@eddy501, I partialy agree with you, but you must find a happy medium between prolonged success and the peaks and dazzling heights of players careers, you must reward longevity, but also the heights which players reached.

Posted by   on (July 23, 2010, 12:46 GMT)

My all time WI team is : Greenidge Hunte Headley- Capt Richards Lara Sobers Walcott- Wkpr Marshall Holding Roberts Gibbs

Leon Francis - Florida Caribbean Sportsline.

@ Metman.....surely this exercise, which is strcitly one of fantasy and fun (joining players together from different eras..etc) and not one averages? We are debating which top players should make the team. I wouldnt pick VIV in 1990 but i'd pick him in 1976!!!! Surely we are picking the greatest players at the greatest level? Viv Richards at the top of his game is in my opinion the greatest batsmen ever...full stop. Sure, not in 1990 when he finnished or 1974 when he started. This exercise isnt about who was the most consistant players!!!!!!!! Youre picking a fantasy team with players from different times playing at there optimum level....eg Lara 277,153*1999, Marshall 7-22 1988, Viv all of 1976, Holding 14-149 1981 etc...These heights of performance are not matched by Weekes, or Walcott or Worrell or Roberts. It's easy, think of the best players and then their best performances then you'll seperate great from legendary.

@wibbly!Why did you got from high class spin bowlers to strong spin bowlers?Wrong choice of words again my friend.They were all mediocre to good,with the exception of Nanan,who was the best of the lot.The others were only effective at the QPO,especially Willie Rodriguez ,and Jack Noriega,both of whom you did not mentioned .,and were better than the rest at the QPO.All the test matches that the WI played did not take place at the QUEENS PARK OVAL.So judging from your remarks,the reasoning/non reasoning,your likes/dislikes,your putting down of greats , your preferences and the hear say,I can conclude that YOUR team will include GIBBS,with Murray as the keeper.No problem!but dont find faults with other players to make a cause for yours.My preference was Walcott over Dujon,I didnt find fault with Dujon ,I tried to use ALL the information I could obtained from STATS to make a case for Walcott.

@wibbly!You claimed that Dujon flung himself around because he lack the footwork and technique to be a good keeper.So are you not putting down a great WI keeper in preference for another?That only not shows ignorance on your part,but a lack of commonsense , cricketing knowledge and reasoning as well!Hey! Dujon at that time could not walk into any other test team purely as a batsmen,RUBBISH!He could not even walk into the WI team as a batsman.Because other people said that Murray was the best they have seen,means ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!That is HEAR SAY!big man!You said that you would be happy with the selection of either Hendricks or Murray,yet you HIGHLIGHTED Murray!You only added Hendricks to act as a distraction so as not to appear BIAS,and every one knows that Murray is the better batsman.Dujon kept to spinners in the Jamaican team all over the WI.As far as I can remember,the battery of world class TT spinners were only effective at the Queens Park Oval in the 70s.

Posted by   on (July 23, 2010, 2:14 GMT)

There is so much of disagreement of who the nomination are, I wonder is this WI ALL TIME XI. We must put a lot of things into consideration when choosing each player. For batsmen THE OPPOSITION BOWLERS,for bowlers THE OPPOSITION BATSMEN, KEEPERS which bowler were in the line up. I put my trust in our chosen panel to also consider the amount of test matches players played. I am still favoring LARA,SOBERS,CHANDERPAUL,AMBROSE,DUJON,MARSHALL,GIBBS..... I am having a feeling there will be no Chanderpaul, there will be a lot of question arising from that.. The others suppose to be make the XI COMFORTABLE.....................

@abner564.Well! Well! Well! I too am a diehard WI fan,and I too have never heard anyone in their sane or insane mind pick a batsman based on how they walk,how they put fear in everybody,how pretty they look at the wicket,or how pretty they look playing shots.If that was the case,big man,one Carl Hooper would have been the #1 choice!Did you DELIBERATELY leave out Weekes,to make out a case for Richards?It was not Worrell in the 40s,It WAS WEEKES IN THE 40s -50s!It was also Walcott in that era too!.Why did you chose Headley,left out Weekes and Walcott and went for Richards?because of his swagger and fear factor?Weekes and Walcott were not known for their swagger or fear factor,yet they were more reliable than Richards.They both put fear in bowlers with their BATS !The panel didnt ask us to pick the best players from an era.Lara wasnt known for swagger and fear factor.Just like Weekes and Walcott,he put fear in bowlers with his BAT!

i have already publshed my bestWI XI on 20/7/10 with as follows: Fredricks, Greendge, Richards,Lara,Headley, Sobers(c),Dujon(wk),Marshall,Holding,Ambrose & Garner. With so much quality available I now cannot resist but publish my 2nd best WI XI as follows: Hunte, Haynes, Weekes, Kanhai, Lloyd, Worrell(c),walcott(wk),Roberts,Croft, Clarke,Hall. Again no spinner taken because I guess with the fastmen at our disposal (even in 2nd XI) we dont require any. batting wise the 2nd XI suffers only slightly in quality than the 1st XI.but middle order is as good..weekes,Knhai,lloyd,worrell hardly any inferior.& the fastmen in 2nd XI maybe just 0.1% lower in overall quality & records than 1st XI(only just) but probably a couple of notches higher in fear factor as Roberts(who may well hv been in 1st XI) got great bouncers with variety, Croft was v.awkward to face,Hall dangerous & Clarke considered by many batsmen of his time as fiercely fast whom not many wanted to face.Again bish & Walsh misses out

King Viv not not justified because of STATS! (I guess to make way for one of the W's - great as they were) No sane person anywhere in the cricketing world other than B/dos would suggest that! 100 years from now Worrell would be relevant for captaincy but Headley, Sobers, Lara & Viv would always be named among the "master bats" of WI cricket because of their DOMINANCE and significance in the team in which they played and in WORLD cricket during their playing days. Stats & Avgs are not all...that's why Kallis is not considered in the same breath as Sobers, why Greg Chappell is better than Ponting, why Gavaskar is better than Hayden, etc. etc.

metman, you also missed my main point. If no spinners were in the windies all time 11, I would pick Dujon because he was by far the better batsman, in his day Dujon could have walked into any other test team purely as a batsman. I simply feel that if a spinner or two(counting Sobers as the second spinner) is included we need a keeper with better technique. To be fair, Dujon never really kept to spin(apart from Viv's part timers) and I am not sure that he could handle a top class spinner. This is simply the age old debate concerning the batsman/keeper i.e. Dujon versus the keeper/batsman i.e. Murray. In the modern game the batsman/keeper wins especially one of Dujon's quality but there's no need to put down a great west indian cricketer because you have a preference for another. windies forever.