Happy Birthday Jason Gillespie!!!

Yes and no Scott. The average of batsmen after they’ve “got in” can be quite different to their overall average. Even before this innings Gillespie was comparatively good on this measure — better than Clarke for instance, much much better than Warne.

Not that a double hundred isn’t a massive statistical outlier; merely that if any bowler was going to do it it was going to be him.

It was a great knock but i don’t think we can start calling him a genuine alrounder. After all it was the first time he had got past sixty in his First-Class carear! and we can’t forget that they are playing Bangladesh, yes the Bangladesh bowling attack gave the Aussie top order a bit of trouble in the first test, but its not like he got 201 N.O against England! And we have knowen for several years Gillespies abilty to keep the straight ball’s out for hours on end, we have just never seen him do it for 9 hours before!
All in all it was a superb knock by the Dizzy one!

Elliot I was just joking, but if you have bowlers that can contribute with the bat, at least sometimes it will take the pressure off any all-rounders like Symonds or Watson.

Even Ian Bell got a big not out score against Bangladesh…

Gillespie’s magnificent feat illustrates several points:-

1. It is always important for bowlers to pay attention to their batting game, and be AS GOOD AS THEY CAN BE, however limited that might be. Indeed, I have felt for some time that one of the most significant differences between Australia and most other test teams is how well their bowlers bat.

2. Jason Gillespie has always been able to bat up to a point, but his batting has not developed because, going in around number 9, he spends less time doing it than someone higher up.

3. One of the (many) reasons “bowlers who can bat” don’t make many big scores is because at the bottom of the order they simply DONT HAVE TIME. Even if they play really well everyone else is likely to be out before they have made a truly big score. One can only imagine – for example – how many runs Pollock would have made in his career had he regularly batted where his talent indicates – No 6 – rather than 8 or 9.

A clasic situation now arises (one that can arise the oter way around when a batsman – Mark Butcher comes to mind – has a little bowl and gets a lot of people out one day, but is not doing the business in his “own” department. If Gillespie now bowls like a drain, how do you drop him after that. Well, of course, you DO drop him, but it makes it harder. Actually I don’t think thatwill happen. Gillespie’s bowling crisis during the Ashes tests was clearly a crisis of confidence. This remarkable innings can only serve to lift his morale and help him get and keep his bowling back on track (we have already seen that it is much improved from the low point of 2005). I predict a good few more tests for Gillespie, many more wickets and, yes, perhaps a few more runs, but still very much at No 9.

One person in the Autralian X1 who would do well to pay heed to Gillespie’s achievement is Shane Warne. The finest legspinner the game has ever seen is also, quite clearly, a talented batsman (and we have seen numerous glimpses of this over the years) but he just wates his talent and slogs about most of the time. If Warne would apply himself when he bats as Gillespie does – and always has – he would have several test hundreds to his name by now. Which feeds back to the first point I made.

Christopher,

You take a serious piece of cricket analysis (intended) and respond as if it was an attempt at humour, which it was not .

I can’t see Hoggard ever making a big score. Hoggard was a useless batsman who, in an attempt to have SOMETHING To offer in the tail, focussed on developing a durable defence. He has succeeded in so doing largely because that is ALL he has tried to do, batting wise. Harmison, oppositely, has focussed on becoming an effective slogger, good for 6 4 dot 4 4 1offtheedge 6 missed out. (25 off 6 balls) now and then. It’s often an effective way for a non-batsman to give himself “something to offer” by focusing on an extreme, and the presence of a number 9 or 10 who is hard to get out or can wipe a quick 20 can be very useful indeed.

The one I keep coming back to is Warne. The man can obviously bat. He’s got a sound defence, and all the shots. We are told he was ahead of Gilchrist as a teenager. It is quite extraordinary that he makes so few good scores and has never made an hundred. The reason is he doesn’t FOCUS, just slogs merrily away until he misses one. He’s a far better batsman than his analogue in the England side, Giles, but you always get 100% of what Ashley has to offer whenever he goes to the crease.

Gillespie has always been a significantly better batsman that Hoggard, in terms of natural eye and talent. You can tell it from the way they address the bowling. Gillespie looks as if he knows what he is doing and has some idea of how to try to do it. Hoggard is ALL GUTS and little else. I’m not knocking it. ALL GUTS is great when you’ve got nothing else. Bob Willis was the same when he batted. But Gillesp[ie has an eye, and a few coachin-book shots. Far more batting talent than Hoggard.