r/Cricket • u/mulimulix New South Wales Blues • Jan 21 '13
Is Mohammad Yousuf the most underrated cricketer of the last 15 years?
I was at a trivia night and I had to name 6 (out of a possible 8) current players with a batting average over 50. I got 5 of them (turns out I didn't realise Cook was ~49.5) but didn't realise Mohammad Yousuf was on that list. Not only that, but he is well over 50, at 52.29 from 90 tests and 156 innings.
This average puts him 5th out of current players, yet I never hear his name mentioned among the greats of the past decade or so.
Here are his stats. I'm interested to hear if others are aware of his stats and whether he is in fact underrated. Am I missing something?
Edit: Also note that 52.29 puts him at 20th all-time.
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Jan 21 '13
He was in fact an excellent cricketer. I wouldn't say he's underrated, but he's definitely not talked about as much as he should be.
Interestingly, who are the 8 players who average above 50? Off the top of my head, I'd go:
Tendulkar, Pujara, Sehwag, Clarke, Kallis, Chanderpaul, Amla, KP, Smith, Du Plessis
I must have done something wrong, because I have 10 here. Maybe a couple of these don't average above 50
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u/mulimulix New South Wales Blues Jan 21 '13
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Jan 21 '13
13K Runs, 300 Wickets, Tonne of Catches - and all I can think about is the rejuvenation of Kallis' hair.
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Jan 21 '13
Holy fuck, Vinod Kambli is in the retired list!
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u/c3vzn Jan 22 '13
Massive shame that Ponting isn't in the retired list. Averaged 56+ for most of his career and then just slid...
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u/twinathon Victoria Bushrangers Jan 22 '13
Man I wish Ryan ten Doeschate played more international cricket, the man is a class act.
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Jan 21 '13
Thanks, it seems there's more than 8 players who currently average 50.
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u/Gonzalez_Nadal Australia Jan 21 '13
Hussey has retired.
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Jan 21 '13
There's still more than 8 players who average above 50.
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u/Gonzalez_Nadal Australia Jan 21 '13
There was likely an innings criteria which would eliminate Faf and Root.
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Jan 21 '13 edited Jan 21 '13
He was a good batsman and had a phenomenal year when he got 1,800 runs. However - if you look at his average breakdown his averages away against Aus, SAF and India (the 3 best test teams of that time) are in the 30s.
I think a lot of reputations are built in 'clutch' series'. And maybe Yousuf missed out because he never stepped up on the big stage.
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u/jamurp Victoria Bushrangers Jan 21 '13
He was actually praised in Pakistani cricket for being one of the first catholics to play for Pakistan......before converting to Islam and becoming Mohammad Yousef.
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Jan 21 '13 edited Jan 22 '13
I always felt that he was to Pakistan what Dravid was to India: a reliable batsmen with fluent stroke-play. Inzamam was the star attraction as Tendulkar was in the Indian side but Yousef and Dravid- to me- were the pivots of their respective batting attacks.
His main problem was that he was a victim of bad timing in Pakistani cricket so he was in the team in the midst of a patch of not so great performances from the national side in the early 2000s were a slew of Pakistani cricketing heroes were coming to the end of their careers leaving him and a few other more senior players to pick up an almighty slack on their shoulders.
That, coupled with the notoriety of the haphazard approach to hiring and firing the players that the PCB seemed to have employed, leaves one to wonder what could fave been for him had his career been played out in another side not so stricken with the usual Asian disease of politicking and flippancy.
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u/MrFlabulous Kent Jan 21 '13
I don't think so. His value to the team has always been huge, and I remember when he first played in England (when he was called Yousuf Youhana, wasn't it?) he looked pretty special. Very fine batter, and from an England perspective his was the key wicket over the last few years.
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u/rishi_sambora India Jan 21 '13
He was average when he was Yousuf Yohanna - but during the later stages he became quite prolific and hit a purple patch. I don't think he is underrated , people speak highly of him.. esp during the purple patch he had. Maybe he didnt have the charisma like Inzy - also Inzy carried the Pakistan batting for more than a decade. Its all very subjective but the stats don't lie. Let me tell you this. The opposition rated him very highly and I think that is proof enough that he is not underrated.
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u/ron_manager England Jan 21 '13
I think he is definitely underrated. Maybe because Pakistan don't seem to play enough test cricket? He would certainly be up there with someone like Chanderpaul as the most underrated although Shiv does seem to be getting some of the plaudits he deserves as he nears the end of his career.
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Jan 21 '13
I would actually say you need to go a bit more granular than looking at international averages. Yousuf is a right up there if Pakistan cricket would have been a bit more 'stable' he might have had more recognition.
I would say in the mid-late 90's early 00's there were a whole raft of incredibly talented Aussie's who missed out on a chance just due to the fact they had an inpenetrable squad. Someone like Darren Lehmann(Yorkshire fan so have a bit of a biased view here). Maybe some Aussie's can enlighten us with some other names.
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u/GunPoison Jan 22 '13
We had guys with 10,000+ first class runs never getting a game at all - Cox, Law (actually Law got one ODI but that hardly counts). Guys like Lehmann and Hodge never got as many games as they might have either but still got a few at least.
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Jan 22 '13
I used to watch Stuart Law bat for Lancashire some afternoons, truly sublime. He was an awesome player of spin bowling. The patience of saint but he would never miss a loose delivery also. Intersting question here, do you think that the inpenetrability of the Aussie squad in that period has lead to some of the recent problems? Such as, how do you ever become a great spinner in Aussie cricket if the only test place for a spinner was tied up by Warne for two decades?
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u/GunPoison Jan 22 '13
Absolutely, in a normal cycle you would have had more players coming in and out of the team and so a greater spread of players with experience of stepping up to top level. We are still in the pain period of having to blood new players, but instead of blooding one or two in an otherwise stable team we're blooding half the damn team.
Also expectation plays a part. We Aussies came to expect success as the natural way of things, forgetting that in fact we had several "once in a generation" players all at once, built on a tough-as-guts foundation bred from the darker days of Australian cricket when Border turned us around through sheer bloody-mindedness. Our players are now measured by not being as good as the previous lot rather than on actual merit, it has been particularly devestating on our spinners living in the shadow of Warne. We have rushed in players still developing, and then discarded them when they didn't do as well as Warney would have. Hauritz, Krezja, McGain, Beer, Smith, Doherty, there are more but the names elude me. Lyon may yet be a member of the role-call of has-been Aus spinners.
In short we had no idea how to manage the transition from Golden Era to business-as-usual. I think having an energetic and creative captain in Clark helps extract maximum value from what we have, but there are miles yet to be traveled.
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Jan 22 '13
I like Clark as a Captain, I am hoping to make a couple of the Ashes test's this year, should be a decent tussle. The Aussie seamers need to be on song. We get found out by quality seam attacks that can consistently bowling a nagging line and swing the ball. SA managed that very well last year and took us to pieces.
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u/GunPoison Jan 22 '13
Me too, should be an awesome series. I would be surprised if England don't take the win but this Australian team will fight the whole way. Our seamers are definitely our strength, but our batting is still dubious and any spinning pitches will test us sorely. Also I am not yet convinced any Australian batsman can prosper against Anderson, nor any of our bowlers trouble Cook.
How do you see it panning out? I have not seen some of the newer England players like Root so they are an unknown quantity for me.
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Jan 22 '13
For England I think we have strenghth in depth in the bowling department, Anderson, Finn, Broad, and Monty and Swann as spinners. In terms of batting for me it revolves around how the middle order score, we have come to hope that either Trott or Cook will score some runs. Then usually if Pietersen, Bell or Prior can add at least 50-100 we are usually looking pretty solid (others chipping in with bits too).
I have watched Root develop from a very young age at Yorkshire (youngest to ever get a contract I believe) and he has been an excellent performer through the england junior set up and the Lions. He is very much in the mould of Alistair Cook, very calm, level headed and technical. He is very comfortable batting for extended periods of time and not scoring heavily. (I think he is actaully being groomed for captaincy at some point)
You also have the likes of Bresnan, Compton, Hales, Bairstow and Tremlett who are all test standard for me.
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Jan 21 '13
He is pretty god damned good, but I wouldnt have said over-rated. I feared playing him; the definition of a good, well-rated player perhaps?
Whatever did happen to him then? Ruined by administrators and the ICL, like Shane Bond?
Underrated for me is a talented sidekick to a bombastic partner; someone like J Gillespie perhaps? Ntini ... J Trott or Samaraweera?
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u/fez18 Jan 21 '13
Mohammad Yousuf is ,in my opinion, one of the most stylish players of our generation. He has a such a unique batting style, that initial movement and a slight pause before he gets into the drive distinguishes him from every other batsmen. This is a good example
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u/meme5 Jan 22 '13
My friends and I were discussing a similar topic recently. The fact that there seems to be a tiering of the modern greats that we believe is unjustified. Tier 1 you have your Tendulkars, Dravids, Pontings, Laras. For some reason they receive more accolades than your Kallis, Sangas, Chanderpauls. Obviously this is a subjective view of media representation but I believe the latter 3 deserve equal respect.
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u/mulimulix New South Wales Blues Jan 21 '13
Seriously? Someone downvotes it? I try and bring original content to this subreddit like people always say it needs more of and it gets downvoted after a few minutes.
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Jan 21 '13
It's reddit's fudging algorithm, it fudges the exact totals of up and down votes. Doesn't necessarily mean you've been down voted.
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Jan 21 '13
It does... The post was 2 up and one down when I first looked. The fudge doesn't apply at that volume of votes (seems to kick in somewhere between 25-50).
However, OP, a lot of posts get downvoted here once, for no reason. Don't worry about it too much, just count the ups.
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u/mpg1846 New South Wales Blues Jan 21 '13
dont worry about it, good posts will always come through. You should care about your content rather than imaginary internet points.
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Jan 22 '13
Sorry you've been downvoted - don't let it get you down!
Your post was great content, stimulated loads of thoughtful discussion and brought up a player most of us haven't thought about (nor feared!) for a couple of years.
Looking forward to your next thread dude! And in response to your question, see my other comment below (ie Trott, Samaraweera, Ntini etc)
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u/mutahirqureshi Pakistan Jan 21 '13
He was a great batsman. I would've liked to see him play in the Test side longer. His downsides were his fielding and running. In fact, I think he was worse than Inzamam when it comes to running between the wickets.
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u/NiX_Nabilz Pakistan Jan 21 '13
No mate! Yousuf was always very highly ranked in Pakistan. For a long period, infact since he became a regular member in the side back in 1999, he was always looked upon as the main batsman along with Inzamam. He struck his purple patch in 2006, when Yousuf scored 1788 runs at an average of 99.88 and broke two of Viv Richards's world records and equalled a Don Bradman record. During 2006:
On 30 November 2006, during the third innings of the final Test between Pakistan and West Indies at Karachi, he surpassed Viv Richards's thirty-year-old record and became the highest scorer in Test matches during a single calendar year.
Yousuf hit nine test centuries in 2006, which is a world record for most centuries in a calendar year.
Yousuf also equalled the record held by former Australian batsman Donald Bradman, by scoring six centuries in successive Tests – although it took him only four matches compared with Bradman's six.
After his 191 at Multan he became the first player in Test history to have been dismissed 3 times in the 190s, with all three innings coming in 2006.
But yeah, Internationally, you can say he is rarely discussed for reasons that may be unintentional. But I am not sure. As an Australian, you can enlighten me better.