Project 5.mp3

In the Big 3 podcast, Adarsh and Adam discuss the recent England versus Pakistan test match. England won by an innings and 47 runs. Pakistan's batting performance was disappointing and showed their vulnerability. The pitch did not deteriorate as expected. Babar Azam's form has declined and there may be technical and psychological issues affecting his performance. The instability in Pakistan cricket management is also a factor. Pakistan spinners did not perform well. England's batting was more focused on running between the wickets rather than boundaries. Pakistan's second innings collapse was seen as a result of their own mistakes rather than England's skill. Hello and welcome to the Big 3 podcast with Adarsh and Adam. Today we are going to discuss on a lot of different topics and our first topic is obviously the England versus Pakistan test that happened just a few days back. So England won the test by an innings and 47 runs and it was Pakistan being Pakistan more than anyone could imagine honestly. I will get on to the details later but first of all good morning Adam and what did you make of it? Good morning Adarsh and happy birthday as well. I think it was one of those games where, like you said, a lot of Pakistan fans I noticed on Twitter were worried about this actually happening even before it actually happened and you could see that once England batted out the end of the second day and they were like 90 for 1 you could sense even then Pakistan fans were kind of panicking and it was two things really. It was one the good side of baseball which is a game that would have been a draw years ago if England managed to win by overtaking Pakistan at such a high rate but also showed the vulnerability of Pakistan and also in a sense that people, when you are on a losing streak it is like a habit, just like winning and your confidence really suffers and normally when someone has just got 800 you think well we can easily bat out 4 sessions but you get self-doubt and your confidence goes and you start to panic and I think that is what happened. I thought we were watching the Multan Grand Prix, I didn't think it was a cricket match. I think the first day, I think we all expected, at least I did, that it will break down and I think Pakistan did too which is why they took a more conservative approach throughout their first innings. If you see both of England and Pakistan both batted around 150 overs but England got 300 or so runs more than Pakistan. I think that is the main difference which Shan Masood in the press conference after the game was talking about where till Abdullah Shafiq and Shan Masood Pakistan were going at 4.5, 500 runs and over. After that Babar and Saud came in and honestly that was sad padding batting, nothing more than that because Saud Shakeel he scored at 46.32 and I do not think that in that sort of a pitch you can afford to score that slowly and after that Salman Agha did provide a bit of a boost to Pakistan's batting but ultimately I think if they were somewhere around 700-750 then they would have a better chance of maybe say getting England out at 700-650 somewhere around that. I think the extra hours which they didn't, which they had spent in the field because of England scoring 823 which was because of the fact that they didn't have enough runs that cost them in the innings later on and England I would say that well Ollie Pope had a bit of an outing, didn't he? I think yeah, so England feasted on that pitch and Joe Root did what Joe Root does. I was just watching Babar Azam standing there, he scored 30 and then after that he dropped two catches in that game. I just think that Babar Azam is a perfect reflection of where Pakistan cricket is at right now because they are just down from every possible corner you can imagine preparing pitches which make for absolute dull-fess and performing just like that. That's a very good point, I mean kind of three things are picked up from what you're saying there. You're spot on about the pitch looking like it might deteriorate, there are like cracks in it and so if you factor that into your mind and think the pitch will deteriorate, you think 5.50, however quickly we get it, will be like a winning score. The pitch will deteriorate, they're batting last and we can win, but then it didn't deteriorate at all, so it's like a big road. With Babar Azam, he looked so good a few years ago, I know there's been a lot of people saying well he never really was that good anyway or whatever, but that's wrong, that's just wrong. Yeah, because I thought he looked good a few years ago. Yeah, yeah, he was really good because when he averaged around 65 in 2021-2022, you can't live in denial. I saw a lot of people on Twitter saying that well he was never very good and he always scores against bad teams, but he scored a 70-odd in South Africa in seeming conditions, he was good in Australia, really good in England in 2020 and yeah, he scored everywhere and he was the player of the tournament for me in the 2020-2020 World Cup. In that tournament, it was quite funny really because I think England and Pakistan were the two best sides and they were meant to get to the final, but they both lost in the semi and in the following year when they played less well, they actually got to the final to even record that, and so yeah, he was brilliant in that T20-2021 tournament, beat India didn't he, beat New Zealand, they were just going like a train in their group and then they lost to Australia in the semis, I think it's safe to say it was kind of because of the Jew, but whatever the reason, he was brilliant in that tournament. I think it's a bit like, I kind of, kind of, it's all missing history a bit to say, I mean he was never good in the first place or whatever, I think there must be, you pointed to a technical reason last week that Gerard Timber had spotted about his bad name, but there must be something and it must also be like a psychological issue that he's not, for some reason he's not happy in this side, I don't know if it's because they keep dropping him in his corner, catching the white ball side or whatever, but there's something. Yeah, obviously because their management is not stable, nothing about Pakistan cricket is stable because there's talk of Shaan Masood being sacked for the next test match, so it's just out of the winds really, you cannot expect the player to be scoring runs when you have a new coach and a new chairman every two months, so yeah, that definitely has a part to play in this and that's why I make a plea to all Pakistan fans, please do not go and abuse him all day long, because he's a human at the end of the day and I really don't like to see someone who's been, who's actually a good person and I have seen him, that he's, people in India make him out to be an arrogant person, but he's not and I just make a plea, just please treat him like a human, yes he's going through a bad patch, but he will come back again. Now coming on to Pakistan spinners, I think Abrar, he looked lackluster honestly, because if you're not getting any purchase, you're expected to at least get, you should be consistent, you should go at 3-4's and over, how much did he go for, let me just check, he went for, he went for 5 runs and over and that's for 40 overs, yeah, in 40 overs, going for 5 runs and over, that's just ridiculous, isn't it and after that, you had Shaheen Shah maybe and Naseem Shah bowling 30 overs each, Naseem Shah did look good to me, at the end of the day, he was swinging it a little, Shaheen looked, Aamir Jamal honestly was a standout for me, because he showed some resilience in that Pakistan line-up, which I hadn't seen before. Yes, definitely, I think with Abrar, he ended up getting injured in the end, he got a fever maybe and he was in hospital for the last two days, but I don't think it made a difference, because he was bowling badly the first couple of days, yeah, I think Naseem did okay, I suppose, if it's such a flat pitch and England are playing in a one-day match, I suppose England didn't, I think they actually hit less sixes than Pakistan did, so what was impressive about Root and Brook was the ones and twos they were running all the time, so maybe they refined things a bit, it wasn't like that one against New Zealand a few years ago, where they just smashed a 550 in double quick time, this was more less boundary orientated and more kind of clever running between the wickets, what did you think? Yeah, you're correct on that, I think that boils down to two issues, three issues actually, first of all it's the skill, which plays a major part, second is their temperament, because if you see Pakistan in the second innings, what happened to them, they capitulated for whatever, 82 for 6, whereas England, as you said, they kept on scoring ones and twos, and whereas South Shaquille, people like that, they were just bogged down in one, and when the ball wasn't doing much, they weren't able to rotate the strike as they should have, like people like Babar Azam, you expect him to be able to manoeuvre the gaps and score at around a rounder in the ball in this pitch, like how Harry Brook did, but he couldn't, Salman Ali Agha did kind of do that, but apart from that, and Shaan Masood earlier on, apart from that, no one did much, even Naseem Shah honestly, people were criticising him, but I thought for a tail ender, he was not too bad in that innings. Yeah, I thought so, I think, how much in this game do you give England credit for coming back from Pakistan's first inning, and surpassing it, and then managing to pull them out, and how much do you give it a case of Pakistan almost committing suicide at the end, what would you say? I think it's more of Pakistan committing suicide, because at late day 4, I'd accept that the pitch was cracking up, and with the new ball, it was doing all sorts back then, but it was not unplayable, it was something which you encounter in any country, you go to England, you will face more, it will be harder to face in first day than there was in the fourth day or whatever, and they just looked like first ball, I saw the first ball like Abdullah Shafiq's stance, and he just got out, and from that moment on, you just knew that they will capitulate that day, and that's what they were tracking. Masood was dropped twice, wasn't he, before he was out. Yeah, and that was the whole theme of their innings, it didn't even, it felt expected in a sense, like how that Bangladesh game panned out, I don't know if you saw it, they were 27 for 6, after that they just scored whatever 300, 400, something like that, and it was like this this time, whereas England, I think yeah, for batting out two days in the heat, in 40 degrees, whatever, that was really good from both of Root and Harry Brook, and they deserve to be commended for that, but Pakistan just shoot themselves in the foot, and we can't deny that. It's funny, when you see a wicket on TV, you think, oh that looks amazing, so Woates' wicket, and there was a wicket cast, and got the one that clean bowled someone, I can't remember who he clean bowled, and that's nice, you think, oh brilliant, and then you look at it again and go, well the batsmen could have done something, there wasn't really an unplayable ball, maybe they were set up wrong, or they were tired, or whatever, but they weren't like really magic delivery, they just looked at it on TV, on first sight, and the people, yeah. They were just, like that, I'll take the example of the, yeah, I'll take the example of the Babar Azam dismissal, if you saw the ball it hit, who bowled that, I think Baden-Kass bowled that, and it seemed as if it seemed away a little bit, in the second innings, but if you actually look at the trajectory, it was just, it was just a 0.2 degree or something like that movement, and that didn't really make a difference, it was just the fact that they were drained after fielding for two days and all that, and that led to them being like that at the end of the day. Which obviously, the second time you just kind of deceived him that much, because the first inning, so I think the end of the first day, Wilkes did something similar to him, didn't he, maybe it's an England plan. Yeah, he was just tired at the end of the day, he just bowled, he said to him, people were saying that, I saw a really funny tweet, so someone tweeted that Naseem Shah was bowling, oh, that was Babar Azam, you remember that catch which he dropped, so someone tweeted that Naseem Shah was bowling at 140 kilometers per hour, and Joe Root hit the shot at 74 kilometers per hour, so it came at 214 kilometers per hour, and no human could have ever caught that, it was genuinely hilarious how people, what lengths people go to defend him, so, yeah, and that was how people were trying to say like, Wilkes set him up, all that, but that's professional cricket, that's top-level cricket, you will get set up, you have to counter with that, and Pakistan just couldn't do that at the end, and I think at the fourth day, like, their pacers, they were, there's a guy called Mir Hamza, and I think they should have played him, because he brings in a left-arm angle, and Pakistan chase quick bowlers, but he bowls around 125, 130, a bit like Ollie Robinson, and he swings it really well, and he has a, he hits a nice length, and he will give you 40 over the day. No, but I did, I did hear that he was going to come into the squad, I don't know if he's a, they haven't announced a team yet, obviously, but I did hear about him, and he was the, he's a guy who is, he's a nephew of, there's some, a big player's nephew, I don't know, could have been like a Meandaz nephew, or a Manix nephew, someone who's been talked about, about coming into the side for the next test. Yeah, yeah, he's Azam Khan, I don't think he'll come in, because, are you talking about the wicket-keeper, who's Moeen Khan's nephew, Azam Khan? He could be, maybe it's Moeen Khan's nephew then, yeah. Yeah, but he, I don't think he's a test player, I, I really don't see him coming in, but I would, I think that they'll, they'll probably drop one of the femurs, and, and most probably they'll sack Shan, whatever I'm hearing, Shan will be sacked then, they've already changed the selection committee, and Jason Gillespie, I just wonder what's going on through his mind, he's sitting in Australia, just drinking beer, whatever, and now he's at the helm of Pakistan cricket, the tsunami that never ends. Because I remember him as a player, he had this really long hair, long black hair, and now you see him, he's, he's got like short white hair, do you think it's the job? Yeah, might be. I don't know if, I wonder if he was the right person to come into Pakistan, mentality-wise, I wonder if he understood about Pakistan cricket, or he had his own kind of view of cricket, and didn't really, didn't really adjust, I don't know, I don't know enough really about, about what he did when he got there, but you kind of have to understand the culture of Pakistan cricket to, to excel there, I think. I'm asking you a question, what would you do to fix Pakistan cricket, step by step? I know this won't be enough, this podcast won't be enough to cover all of it, but if you were to just give a briefing, how you would fix Pakistan cricket? I mean, I think that's a difficult one, I mean, it's like a, it's hard, yeah, I mean, it'd be like two levels, it'd be like a long-term infrastructure thing, where you say, for instance, don't, don't play that one-day tournament just before a test series, but, you know, be a bit smarter there, that's like a small thing. He could say that, my niece would say that, just like you did, it's Pakistan, they won't do it, but my niece could do that. Yeah, so you do that, also the, I think that they change their selectors when different parties get into it, they say, it's like the selector is like a political appointment. Yeah, I think personally, what they should do is, well, if we are going to ignore Pakistani society, and Asian society as a whole, because, or maybe subcontinental society, because here people, most cricket teams are run by the government, BGCI is also run by BJP, but, but the thing is that with Pakistan cricket, that if a game does not go well, like if you see Pakistan's, if you go to the political scenario, there, no Prime Minister has ever completed their tenure, and I think that reflects well in their, in Pakistan cricket as well, because, no, I don't think a chairman has ever served their entire four year tenure, no one, till Basim Khan was there, there was some sort of stability in that unit. And I think if I were to fix Pakistan cricket, I'd first of all, remove the church from the state. And then after that, I'd, I'd make sure that, well, invest in the grassroots infrastructure and keep scouts everywhere. And I make players and give clarity to players, like if I were to look in the short term, like, you're going to be with me for 10 test matches, or 15 test matches, and, and you, and we give you full backing to do whatever you want. And just work with them technically, like what Babar Azam had, just try to fix it with good coaches, rather than just appointing $500,000 mentors, which are basically going to sit there and give haughty speeches. That, that I think if they were to do something like that, then there could be some sort of fix for Pakistan cricket, but I don't think it's happening anytime soon. Do you see Pakistan being like this? Or do you see them ever getting back to where they were, say 20 years ago? That's a great question, because initially, I just thought they'd be up and down. But it's looking a bit more now like a West Indies style decline in test cricket for them, where they just continue to decline, because I thought, you know, they were, they were a decent side. I mean, white ball wise, they could always, say they've won a T20 World Cup, then lost the final, they got to semis. But test wise, in particular, they've been a bit up and down, but they have been good as well as bad. So it's not like, it hasn't looked terminal. But recently, maybe the last two years, it has taken a real, to me, seem to take a real turn for the worse. Yeah, I don't see it in the same way as the West Indies test foot side, where you think they're never ever going to come back. This one seems a bit different. I think it's possible. Do you think it's the fact that they can't play anything that affects them in a way that they're being strangled a bit financially? I don't think they're honestly financially strangled, because PCB makes the third most money out of all the boards. Yeah, because they have the PSL in Pakistan's home bases also. There are a lot of fans in Pakistan. So that makes up for a lot of money. But yeah, I think Indian cricket, I think the worst thing that's happened to Pakistan cricket was the 2021 India-Pakistan game in the T20 World Cup. Because if you ask any Pakistani cricket fan, they'll say the same thing. Because what happened after that was that they got placed in a higher pedestal than what they were. And that was a young team, 25 year olds, everyone was young and they were fit, agile, talented. But everyone was given a lot of money, a lot of fame, and they thought they were kings. And what you do from that phase is go on and improve. Because beating India in a group stage game might be huge in the short term, but you cannot keep on banking on that for your future. And that's what they did. That game was played out 50 times, 60 times for the entire year. And you see after that, I think it was the Asia Cup again, the game versus India, one year later, and two years later, and they just fell apart in that game. And after that, I think the downfall has really started for them. So yeah, that game, I think, just being overconfident in themselves. And Ramesh Raja, I think when he was there in the Pakistan series, in the last England versus Pakistan series in 2022, he asked for them to prepare, well, very flat pitches so that Babar could score 200s and all that. He wanted them to start bad basically. And I think all of that combined along with the mental stress that comes with being a Pakistan player has led to this. I remember in the late 90s, England were in a similar situation. And there were all these theories going around, what do we do? Do we change the school system? Do we redo the county structure? Blah, blah, blah. And in the end, all it took to recover was a good coach and a good captain working in unison, Fletcher and Hussain. And they managed to make the recovery. And it was a similar way to maybe Ganguly and John Wright, but India didn't start at such a low base. When Fletcher and Hussain took over, they ended up in a really bad way. But all it took was two good people working together with a sensible kind of criteria, sensible ideas, and being backed. And they did it. So I still think it's possible for Pakistan if they got things right with a coach and captain, in terms of good ones that work together well. But like you say, you need to have faith shown in them to come back. I don't know how much money they lost after having to play abroad all the time. They went through a time where they couldn't play at home. So I wonder if that had a big effect on them. Yeah, I think that had a big effect on them. And as you spoke of, I think Babbar and Mickey Arthur in that little phase between, like England, like Nasser Hussain and Abdul Fletcher, both of them were bonding really well. But I think with England, the difference was that there was no governmental interference every time. So when Pakistan was at a real high in 2022 or 2023, the start of 2023, I think the politicians or the people in administration were scared that Babbar was too powerful. So they wanted to break his power. And they created groups in the dressing room by promising Shaheen captaincy, promising Rizwan captaincy, and that created a lot of angst between them. Because before that, they looked like a unit that wanted to win for their country. But after that, now they look like a group of people who just want to play for their own averages, for their own wickets, and for their own cumulative runs. And that can never be a good thing. What's interesting is, obviously, there's been interference and some things aren't run well, etc. But that might have been the case a few years ago, too. So why is it in the last two years in particular, there's been such a steep decline? And I think that might be a question. It might not necessarily be a big structural change needed or something, there might just be something in the last two years that's gone wrong. Yeah, and you see Mohsin Naqvi when he came around, he was trying to do I don't know if you follow it to that depth. But he said after every tournament, he says, we'll have a surgery, surgery 2.0, surgery 3.0. I just don't know what that means. Because every time you lose a tournament, you won't just change your entire domestic system. That does not work like that. I mean, you can't change the number of teams they had in baseball Australia, this is like four years ago or something, I think. But that does not. Yeah, he did that in the Kaidei isentropy. And now they're talking of just removing it overall. And I just don't understand how that works. Because you have a working domestic system that has given them players on and on for around, whatever, 50-60 years. And they're trying to change that. And I think that will be wrong for them. And yeah, I think for the past two years, it's just been first of all, there's a lot of obviously like there was a lot of focus on Babar Azam the player. And I think that that was something there. And just the administration, I think before him, Waseem Khan was really good. And before that, they had Mirza, Eunice Khan, Bahab Riaz, all of these guys carried them for a lot of time. I think, I think Pakistan cricket, we can go on and on discussing Pakistan cricket, because there's a lot to unravel there. I think England deserves a shout out to for how they played in this test match. And yeah, I think you could take over for Joe Root and Harry Brook. We're going to talk about Root in comparison to the other top players in a bit. But I mean, he's just proving himself to be England. Ron Wise is overtaking for England's leading run scorer ever in test cricket. Best England player I've seen. I don't know if some of the guys in the past, like I don't know, Wally Hammond, or Sir Ben Hodgson, or James Finch, or these legends that I didn't see apart from Vince. I don't know if someone might, you know, had a time machine to see them, maybe they were better. But definitely, record wise, he's the best, the best I've seen. And he's comfortable against all types of bowling. He's comfortable against spin and seam. He's got an array of shots as well. And he's also a good fielder and also can get wicked as well. He's been a brilliant player. Brook really should be someone who is England's best player in all formats for the next decade. I think we both said this on Twitter. I think maybe other people agreed that he was disappointing in the summer just gone because he was too good to only have 100 in those six tests. He got 100 against the West Indies, didn't do much else in the summer, maybe got the odd 50. And he was too good to that because he really should have been dominating those sides. Because I think the difference between him and Pope, and him and Dockett and Crawley is big. I think he's someone who should be maybe not quite as good as Root, but aiming towards that level, or Kevin Peterson. He should be the next standout player, really. And there shouldn't be anyone that really pushes him in the side. He's got everything, he just needs to kind of do what he did then. Because I think at the end of the summer, I was a bit worried because Sri Lanka were bowling this stump line to him, and he's bowling to the umpires as if it was illegal. I couldn't believe it. And then Sri Lanka worked out how to get him out, and you thought, oh no, has he been worked out? And I think the West Indies used a short ball against him with some effect as well. And I thought, oh, there's a couple of areas here where he's a bit weaker than I thought. But luckily, that was just a kind of aberration, I think, and he should be back. Back to normal now. Yeah, I forgot to ask you that question exactly. Has he been worked out? Because Pakistan, I don't think that Pakistani pitchers are the best to judge a player's technique, because even I scored a century there, and you as well. So I think that that's a bit of a concern. And next year when India come over, or do they have tests against New Zealand? Yeah, New Zealand, I think. Yeah, so he may be tested out there. And yeah, Root was just phenomenal as he always is. And I think we could move on from here to the next topic really well, which is which is about the Fab Four. And first of all, I'd like to start with going in the past. Like if you had to name from, not from this current player pool, but before that, four batters who were the Fab Four, I'll name mine after you. In the whole history of the game? Yeah. And they don't have to be playing at the same time? No, just Fab Four. Bradman, even though I never saw him. And then I'd say, without doubt, Sachin and Lara. They would be for me, the best team I've ever seen. And they might be between the rest. And then there'd be another one. And that could be, that could be a number of people, could be Viv Richards, could be Punting, could be Callis, could even be Root or Kohli. But I think the three at the top, without any doubt for me is Bradman, Tenduka and Lara. And the fourth one is kind of arguable. This was for the past, like not Kohli and Root. Maybe I'll go for Richards then as the fourth one. Yeah. So if I had to choose four, it would be Sachin Tendulkar, Don Bradman, A. B. De Villiers and Lara. Yeah. Tendulkar, Bradman, De Villiers and Lara. And for the bowlers, who would you have? Fast. Four of them. Yeah. And it can be Spinner and Seamer. Yeah, just anyone. Definitely Warner-Murray, they'd be two. Yeah. And they would by far the two best spinners. And then the two fast bowlers. That's a good one. I might say, I might say Ambrose and McGrath myself. Okay. And what about you? I'd go for Warne, Bailstein. Warne, Bailstein and Sidney Barnes. Yeah, his record's amazing. Yeah. You just have to put him in there. Like it's alien-like. It's alien-like. And at number four, I'd have, that's a tough one. I'd have Moorley. Yeah, I think Moorley will be a good shout. So Warne, Bailstein, Sidney Barnes and Moorley. That's a pretty good one. Yeah. But Barnes' record's amazing because I hadn't really seen him. I went to Ambrose and McGrath, but you're probably right with Sidney Barnes. Yeah. I just, I just don't think that I have not seen, first of all, I've not seen Ambrose and Walsh bowl and neither have seen McGrath. So I don't think I can comment on that. Neither can I comment on Sid Barnes, but you can't either. So I think it's a safe choice there. I think fielding is one that's never discussed. And what would be your fielding path for the past? Well, growing up, it was like John T. Rose would have been one of them. John T. Rose in South Africa. Paul Collingwood was really good. I can only think of a couple of my heads, but he was an excellent fielder. Well, I mean, if you're talking about the slip catching, Warne was very good, but not as an outfielder or a ground fielder. Yeah. Mark Ball was an excellent slip catcher as well. Travis was a good slip catcher. But thinking about fielding, the guy who used to play for Warwickshire called Trevor Penny, he was amazing. I don't know him. Yeah, but he might have played the odd game for England, but he was an exceptional fielder. That was like his main strength. Nick Knight, I don't know if you will see him as a commentator now, but he was a very good fielder. I don't need to be in the top four in the world. I'm just trying to think. Michael Clarke was a good fielder. I don't know if he's in the top four ever. Let's see who else. Dave is a very good fielder. Yeah. I don't know if he's in the top four ever, but he was excellent. This was not ever. I think this was past. Okay. Yeah. I think at the top of my head, I'll just go to Collingwood Roads, Gymnasia. Now, you could say the youngest Stokes, who was not only a very good slip fielder, but it was also a good outfielder. But that's just off the top of my head. I'll probably think of more later. What about you? Yeah. No, actually, I said past, not the players who are playing right now. So, Jadeja and Stokes wouldn't fit into that criteria. Do you have two other ones for them? Carl, who could be the best fielder? I don't know if he's in the top four. Let's see. I'll have to come back to the last two. I'll have Collingwood and Roads and then think about the other two. Yeah. So, mine would be Roads, Ponting, Mark Waugh and Shane Ward and Jack Callis. I'll have Mark Waugh and Jack Callis and just the best slip fielding. Yeah. Because Mark Waugh was just phenomenal. Whatever I've heard of him was that he dropped nothing. He took everything. And now let's go on to present. So, in the present, you have the top four of batting. Everyone knows that. Yeah. The top four of bowling at this present time, for me, would be Bumrah, Cummins, Rabada and is there a fourth one right now? Is it Shaheen Shah? I think that's debatable, isn't it? I think Bumrah is obviously dead. Yeah. Is that recognised as the top four of bowling then? Yeah. I'm just trying to name top fours of all spectrums. Yeah. I rate Hazelwood higher than I rate Rabada myself and even both. I think I'd go Bumrah, Hazelwood and then it's the other two. It would be trickier to find two outstanding ones. There's a lot of good ones but you could even have Cummins as well. Shammy. Shammy is a great shot, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Shammy is a good one. Maybe Shammy then. You could have two from each. Two from India and two from Australia. Yeah. And that just sums up the title of our show, The Big Three. We just talk about that. The lesser nations will curse us for that reason. For the fielding top four, I think it's pretty straightforward right now. I think it's Dedeja, Steve Smith, Maxwell and Glenn Phillips. Phillips is exceptional. Yeah. Phillips is really exceptional. Yeah. Do you think Phillips is the best one? I think Phillips is the best fielder I have seen. Probably A B W is ranked somewhere near him but Phillips definitely. And now on to the future, which is the really interesting one. The future Fab Four batters, which is the main conversation. So what would be your future Fab Four batters? I think Ravindra, Brooks, Jaswell and there's one other. No, Mendes from Sri Lanka, Kemadu Mendes. Isn't he 30 though? Sorry? Isn't he 30 though? Or is he young? He's young. The other Mendes is 30. This is Kemadu, the new one. Oh, all right. Yeah. I was thinking more of three format players. So I'd go Jaswell, Brooks, Cameron Green and Ratan Ravindra. Yeah. Yeah. These will be my four. And if I, I think there should be a Fab Five because I think Shubman Gill will be, because India is trying to make him the poster boy of Indian cricket. And I think that he'll fit into the role after say, Jaswell, he'd be the next one in line. For the bowling. Yeah. For the bowling, who do you have as your next Fab Four? It's a bit trickier, isn't it? I'm trying to think of the good fast bowlers coming through. Yeah. That's much trickier to find four standout ones. It's not. You could, you could just say Gus Atkinson, Gus Atkinson, Gus Atkinson. I think for a minute it would be Gus Atkinson. I don't know if he would be the next standout one though. This is, this is the thing. The Patterson we mentioned, they're going to be standout Patterson and Jaswell and Brooks. I don't know if, that could be a very good one. I don't know if there'll be standout, a standout bowler in the next, next few years. Yeah. Now that's a tricky one. I could go for, I'm hoping someone like Hull or Bashir will be, but I don't know about that. What about maybe, maybe Rourke, Rourke from New Zealand, although I haven't seen much of him. Maybe he could be good. Yeah. Yeah, maybe. You could go Rourke, Atkinson. We're just free bowling here. Go with anyone you like. Yeah. I think it's hard to pick a kind of, I can't see anyone obviously. Well, maybe, maybe Alzari Joseph from the West Indies. Yeah. And, and one more. Cool. Can we still have Shah from Pakistan? Huh, who? Can we still have Naseem Shah from Pakistan? Yeah, you could, you could, you could. Oh, I'll have him then. Yeah. So my path for past bowling would be then Naseem Shah. No, not Naseem Shah. Sorry. It would be Shamah Joseph from India. I could be Mayank Yadav from, from England. I, I don't think there's anyone from England, from Australia. No. Oh yes. I'd have from South Africa. I'd have Nandre Berger and from, and from whom did you say Pakistan? Right. Yeah. So I'd have Naseem Shah. So Nandre Berger, Naseem Shah, Shamah Joseph. And who was the other one I talked of? Mayank Yadav. Yeah. Yeah. When I said Joseph, I meant the younger Joseph. Yeah. I was a little bit confused there. Not the 29-year-old one. He's too old to be imagining stuff. Yeah. So what about now? The big one is after, after Root's double century, kind of people are kind of revisiting a debate about who was better between the fab four that emerged that were, were, what this discussion is really based on. And when they, when it was Williamson, Coley, Root and Steve Smith, and they were the fab four, and they actually became the fab four. So it was all, all the kind of talk about them is true. And they've all gone on to have excellent careers. And they're all still playing. So out of the four, which one would you say has been the best? In tests or all formats? Both. In tests, I would say that overall, it's been, I'd say overall and presently overall, it's been, for me, it's been Steve Smith overall in tests. And, and all formats, it would be Virat Coley. And I think no one's going to doubt all formats in comparison. And right now, I'd say in tests, Joe Root, obviously, and all formats, it is still Virat Coley. And I think that Joe Root's been really, really nice over the past years. But I think there's a lot of fire in Smith, Williamson and Coley, because Williamson has three tests in India. And after that, two against, three against England. So six tests for him. Coley has eight tests, and Smith is around seven tests. So all of them have a pool of matches from where they can be in state where they were. And I, and I honestly see someone like Coley or Williamson, just, just getting there, there and thereabouts with Root after this season. That's a good point. I mean, there's so much to compare when you look at all of them. They all, they all have all played three formats, to a lesser or greater extent. You're definitely right that Coley is the best if you, if you put them all three formats together. Because Root's a good one-day player. And so is Williamson. And so is Smith. But they're not as good at international T20 anyway. I mean, Root was at the leading one score in the 2016 T20 World Cup, I think. And they may be unlucky to be dropped from that, from that side. Smith, I don't think has ever been an amazing T20 player. Williamson's a decent one, but much better at less than 50, I would say. But they've all played all formats. They've all kept in their country. They've all done occasional bowling, to a greater or lesser extent. They're all of very similar age, so that you can do a lot of comparisons about them. You can compare them as fielders, as batsmen, as bowlers, as white ball players, as red ball players. And so you could do a really good, it would be a quite good book, comparing them all. Now, I think, in a Test match, Root is the best of those four, right now. But there was a period of time where Steve Smith was just invincible. Invincible in the way that Lara or Senduka was, in that sense where, I'm never going to get this guy out. As good as Root, Williamson or Coley have been or are, they didn't have that same invincibility that Steve Smith had. There was one, 2019 actually, there was two all, and that could have been 4-0 to England without Smith. Smith was amazing. He'd get like 100 in each game. And in the end, England gave up trying to get him out. It was almost like, almost like he was batting with a tail when he was batting with like number four and five. He just kept bowling wide outside his off stump or whatever. They just didn't think in the end they could get him. That aura of invincibility about Yeah, he had alien-like hand-eye coordination, which honestly just carried him from Bradman Isk, which was his level in Test cricket from 2014 to 2019. There was one innings, which he played in Pune, 2017, first Test. And that innings just stands out to me as, that's probably one of the best innings I've seen in Test cricket from a player because that pitch was ragging, absolute. I think you saw the Ahmedabad pitch in 2021. Yeah. So just double the spin and you'll get the Pune pitch in 2017. That was how hard it was. And Smith got 177 on that without any like flawless innings. And just seeing that, and then obviously he did really well in England. So for me, he stands out in that way. And he just, I think as he's aging and the sandpaper ban didn't help him. I think if he wasn't banned in that period, he'd have got maybe 70 average. He'd have a 70 average right now. Yeah. So yeah, I think he fell off from the 2020 period where everyone except Root fell off and then Root's just gone to a different level in Test after that. I think before the lockdown, Kohli and Smith were competing for Test like who was better, but it was pretty clear that Smith was above him. But after that Kohli just fell off. So yeah, you're pretty correct there that right now it'd be Root and overall it'd be Smith. And what about all formats? Where would you rank all of them? So I think the best 20 over player there is Kohli without any doubt. Yeah. Now the best Test player there was Root, but it's very close. I'd say right now Root. But overall probably Smith, like we said. There's 50 over there, I'd probably say it's Kohli as well. Yeah, Kohli, I think he's the best 50 over player ever. Yeah, that's a good place. He could well be. If you look at, because they were showing the number of Test runs that Root had got and he might probably be up by the end of the AP second on the all-time list, just below Sachin. But they also showed the number of international runs and Kohli had a lot more international runs than when you put together the 20, 20 and 50 over runs he's got. Yeah, he's got around 14,000 runs in ODIs with an average of 60. So I think the main debate here was only of Test cricket. And I think that, yeah, in that facet, Williamson, if I were to rank them, it would be, overall it would be Smith, Root, Kohli and Williamson in Test cricket. In ODIs it would be Virat Kohli, Steve Smith, Joe Root and Kane Williamson. And in T20s it would be Kohli, Root, Williamson and Smith. And as captains, I'm just rating everything like you said, captains and so it would be for me, Virat, then Smith, Williamson and Root. And as fielders, no, I think we should leave fielders alone. These metrics are okay. Yeah, I think with the captaincy it's interesting because they've all captained their country for a kind of a lengthy period. I think, yeah, as captain Kohli and Williamson and Smith achieved more than Root. But Root wasn't a bad captain. I'm trying to think what do you think? Not as bad as Bas Ball makes him out to be. Yes, but people now think, I don't know, cricket started in 2021 when India did a COVID tour of India and then finished with a COVID tour of Australia. And that's where cricket started. And we never won a game before. And Root was terrible. And then it was like reinvented by Bas Ball. But before that, Root had done quite well. He won in South Africa 3-1, which is a good series win. He beat India 4-1, which is pretty good. And that's an excellent, I'd much rather beat India 4-1 in a test series than win all these other series in a really exciting way. Like, I don't know, beat the West Indies going at six runs and over. Beat Pakistan going at six runs and over. For me, a 4-1 win against India, it was a very good India side that had beaten Australia in Australia with the likes of Kohli in it. I thought that was a really impressive result. 4-1 kind of flattered us a bit because they were all close matches, but that was a good achievement, I thought, from Root. He'd also beaten the sides that England had beaten under Bas as well. He beat Pakistan, he beat West Indies like they did. And I suppose he was the first captain, though, not to win a home match as he drew his one, so we didn't get to retain, Australia retained it. But he lost in India 3-1 rather than 4-1 like Stokes did. I think as a captain, he was fine. He beat Sri Lanka 3-0 too. Yeah, exactly. He beat Sri Lanka 3-0, which is pretty good in Sri Lanka. And then he beat them 2-0 as well. His record is pretty decent. He beat South Africa at home and away, he beat West Indies. I suppose he lost an away series to West Indies. I think he lost two to them, but won the home series. Yeah, I think we could do an entire segment on busting the next bat ball, which we could leave that for another episode because I've got a lot to say about this. In terms of Joe Root, yeah, it's true. Yeah, because honestly, whatever I've seen, the amount of people who just discredit Root as if he was the worst captain to ever grace humanity, that's not true. He wasn't that bad just because at the end of the COVID bubble, things got exaggerated a lot because they were playing India and Australia a lot. And obviously, they were, they played the most amount of Test cricket or the most amount of cricket overall. And the thing is, that year, it's a bit unfair because they're comparing it's a bit unfair because they're comparing bad winning against West Indies, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, with Root starting off in India for four tests, and playing two home tests against the New Zealand side, who at that point had become World Test champions, or were about to. And then another four against India, who were the other World Test Championship finalists then, and then five in Australia, under a COVID bubble as well. But even without the COVID bubble, five in Australia is difficult. So it's really unfair to compare, it's not comparing like to like, is it? So he's treated a bit harshly there. So I think he's a much better captain than people make out. But he wasn't as good a captain as Coley or Williams who did a really good job with a less good side than Coley had or a less good side that Smith had. I think those, those two are very good captains. Yeah, another thing which which people forget is that when Key came in, he gave test cricket priority for English cricketers, whereas when Root was captain, white ball cricket was given priority. That's a very good point, Root had to contend with that. In a way, it's like the reverse of Butler now, Butler doesn't have the priority given to one day cricket that Morgan does. So he has to play a lot of kind of second choice plays. He'd rather have, he'd love to call on Wood, for example, say, but he can't because they prioritise him for test cricket now, whereas it could have been the other way around for Morgan. And like you say, during that, the India 21 away series, they'd won the first test. And then Butler went home, do you remember? Yeah, yeah. And it was because they wanted to keep him fresh for, I don't know, maybe, maybe IPL. Yeah, and then it was like, well, that Root didn't have his best side at hand, really, it wasn't his choice. So that was taken out of his hands. Whereas now, I think, Spokes can get it wherever he wants in terms of selection. Yeah, so I think he's still not criticising Spokes for that. But there was a priority given to the white ball side then, that there isn't now. Yeah, so I think the gist of this conversation is that when you throw around the stat 1 in 17, 1 in 17, which I've seen, like, I have to argue that out every single day. It's not as simple as this 1 in 17. There's a lot of, yeah, it just because you throw a stat does not mean that it means a lot of things. Like that, if you're going to this, I'll tell you a stat, Yasser Shah has more sensibilities in Australia than Joe Root. Does that mean that Yasser is a better, does that mean Yasser is a better batter than Root? No, right? Stats don't tell the entire story. And they, and some English fans, they've just been like, they've been to my head. And honestly, please just back down. If you think that bat ball is so great, then just wait around till next year, when India comes and when you tour Australia, that will be their litmus test. And if the bat ball works in those series, then fair play, it has been a success and well done to Baz. You must judge it by that criteria, not the other series. And like, how would you rate these four players, like the Fab Four, as white ball captains? Just as we were in the topic. I think you'd say that to Kurt as well. I think you'd say Cody was the best one still, wouldn't he? Yeah, yeah. I think Root, I'm trying to think of the times when Root captained the white ball team. Did he do it that often? No, I don't think he did much. I think he was, for one, did he do captains on the white ball side? He had Kurt, and then Morgan. He never did it permanently. I'm just wondering if there was a match here and there he did, because of, I don't know, injury or something. But I can't think of one off the top of my head. I don't really remember either. So just Smith and Williamson, you can just rate them. Yeah, I think... Well, Williamson was very, very, very close to winning the World Cup as a white ball captain. Very close. But he didn't win it, whereas Smith and Cody had won one. Although Smith wasn't... When Cody won it, he wasn't captain. And when Smith won it, I don't think he was captain, I think it was Clark, wasn't he? Yeah, I think neither of them have won a World Cup. No, as captains. Yeah. I think Smith is actually quite good tactically. I think Cody was very inspirational. I remember being at Lord's, this is a test match for the second test, about 2021, and it looked for the world like it would be a draw. England were favourites at the beginning. And there was a 9th and 10th wicket partnership by India. But it was launched, it had taken them to 9th and 8th time. And you think, well, England should be able to bat this out. But he gave this kind of really ferocious team talk on the pitch. And it did seem to really inspire the Indian team. Sibley and Burns, they looked a bit scared. They got out, he lost the first two wickets in the first couple of overs. And you could see, motivationally, Cody has done a really good job. What do you think of him tactically? Cody tactically, I think Rohit Sharma, for that reason, he was replaced by Rohit in white ball cricket. He was not that astute as maybe say a Williamson or a Smith. But yeah, inspirationally, he was at the top. And that's why he was successful. Yeah, you're so correct. I think he does not rank that high tactically. Or even I think as a man manager, also people, there was some sort of rumours about him not being very approachable in that sense that he was a star in the team. So people didn't feel like they could go and talk up to him about their personal issues or something about their game. Yeah, so he was, I've heard a rumour and I don't know if this is completely true or not that he was very abusive after losses. So he used to just lash out on the dressing room. But I don't know if that's true or not. And in that period, Rohit was more of a big brother kind of person who they went around and he wrapped them in their arms and all of that. So in that way, maybe he was not that great. But I think pointing was that like that also you don't, you don't always need a golden retriever as your captain. You sometimes can have sometimes can have a bit of ruthlessness and a bit of aggression and that worked for him, definitely. Yeah, I think most importantly, when ranking the top, the top four, who was a better bowler? Yeah, the meeting's about to end, I'll make another one. I'd rank it as Root obviously. Root is clearly the best bowler in there. And after that it'd be Smith, Williamson and Coley. Yeah, I think so. It's impressive. Root's bowling is a bit more subtle than you would think for someone who's a part-time spinner. Yeah, different variations. He's got a wicket with a bounce the other day, didn't he? Yeah. Which broke her ducked thumb. I mean, he's got these variations. He's got 70 test wickets, which is quite good. Yeah, he could be an all-rounder. He could have been an all-rounder, according to me. Yeah, I mean, if you re-look at some of the spinners that England play and they're not that great, you would have thought England could have picked four pace bowlers and had Root as the all-rounder, when Stokes wasn't there, that is. Because he could easily bowl you 10 to 12 overs a day without any problem. Like I say, 70 test wickets. You think he's got a 30 or 40, 50 over wicket. I think he's got a cutie 21. Smith's a funny one because he actually started as a leg spinner. I remember him as a spinner for Australia when he first came out. He played in the Nash's match as a leg spinner and didn't really do much. Then all of a sudden he's turned into like a great batsman. So his bowling must be second on the list. I've seen Williamson get wickets before and I've seen Coley in his early years get the odd wicket, but he rarely bowls now, does he really? Yeah. If I had to, like you said, Smith was really unexpected. He used to bat at number 10 or something like that. So him turning from there was something different. And Williamson, I think, got banned for his action or something like that. That means that though, because I remember he was pretty useful with his offspin. He was banned around 2017 for chucking the ball. Ah, because I remember when Bournemouth talked about having him as a Yorkshire player, as a Yorkshire overseas player. And he said that when he was thinking he was advising Yorkshire to sign him, his offspin was part of the deal in a way that he wasn't just seen as a top batsman. He offered him as a genuine string to his bow. So maybe as he's got older, he's had injuries, hasn't he, as well. He's just bowling less. Yeah, yeah. So let's wrap this segment up, this one, by saying who will be the best at the end of their careers, like, overall, not just all formats, who would be the best? No, sorry, Test Cricket, because all formats has already been Kohli. So Test Cricket, who would be after the end of their careers, according to you, in chronological order? End of their careers, I think I'll go, if you can, they're all very good, but it sounds really harsh if you rank them. Yes. End of the career, I'd probably say, just to test, Root, Smith, Kohli, Winnington. What about you? Yeah, so for me, it would be Smith, because overall, it's Smith, and Root, Kohli, Winnington. I think it will remain like this, because there's no way that a Winnington or Kohli can catch up to Root right now. I don't think there's a chance for that. Yeah, and I think I missed out on a player for South Africa, which some South African people may get upset, because Tristan Stubbs, I think he'll be a really great one. Oh, yeah, he's brilliant. Yeah. Yeah, I think he'll be an all format player. And he's really good in ODIs and G20s. And he has a solid technique. People are shying away from terming him the next ABWs, but I think he can be one. He's an excellent player, I agree with you there. Yeah. Yeah, so now about the Women's World Cup, I think it's been going on. But you've lost to the Kiwis. Yeah, we lost to the Kiwis. And after that, we had a huge NRR blow. And then we had a game against, who was it, Bangladesh? No, Pakistan. Yeah, Pakistan was there. And they scored around 106. And you'd imagine India would score, get that then within 15 overs. But this year, it's within 19.4 overs. And that didn't help their net run rate. And yeah, so I think Australia will qualify, obviously, for the finals. And the other two semifinalists and India, I think India has a chance and they'll go in there. We have a game against Australia tomorrow. And I think that will be a huge one at 7.30. And if India wins the game, India are guaranteed, India and Australia go through to the semifinals. And if India doesn't, then other results matter a lot. So it looks like India's group is the harder one, India and Australia's group. I think England did well with their group. England got away with the group a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. I think last time around, South Africa, England, India, Australia were the semifinalists. And there was a surprise win for, I think Australia narrowly beat India, didn't they? And there was a surprise win for South Africa over England. Do you think it's going to be a similar bunch of semifinalists this time around or not? Yeah, I think this time it will be the same. No difference. Because no one's there really. Sri Lanka looked like they could do something, but they just capitulated against India. So my winner for the World Cup would be India. I'll go for India because I want them to win the World Cup. And I'm biased here, but I don't care. In here, all the headlines anyway were like, this is like an Australian women's cricket side. It's like one of the most dominant sides in sports, isn't it? Yeah. This could be the time that they don't actually win a World Cup. They've won it a few times, but they don't. Yeah, they were the behemoths of women's cricket. Like, for example, America in basketball, like that. They were just leaps and bounds over. You could pick their third team and they'd compete with the international level. And Elise Perry is the best women's player, according to me, that's ever played. We can say that, right? Yes, it seems that way. Yeah. So I think that their team was obviously, but I think now the team is the mighty are falling right now for Australia. Even now they are favourites, but not as much as they were, say four years from today. Who's winning the World Cup for you? I'm going to be biased and say England. So India, England. I'm just going on the fact that if people are saying this is the one World Cup that Australia might not win, then you would probably say the winner would be India, England, and I'll be unbiased and say England. Yeah. So that's really nice. I think we've covered a lot of topics today and it was a nice conversation. And if you have any questions, you can send that to both of our Twitter handles or the Big Three page in Twitter, which is the add the Big Three pod. And you can find find a page there. And I think we can end the podcast now. We'll see you next Saturday. Yeah. I just stopped recording.