Dear Editor,
In the history of test cricket beginning in 1877, only 92 batsmen have attained a rating of 800 or greater with the Australian genius Sir Donald George Bradman (961 in 1948) at the top of the list. His test batting average of 99.94 runs per innings is the Mount Everest of test cricket.
A total of 27 batsmen have achieved an individual maximum rating of or in excess of 900, comprising 7 Australians (Bradman, Ponting, Hayden, Walters, Harvey, Hussey and Clarke); 7 West Indians (Walcott, Sobers, Richards, Weekes, Headley, Lara and Chanderpaul); 6 Englanders (Hutton, Hobbs, May, Compton, Barrington and Pietersen); 4 South Africans (Kallis, Pollock, Nourse and Amla); 1 Sri Lankan ( Sangakkara); 1 Pakistani ( Mohamed Yousuf) and 1 Indian ( Sunil Gavaskar).
Shivnarine Chanderpaul, whose highest rating is 901(2008) is ranked at number 26 in this list, just above the Australian Michael Clarke (900, 2012). The remaining 25 aforementioned batsmen all have higher ratings, including the West Indians, Sir Clyde Walcott (938, 1956), Sir Garfield Sobers (938, 1967), Sir Vivian Richards (938, 1981), Sir Everton Weekes (927, 1956), George Headley (915, 1948) and Brian Lara (911, 2004).
Great batsmen with lower maximum ratings than Chanderpaul’s 901 include Sachin Tendulkar (898,2002), Walter Hammond (897, 1933), Steve Waugh (895, 1997), Rahul Dravid (892, 2005), Javed Miandad (885, 1989), Mahela Jayawardene (883, 2009), Greg Chappell (883, 1977), Allan Border (877, 1981), Richie Richardson (876, 1989), Rohan Kanhai (875, 1963) and Colin Cowdrey (874, 1958). Adam Gilchrist (874, 2002) and Alastair Cook (874, 2012). They complete the top 50 ratings.
Other West Indians in the top 100 ratings include Alvin Kallicharran, (866, 1975), Gordon Greenidge (844, 1984), Sir Frank Worrell (828, 1954), Sir Conrad Hunte ( 823, 1966), Clive Lloyd (818, 1983), Jimmy Adams (813, 1995), and Jeffrey Stollmeyer (808, 1953).
It must be noted , however, that if the batting statistics of the World Series Cricket Supertests of 1978 and 1979 were included, then both Sir Vivian Richards and Greg Chappell would have , in all likelihood, achieved higher ratings. Chappell, who outscored Richards during the
Packer supertests, may have achieved a rating, at a minimum, somewhere between Ponting (942, 2006) and Hayden (935, 2002), given his outstanding performances against “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse”-the incomparable quartet of West Indian fast bowlers (Holding, Roberts, Croft and Garner), the greatest and most frightening assembly of deadly speed merchants in the history of mankind. Greg Chappell scored 625 runs in 5 supertests against the West Indies in the West Indies in 1979 with 3 centuries in a drawn series.a
An analysis of these ratings can lead only to one logical conclusion and one that is equivalent to a commandment: Thou Shalt Not Say That Shivnarine Chanderpaul Is Not A Great Batsman. Shivnarine Chanderpaul, (whose current rating is 880), over the past 20 years , has demonstrated over and over again that he is a great batsman.
Yours faithfully,
Radhay P.Misra
Executive member, IAC
