Which domestic team is the greatest?

[The Speaker]

Sometimes as I'm sifting through my mind's catalogue of cricket facts, it occurs to me that some domestic cricket teams have an astonishingly good history. Cricket is not an egalitarian sport in a collective sense (though I would argue it is in an individual sense, in that it's open for all kinds of body types and personalities in a way many other sports aren't). Once a domestic team has developed a system for consistent greatness, it rarely loses it.

So, as a result of this thinking, I eventually began asking this question: which domestic team is the greatest? There were a few names that came to mind straight away. New South Wales probably has the greatest claim to the title, having produced an entire XI of Hall of Famers, plus more on the side. But are they so far ahead of everyone else as to make the competition boring? Yorkshire, for one, has produced a vast array of talent, as has Surrey. Mumbai has dominated Indian cricket for decades. South Africa's big three of (KwaZulu)-Natal, (Gauteng) Transvaal, and Western Province have been at the pointy end of cricketing greatness for many years. Karachi and Lahore have understandably been responsible for much of Pakistan's success. And New South Wales would be nothing without its state rivals in Australia, of course. This is to say nothing of the West Indies' best nations either!

So, I decided one way to test this out would be to do something similar to a couple of other simulations I've done in the past. Using the now-dated simulator Virtual Cricket 4, I'll pick twenty domestic teams from nine different nations, all representing the best that country has to offer, to see which team can truly claim to be the king. To make it fair, they'll be playing four day first class matches, not five day Tests. Eligibility for the teams is based on birth place and place of debut, and they must have played on that team for a significant number of years. The teams are as follows:

Australia
New South Wales
1. AR Morris
2. RB Simpson
3. DG Bradman
4. VT Trumper
5. SR Waugh
6. CG Macartney
7. AK Davidson
8. WAS Oldfield
9. CTB Turner
10. WJ O'Reilly
11. GD McGrath
12. AR Border
Victoria
1. WM Woodfull
2. WH Ponsford
3. J Ryder
4. RN Harvey
5. AL Hassett
6. KR Miller
7. WW Armstrong
8. JM Blackham
9. SK Warne
10. H Trumble
11. PR Reiffel
12. DM Jones
Western Australia
1. JL Langer
2. MEK Hussey
3. SM Katich
4. DR Martyn
5. KJ Hughes
6. TM Moody
7. RW Marsh
8. B Yardley
9. DK Lillee
10. TM Alderman
11. BA Reid
12. RJ Inverarity
England
Middlesex
1. JDB Robertson
2. WJ Edrich
3. MW Gatting
4. DCS Compton
5. JW Hearne
6. EH Hendren
7. GOB Allen
8. FJ Titmus
9. JT Murray
10. JT Hearne
11. AE Moss
12. JE Emburey
Surrey
1. JB Hobbs
2. JH Edrich
3. PBH May
4. KF Barrington
5. TW Hayward
6. MR Ramprakash
7. AJ Stewart
8. JC Laker
9. AV Bedser
10. GA Lohmann
11. T Richardson
12. R Abel
Yorkshire
1. G Boycott
2. H Sutcliffe
3. L Hutton
4. JE Root
5. FS Jackson
6. GH Hirst
7. W Rhodes
8. G Ulyett
9. H Verity
10. FS Trueman
11. JG Binks
12. R Illingworth
India
Karnataka
1. KL Rahul
2. V Subramanya
3. R Dravid
4. GR Vishwanath
5. BP Patel
6. RHM Binny
7. SMH Kirmani
8. A Kumble
9. J Srinath
10. EAS Prasanna
11. BS Chandrasekhar
12. BKV Prasad
Bombay-Mumbai
1. VM Merchant
2. SM Gavaskar
3. DB Vengsarkar
4. SR Tendulkar
5. PR Umrigar
6. MH Mankad
7. FM Engineer
8. KD Ghavri
9. Zaheer Khan
10. PK Shivalkar
11. SP Gupte
12. RB Desai
New Zealand
Auckland
1. MH Richardson
2. MD Crowe
3. BN Sutcliffe
4. WM Wallace
5. JF Reid
6. JG Bracewell
7. IDS Smith
8. AR Adams
9. HJ Howarth
10. DK Morrison
11. J Cowie
12. MJ Guptill
Canterbury
1. SP Fleming
2. WA Hadlee
3. MP Donnelly
4. CZ Harris
5. NJ Astle
6. CD McMillan
7. LK Germon
8. RJ Hadlee
9. SE Bond
10. RC Motz
11. TB Burtt
12. BR Taylor
Pakistan
Karachi
1. Saeed Anwar
2. Hanif Mohammad
3. Mohsin Khan
4. Shoaib Mohammad
5. Javed Miandad
6. Mushtaq Mohammad
7. Asif Iqbal
8. Rashid Latif
9. Iqbal Qasim
10. Mohammad Sami
11. Saleem Jaffar
12. Wasim Raja
Lahore
1. Mudassar Nazar
2. Azhar Ali
3. Majid Khan
4. Mohammad Yousuf
5. Salim Malik
6. Imran Khan
7. Imtiaz Ahmed
8. Wasim Akram
9. Abdul Qadir
10. Saqlain Mushtaq
11. Fazal Mahmood
12. Sarfraz Nawaz
South Africa
Gauteng-Transvaal
1. EJ Barlow
2. SJ Cook
3. B Mitchell
4. GA Faulkner
5. CEB Rice
6. AJ Kourie
7. DT Lindsay
8. JHB Waite
9. RO Schwarz
10. NAT Adcock
11. AE Hall
12. EAB Rowan
KwaZulu-Natal
1. BA Richards
2. DJ McGlew
3. HM Amla
4. AD Nourse
5. HW Taylor
6. TL Goddard
7. BL Irvine
8. MJ Procter
9. SM Pollock
10. VAP van der Bijl
11. HJ Tayfield
12. AEE Vogler
Western Province
1. HH Gibbs
2. G Kirsten
3. JH Kallis
4. AJ Lamb
5. PN Kirsten
6. JP Duminy
7. HB Cameron
8. JM Blanckenberg
9. VD Philander
10. GS Le Roux
11. DL Hobson
12. CR Matthews
Sri Lanka
Sinhalese Sports Club
1. FDM Karunaratne
2. NT Paranavitana
3. MS Atapattu
4. DPMD Jayawardene
5. A Ranatunga
6. RLD Mendis
7. PB Dassanayake
8. KTGD Prasad
9. DNT Zoysa
10. CRD Fernando
11. GP Wickramasinghe
12. SMSM Senanayake
West Indies
Barbados
1. CG Greenidge
2. CC Hunte
3. FMM Worrell
4. ED Weekes
5. CL Walcott
6. GS Sobers
7. DA Murray
8. MD Marshall
9. J Garner
10. WW Hall
11. CC Griffith
12. DL Haynes
Guyana
1. CH Lloyd
2. RC Fredericks
3. RB Kanhai
4. S Chanderpaul
5. CL Hooper
6. A Kallicharran
7. BF Butcher
8. RJ Christiani
9. LR Gibbs
10. CEH Croft
11. RA Harper
12. J Trim
Jamaica
1. CH Gayle
2. AF Rae
3. LG Rowe
4. GA Headley
5. OG Smith
6. JC Adams
7. PJL Dujon
8. MA Holding
9. JE Taylor
10. AL Valentine
11. CA Walsh
12. BP Patterson
Zimbabwe
Mashonaland
1. H Masakadza
2. GW Flower
3. MW Goodwin
4. DL Houghton
5. A Flower
6. BRM Taylor
7. T Taibu
8. RW Price
9. EA Brandes
10. BC Strang
11. KM Jarvis
12. PA Strang​

The tournament will be a home and away season, complete with pitches appropriate to the home team. Who do you think will win?

(Before anyone asks, WA is in there because their team is more even than the Queensland team, and better overall than the SA team - both of which benefited from overseas and interstate players in their time.)

 

[cricketnut14]

couldn't squeeze in kim hughes into the WA side ?

 

[greatwhiteshark]

couldn't squeeze in kim hughes into the WA side ?

Was about to ask the same thing, played with and against Clag for years and in my opinion WA greatest batsman. I know stats tell a different story but one must remember the era Hughes played test cricket in.
Anyway just an opinion.

 

[PhatBoy]

Barbados ftw

 

[Underarm]

How many matches did Tendulkar actually play for Mumbai? Can't have been many?

 

[PhatBoy]

How many matches did Tendulkar actually play for Mumbai? Can't have been many?

He scored 30 first class hundreds outside of tests so he still would have played a few.

He belted 200 for them in a tour match against Australia including warne in 1998 from memory

 

[eltrain]

Between NSW and Barbados for mine, both of those XIs are legendary. Mumbai in Mumbai would be pretty unstoppable though I’d think.

 

[GROTTO]

He scored 30 first class hundreds outside of tests so he still would have played a few.

He belted 200 for them in a tour match against Australia including warne in 1998 from memory

You would never see that in a tour match today. Most home countries now field shit teams.

 

[Demosthenes]

Bit rough on Gilchrist to not make either the NSW or WA XI.

 

[Underarm]

He scored 30 first class hundreds outside of tests so he still would have played a few.

He belted 200 for them in a tour match against Australia including warne in 1998 from memory

Most of those for India in warm up matches I'd expect.

edit: https://www.cricketcountry.com/arti...ailed-analysis-of-his-record-for-mumbai-32841
38 matches, 18 centuries/19 50's. 4,300 runs @ 87.3. More than I thought he would have.

 

[The Speaker]

couldn't squeeze in kim hughes into the WA side ?

Was about to ask the same thing, played with and against Clag for years and in my opinion WA greatest batsman. I know stats tell a different story but one must remember the era Hughes played test cricket in.
Anyway just an opinion.

I was intending to, then I looked at his stats. His FC record is actually lower than his Test record, which isn't that high to begin with. I was a bit shocked.

How many matches did Tendulkar actually play for Mumbai? Can't have been many?

38 in the Ranji Trophy.

 

[greatwhiteshark]

I was intending to, then I looked at his stats. His FC record is actually lower than his Test record, which isn't that high to begin with. I was a bit shocked.



38 in the Ranji Trophy.

Fair enough as its your opinion, if i had to select WA greatest side he would be first picked of the batsman and by some huge margin. Stats are stats and must stand up to a point. But Kim was a sensational player.

 

[Richard Pryor]

Simmed through a NSW v VIC game at the SCG with OP squads using a historical database I've been tinkering with for CC2014:

One at MCG:

 

[t_94]

Yorkshire needs more love

 

[PhatBoy]

Yorkshire needs more love

Especially their opening bowler J ‘Jar Jar’ Binks

Edit: he’s a keeper.

 

[Howard Littlejohn]

For a fairly small place the Barbados side is insane. Them v NSW in the final for mine.
That Lahore bowling lineup would be unplayable in the right conditions too.

 

[PhatBoy]

For a fairly small place the Barbados side is insane. Them v NSW in the final for mine.
That Lahore bowling lineup would be unplayable in the right conditions too.

And the majority of that side - 7 of them - were all in the team at the same time. The other four? All in it at the same time as well I’m pretty sure. Amazing for a place as big as Launceston to have that sheer volume of quality in the team at the same time.

 

[STFU Donnie]

Simmed through a NSW v VIC game at the SCG with OP squads using a historical database I've been tinkering with for CC2014:
View attachment 596903
One at MCG:
View attachment 596907

I wonder. Did Australia pick Ponsford for the third match of the series? And then make him 12th man?

 

[The Speaker]

Simmed through a NSW v VIC game at the SCG with OP squads using a historical database I've been tinkering with for CC2014:
View attachment 596903
One at MCG:
View attachment 596907

I did strongly consider using CC14, but I don't own it and I'm not sure what the editable inputs are for it.

 

[The Speaker]

Fair enough as its your opinion, if i had to select WA greatest side he would be first picked of the batsman and by some huge margin. Stats are stats and must stand up to a point. But Kim was a sensational player.

Who would you drop?

 

[Mockcockpit]

Who would you drop?

Invers without even thinking. He's only in there to be captain.

 

[The Speaker]

Invers without even thinking. He's only in there to be captain.

Having a second spinner will be pretty useful in some places.

 

[greatwhiteshark]

Who would you drop?

Any of your top 6 would be dropped in my team for Kim.

 

[Mockcockpit]

Having a second spinner will be pretty useful in some places.

I'd rather have a Kim Hughes.

 

[The Speaker]

I'd rather have a Kim Hughes.

I'm sure the .62 extra batting average will make a huge difference?

Any of your top 6 would be dropped in my team for Kim.

I figured that, but not really helpful in terms of simming this.