Paul Collingwood - best 'worst' batsman?

Been thinking about this. Colly is a pretty limited player. Ugly technique & not great to watch and yet is on the cusp of notching 10 test hundreds when he gets his next.

What other best 'worsts' are there who have joined the 10 club?

This isn't a crap players who scored 10 tons thread, more of a players who scored 10 test hundreds who made the most of limited ability.

Call for Skully.

JKLever wrote:This isn't a crap players who scored 10 tons thread, more of a players who scored 10 test hundreds who made the most of limited ability.

I don't think anyone can be "crap" and score 10 Test centuries anyway! According to cricinfo, 102 players have achieved this, looking at the list most of them are/were top class apart from a few I can't claim to know much about...

Perhaps he is the "worst" "best" batsman.

Butch Butcher would've been close - 8 hundreds @ 34.

But he's kind of the opposite to Collingwood, as a far more gifted batsman who never quite lived up to his billing.

At the moment Colly averages 44, that's about the same as Thorpe and Trescothick...

Those who have made 10 Test centuries with averages below 40:

Atapattu 16 (39.02)
Atherton 16 (37.69)
Stewart 15 (39.54)
Botham 14 (33.54)
Lamb 14 (36.09)
Hooper 13 (36.46)
Ijaz Ahmed 12 (37.67)
J Wright 12 (37.82)
Asif Iqbal 11 (38.85)
Astle 11 (37.02)
Shastri 11 (35.79)
Gatting 10 (35.55)
Mudassar Nazar 10 (38.09)
Mushtaq Mohammad 10 (39.17)

beamer wrote:At the moment Colly averages 44, that's about the same as Thorpe and Trescothick...

Those who have made 10 Test centuries with averages below 40:

Atapattu 16 (39.02)
Atherton 16 (37.69)
Stewart 15 (39.54)
Botham 14 (33.54)
Lamb 14 (36.09)
Hooper 13 (36.46)
Ijaz Ahmed 12 (37.67)
J Wright 12 (37.82)
Asif Iqbal 11 (38.85)
Astle 11 (37.02)
Shastri 11 (35.79)
Gatting 10 (35.55)
Mudassar Nazar 10 (38.09)
Mushtaq Mohammad 10 (39.17)

Amazing how crap Gattings record looks... different era though.

I guess Nathan Astle must be a contender...

Most centuries for a player averaging below 30 is Grant Flower's 6. Mohammad Ashraful with 5 centuries averages 23.87...

@JKL: nope, Astle was always great to watch.

Shastri is the worst.

Its probably Dhoni in ODIs. Looks fugly at the crease, mistimes the shots 50% of the time, but gets the job done.

JGK wrote:Shastri is the worst.

by far

Would be interesting to ask the same question for 20 ton players. You can't call any of them "bad" but I reckon Langer might be up there with the "worst".

spangler wrote:

JGK wrote:Shastri is the worst.

by far

Probably.

He picked up towards the end of his career but Hooper was a serial dissappointment in test cricket. Attapattu- god bless shim must have made far too many of his tons in sub-continent run orgies- I believe his record against Bangladesh is something to behold.

I apologise Marvan- he's only got one ton against Bangladesh (albeit a double ton) but has five tons and an average of 90 odd against Zimbabwe.

Only averages 40 plus against one major test nation which is Engalnd funnily enough and that's mainly because of two featherbead massive tons. Scored in binary the rest of the time if I remember rightly.

Bell's destined to be on the list.

JGK wrote:Would be interesting to ask the same question for 20 ton players. You can't call any of them "bad" but I reckon Langer might be up there with the "worst".

junior waugh has the lowest average. 12 of the 30 average below 50

link

Thanks for the list. Langer and Jaya would vie for the "worst" with 23 or more tons but it is a pretty outstanding group at that level.

HH_pink wrote:@JKL: nope, Astle was always great to watch.

Not the point. He was still rather gash...

It's between Shastri & Astle then.

Actually, John Wright and even Gatting probably challenge those two.

I'd still say Shastri though.

And Gatting? How good was he? The stupid reverse sweep and the Warne ball are the only things about his batting that are talked about much.

The other list would have Jayawardene and Waugh competing.

doremi wrote:And Gatting? How good was he?

Average doesn't look anything special - he didn't score a ton until he got a double in our winnings series in India in 84/5. Then he was close to being our best batsman from 1985-1988 before going on that rebel tour. Was waaaay past it when recalled in the mid 90's...

I'd still rate him above Astle, considering the quality of bowling was higher throughout his career.

beamer wrote:At the moment Colly averages 44, that's about the same as Thorpe and Trescothick...

Those who have made 10 Test centuries with averages below 40:

Atapattu 16 (39.02)
Atherton 16 (37.69)
Stewart 15 (39.54)
Botham 14 (33.54)
Lamb 14 (36.09)
Hooper 13 (36.46)
Ijaz Ahmed 12 (37.67)
J Wright 12 (37.82)
Asif Iqbal 11 (38.85)
Astle 11 (37.02)
Shastri 11 (35.79)
Gatting 10 (35.55)
Mudassar Nazar 10 (38.09)
Mushtaq Mohammad 10 (39.17)

What about Nasser? 14 (37.18)

er, ok then. That is meant to say 37.1 eight, but Mr Smiley likes to pop up on that average.

Steve Waugh wasn't exactly easy on the eye, and looked downright out of his depth against the short stuff, but he scored over 10,000 test runs at 51.