An all time XI for each decade

[noducksallowed]

Self explanatory title, self explanatory what you gotta do!

My lists are below .Depending on how discussions go on here I may do a little write up on each one and maybe even stretch a bit further back in time.

1970s XI -
1. Sunil Gavaskar IND
2. Gordon Greenidge WI
3. IVA Richards WI
4. Javed Miandad PAK
5. Clive Lloyd c WI
6. Garfield Sobers WI
7. Ian Botham ENG
8. Rod Marsh AUS
9. Dennis Lillee AUS
10. Michael Holding WI
11. Derek Underwood ENG

A great mix of the young blood mixing with the old guard.

1980s XI -
1. Desmond Haynes WI
2. Gordon Greenidge WI
3. IVA Richards WI
4. Javed Miandad PAK
5. Alan Border AUS
6. Imran Khan c PAK
7. Kapil Dev IND
8. Jeffrey Dujon WI
9. Richard Hadlee NZ
10. Abdul Qadir PAK
11. Malcolm Marshall WI

Probably the most complete XI of all the decades I'm picking. And Miandad, Richards are picked across decades, some achievement.

1990s XI -
1. Graham Gooch ENG
2. Saeed Anwar PAK
3. Brian Lara WI
4. Sachin Tendulkar IND
5. Steve Waugh c AUS
6. Inzamam Ul-Haq PAK
7. Ian Healy AUS
8. Shaun Pollock SA
9. Wasim Akram PAK
10. Shane Warne AUS
11. Waqar Younis PAK

This team is essentially my childhood.

2000s XI -
1. Matthew Hayden AUS
2. Virender Sehwag IND
3. Ricky Ponting c AUS
4. Sachin Tendulkar IND
5. Jacques Kallis SA
6. Andrew Flintoff ENG
7. Adam Gilchrist AUS
8. Shoaib Akhtar PAK
9. Shane Warne AUS
10. Muttiah Muralidaran SL
11. Glenn McGrath AUS

Difficult choice between Kallis and Yousuf here but had to go with the all rounder.

2010s XI -
1. David Warner AUS
2. Alastair Cook ENG
3. Hashim Amla SA
4. Virat Kohli IND
5. Steve Smith AUS
6. Ben Stokes c ENG
7. MS Dhoni IND
8. Nathan Lyon AUS
9. Dale Steyn SA
10. Kagiso Rabada SA
11. James Anderson ENG

Younis Khan, Asad Shafiq, Joe Root, ABD, Shakib, Broad and a few others unlucky to miss out.

 

[icyman]

You could have started a draft here. Might make it more interesting...

 

[icyman]

A more detailed look at this and I feel the thread can be re-titled to 'All Time Test XI's' as these teams tend to be more in tune with the longest format of the game. The XI you've chosen for 2010's would be at the receiving end of many other teams in ODIs.. The only XI that reallt stands the test of ODIs is the one from 2000s.

 

[Bevab]

A more detailed look at this and I feel the thread can be re-titled to 'All Time Test XI's' as these teams tend to be more in tune with the longest format of the game. The XI you've chosen for 2010's would be at the receiving end of many other teams in ODIs.. The only XI that reallt stands the test of ODIs is the one from 2000s.

I assumed it was tests only until I saw Dhoni in there, no idea what he’s supposed to be doing in a an all-time test XI.

 

[pillowprocter]

1870s XI:

Charles Bannerman
George Ulyett
Andrew Greenwood
Alec Bannerman
Lord Harris
Billy Midwinter
Alfred Shaw
James Lillywhite jnr
Fred Spofforth
Jack Blackham
Tom Kendall

 

[Bevab]

I made an ATG ODI XI for each decade not so long ago… with the catch that the player in the team being eligible only if they made their debut in the same decade. Can’t remember if I only considered stats for that decade (upon checking the teams I have Abbas in the reserves for 70s so it may have been only stats for that particular decade) and if the end cutoff year for each period was the x9 or x0 (I assume I was lazy and went with whatever Cricinfo gave me). Hope it’s still in the spirit of this thread.

70s

1. Dennis Amiss
2. Majid Khan
3. Viv Richards
4. Greg Chappell
5. Clive Lloyd
6. Ian Botham
7. Rod Marsh
8. Sarfraz Nawaz
9. Dennis Lillee
10. Andy Roberts
11. Derek Underwood

A very strong team to start us off and since the first ODI was played in 1971 you have a full contingent to choose from unlike the upcoming decades. Asif Iqbal is terribly unlucky to miss out since I went with Botham assuming he’d be up for the fifth bowler workload more than Iqba…. can see the argument for there Chappell, Viv and Majid all contributing enough to make up for it though. Other notable misses include the West Indian opening duo, Garner, Holding, Gower… y’know the usuals.


80s

1. Geoff Marsh
2. Andrew Jones
3. Dean Jones
4. Allan Lamb
5. Saleem Malik
6. Steve Waugh
7. Jeff Dujon
8. Wasim Akram
9. Malcolm Marshall
10. Abdul Qadir
11. Curtly Ambrose

I expected this to be the worst affected team but… that isn’t a bad team at all. Not sure who acts as the captain here, might well be Marsh senior himself. Not sure why I kept Sidhu out in all honesty. The team’s reliant on Deano and Lamb to up the ante after the openers ‘see‘ out the new ball without losing their wickets before Malik and Waugh provide the fireworks down the order. The bowling needs no introduction and as long as Waugh (and the mythical sixth bowler) isn’t exposed it should work fine against most teams.


Will post the rest of them soon enough.

 

[noducksallowed]

A more detailed look at this and I feel the thread can be re-titled to 'All Time Test XI's' as these teams tend to be more in tune with the longest format of the game. The XI you've chosen for 2010's would be at the receiving end of many other teams in ODIs.. The only XI that reallt stands the test of ODIs is the one from 2000s.

I didn't necessarily have a single format in mind. More a list of the XI greatest players of that decade in a team...but I may add more detail. And I like the idea of the draft too but I'm currently involved in one and I think there is another one running, so I may look to start after all those are completed.

Edit: I forgot to add, for the decades 70s and 80s I certainly skewed more towards test performance.

 

[noducksallowed]

I made an ATG ODI XI for each decade not so long ago… with the catch that the player in the team being eligible only if they made their debut in the same decade. Can’t remember if I only considered stats for that decade (upon checking the teams I have Abbas in the reserves for 70s so it may have been only stats for that particular decade) and if the end cutoff year for each period was the x9 or x0 (I assume I was lazy and went with whatever Cricinfo gave me). Hope it’s still in the spirit of this thread.

70s

1. Dennis Amiss
2. Majid Khan
3. Viv Richards
4. Greg Chappell
5. Clive Lloyd
6. Ian Botham
7. Rod Marsh
8. Sarfraz Nawaz
9. Dennis Lillee
10. Andy Roberts
11. Derek Underwood

A very strong team to start us off and since the first ODI was played in 1971 you have a full contingent to choose from unlike the upcoming decades. Asif Iqbal is terribly unlucky to miss out since I went with Botham assuming he’d be up for the fifth bowler workload more than Iqba…. can see the argument for there Chappell, Viv and Majid all contributing enough to make up for it though. Other notable misses include the West Indian opening duo, Garner, Holding, Gower… y’know the usuals.


80s

1. Geoff Marsh
2. Andrew Jones
3. Dean Jones
4. Allan Lamb
5. Saleem Malik
6. Steve Waugh
7. Jeff Dujon
8. Wasim Akram
9. Malcolm Marshall
10. Abdul Qadir
11. Curtly Ambrose

I expected this to be the worst affected team but… that isn’t a bad team at all. Not sure who acts as the captain here, might well be Marsh senior himself. Not sure why I kept Sidhu out in all honesty. The team’s reliant on Deano and Lamb to up the ante after the openers ‘see‘ out the new ball without losing their wickets before Malik and Waugh provide the fireworks down the order. The bowling needs no introduction and as long as Waugh (and the mythical sixth bowler) isn’t exposed it should work fine against most teams.


Will post the rest of them soon enough.

Good stuff!

I almost used the criteria of "debuting in the decade" but thought it could be unfair and leave out some absolute stars.

Post automatically merged: Dec 12, 2023

1870s XI:

Charles Bannerman
George Ulyett
Andrew Greenwood
Alec Bannerman
Lord Harris
Billy Midwinter
Alfred Shaw
James Lillywhite jnr
Fred Spofforth
Jack Blackham
Tom Kendall

Now that's some serious research...I will be stretching further back in time too, starting with the 60s...should be up later today.

 

[Bevab]

Good stuff!

I almost used the criteria of "debuting in the decade" but thought it could be unfair and leave out some absolute stars.

Oh yeah, Tendulkar for instance misses out because he made his debut in December 1989, barely missing the cutoff. I had originally planned it out as a draft idea but wanted to know if it was feasible so got around to making teams and… ended up doing them till the last decade. For the current decade I had to relax the restriction but I might look again and see if it’s possible to make one just with 2020s debutants now that the WC is over.

 

[noducksallowed]

On to the 1960s, which will be a purely test XI.

Just a bit of a heads up on my criteria:
For a cricketer to be considered, they have to have at least 10 tests in the decade.
For previous XIs I wasn't using just stats because I think the eye test is also important and there's plenty of footage around from those eras...however it will start to become increasingly difficult so more reliance on stats and article/testimonies from contemporaries.

1960s XI -
1. William "Bill" Lawry
2. Robert "Bob" Simpson
3. Rohan Kanhai
4. Ken Barrington
5. Hanif Mohammad
6. Garfield Sobers
7. Wally Grout
8. Richie Benaud
9. Lance Gibbs
10. Fred Trueman
11. Graham Mackenzie

 

[pillowprocter]

7. Wally Grout

I'd like to contest this one. Grout and Jim Parks both had over 100 dismissals in this era, with Grout having superior dismissals per match. But Parks scored 1876 runs @ 32.34 in 64 inns and Grout scored 538 runs @ 11.95 in 50 inns. You aren't sacrificing much in keeping and he's undoubtedly a massive upgrade with the bat, so why not go with Parks?

 

[noducksallowed]

I'd like to contest this one. Grout and Jim Parks both had over 100 dismissals in this era, with Grout having superior dismissals per match. But Parks scored 1876 runs @ 32.34 in 64 inns and Grout scored 538 runs @ 11.95 in 50 inns. You aren't sacrificing much in keeping and he's undoubtedly a massive upgrade with the bat, so why not go with Parks?

You're right, these are numbers 1 and 2 when looking at numbers of dismissals. However, Grout has 20 more dismissals in 6 less tests...thats potentially 12 innings. The dismissals per match, from an analytical pov is also quite a big difference, as Grout is rounding towards 2 while Parks is closer to 1.

However, as I said, it's not just the numbers, its also contemporary accounts of the players and Grout is regarded as the best keeper of his age and arguably one of the best to do it with spin. Considering my team has 2 spinners, maybe 3 depending on what SObers decides on the day, Grout was the superior choice...in a team where I didn't feel like I needed to bolster the batting much (Benaud was handy with the bat also and would probably bat higher).

 

[Welwyn]

Benaud and Grout would definitely swap and it would fit the era in that keeping was considered WAY more important than what they provided with the bat.

 

[noducksallowed]

Continuing my dive into this...

1950s XI -

1. Len Hutton
2. Hanif Mohammad
3. Neil Harvey
4. Peter May
5. Everton Weekes
6. Frank Worrell
7. Gary Sobers
8. Godfrey Evans
9. Jim Laker
10. Ray Lindwall
11. Fred Trueman

This is a great decade to look into, there was the burgeoning modernity (a reverse sweep??), as the age of the Lindwall pace machine was coming to an end the likes of Trueman and Tyson burst onto the scene and there were at least a couple of very good fast bowlers from Pakistan as well. Not to mention the game opening up to more territories after WWII. oh and some guy named Sobers burst onto the scene!

 

[noducksallowed]

A decade shortened by war and in all honesty, feels very much like an extension of the 1930s but an interesting one nonetheless my 1940s XI:

1. Len Hutton
2. Arthur Morris
3. Don Bradman
4. Denis Compton
5. Bill Edrich
6. Keith Miller
7. Mulvantrai "Vinoo" Mankad
8. Don Tallon
9. Ian Johnson
10. Ray Lindwall
11. Ernie Toshack