the line. This eleven in particular is one of the strongest from the ICC we’ve seen for a while.
So, the qualification period was from 18 September 2014 and 13 September 2015. As such, due to the vagaries of the tour programme, there weren’t a lot of Tests for the South Africans to stake their claim for the premier eleven. But it is refreshing to see that there are enough world-class cricketers to have a balanced, quality world eleven without selecting players from the team that has been at the top of Test cricket for several years.
If you glance at the batting aggregates for the period, the ICC choices for the batting line-up are quite justified. We have Cook and Warner at the top, combining aggression and accumulation, and then four run-scoring machines in the form of Williamson, Younis Khan, Smith and Root. While you could put in Rogers for Cook, Cook probably wins out on his sterling captaincy efforts for the period.
The only other point of contention would be the number six position for the side. While Virat Kohli and Azhar Ali had excellent periods averaging over 60, Joe Root had a similar record over the same period but offers that energetic, counter-attacking presence you need in the middle order. You could try to shoehorn an all-rounder in there in the form of Shakib al Hasan, who by no means had a bad year averaging 50 with the bat and 30 with the ball. However, 3 out of 8 of his matches were against Zimbabwe, against whom he boosted his averages with an almost run-a-ball century and a ten wicket haul.
As wicket-keeper, Sarfraz Ahmed is the pretty clear pick as he established himself as a brilliant counter-puncher at number seven for Pakistan, producing innings of note against Australia, New Zealand and Sri Lanka. Although the 3rd Test of the series against Sri Lanka will probably be remembered for Pakistan’s chase of 377 in the 4th innings with seven wickets to spare, they would never have been in that situation if it weren’t for Sarfraz Ahmed’s innings of 78 in a 2nd innings total of 215.
The bowling attack is again pretty obvious as all four of them have enjoyed very successful years as Boult and Hazlewood have established themselves as the leading quicks of the future, while Broad, outstanding in the 2015 Ashes, continues to defy predictions of his decline with age. It should be noted that none of these three quicks bowl at the holy 140kph benchmark that Darren Lehmann and the Australian selection panel seem so set on maintaining. Yasir Shah, ordained by Shane Warne as the leading legspinner in the world, has enjoyed a rampant start to his career, but we’ll have to wait and see if he has a ‘mystery’ factor that could wear off.
Now, the one-day team.
ICC ODI Team of the Year (batting order)
- Tillakaratne Dilshan
- Hashim Amla
- Kumar Sangakkara (wk)
- AB de Villiers (c)
- Steven Smith
- Ross Taylor
- Trent Boult
- Mohammed Shami
- Mitchell Starc
- Mustafizur Rahman
- Imran Tahir
12th man: Joe Root
For reference, here are the batting aggregates and the bowling aggregates.
Although I wish it was possible to slot Williamson in somewhere, the top five seems excellent. Dilshan and Amla were just scoring mountains of runs in this period and can also turn on the aggression as well. Kumar Sangakkara broke the record for most consecutive one-day hundreds and even did so at a World Cup. AB de Villiers produced so many ridiculous innings with anomalous strike-rates. Steven Smith was the one Australian batsman who could be trusted to consistently make runs in a team filled with players who could often be boom-or-bust (apart from maybe George Bailey).
However, once we get past the top five, there are a few problems with the team balance. While Trent Boult is an outstanding bowler, he is not a number seven batsman in one-dayers. He does have a slogging technique, but this position actually has some importance in one-dayers. While the number six is the legitimate finisher position, the number seven puts the extra finishing touches to an innings either with a quick, aggressive cameo or a guiding hand in a chase.
As such, instead of Ross Taylor and Trent Boult at six and seven, I suggest that Glenn Maxwell and James Faulkner should replace these two. Maxwell and Faulkner both averaged forty with the bat with great strike-rates: Maxwell scored six fifty-plus scores from 26 matches at a strike-rate of 125. While Faulkner bowled very well throughout the period with 22 wickets from 16 matches at 26, this is to be expected as he is a bowling all-rounder. However, what is surprising is that Maxwell managed to take 27 wickets from 26 matches at 29, contrasting with my thought that his impact had been limited.
The bowlers were pretty obvious choices for the ICC as they all enjoyed break-out years in 2015 with none of these fours really being considered world-beaters prior to this year. Mitchell Starc’s rise to prominence is particularly significant as I had previously thought his bowling was just never going to be that consistent and he would just continue flitting inside and out of the team, producing the occasional brilliant yorker. Who knew that you can still shatter the stumps of modern batsmen if you bowl at 150kph with a bit of swing?
So, looking at these ICC selections, it seems quite remarkable that these teams are all so strong. Moreover, a number of these players are relatively new to the scene. In each side, you can probably find about five or six players who you were nowhere near world eleven status two years ago. Such quality in world cricket bodes well for the state of the game.
Genuine Half-Volley 